Fyang Smith’s parents back JM Ibarra’s courtship

If there’s anything to be admired about Fyang Smith and JM Ibarra, it is their honesty — unfiltered, raw, and delivered without the usual varnish. It is the kind that does not try too hard, and perhaps that is precisely why it lands.

Their recent banter with Karen Davila on her YouTube channel offered viewers a ringside seat to the dynamics of a love team still in its formative, slightly chaotic stage — one that began inside the Pinoy Big Brother house.

Ibarra, for his part, did not soften the edges. He admitted, quite plainly, that Smith was “loud,” her loquaciousness bordering on what he described as “noise.” Dealing with her unparalleled “kadaldalan,” he implied, required a certain patience.

And yet, in the quiet moments, he found himself missing it. That noise — persistent, unmistakable —became the very thing he gravitated toward. It was there, somewhere between irritation and affection, that his feelings began to take shape.

One telling moment came after a gig, when Smith’s mother invited a visibly hungry Ibarra to a late dinner. What followed was less small talk, more interrogation.

“Noong wala pa ang food, nagtanong ang Mama ko, ‘JM, nililigawan mo ba ang anak ko?’” Smith shared.

Ibarra initially deflected, saying it wasn’t like that. But the question lingered, pressing.

“Ano ba, nililigawan mo ba ang anak ko,” Ibarra recalled.

It did not take long before hesitation gave way to intent. Smith revealed that Ibarra eventually asked her mother for permission to court her — a gesture that, in its old-school simplicity, carried weight.

“Siya ang unang lalaking nagpaalam sa nanay ko and siya rin ang unang lalaking gusto ng tatay ko. Kapag umuwi si daddy, sabi niya, ‘Where’s JM?’, ‘Where’s JM?’”

Approval, it seems, came early—and from both sides. Smith would later recall a moment that sealed Ibarra’s standing, at least in her eyes.

“Dapat lilipad siya pa-Ilocos for two weeks pero minove niya ‘yung taping niya para makapunta sa mismong graduation ko. Doon ko siya pinakilala sa tatay ko na manliligaw,” she said. It is the kind of gesture that does not announce itself loudly but settles in quietly, doing its work over time.

At the mediacon for their launching film “Almost Us,” Smith clarified the status — if only to temper expectations. Ibarra, she said, is still courting her. There is no rush, no tidy resolution.

Smith, after all, is someone who once lined up for Pinoy Big Brother auditions with friends, waiting it out for two days in a mall while her mother stayed just outside — proof that patience, in her world, is not unfamiliar.

And so Ibarra waits, too — perhaps a little longer than expected, though not without advantage. He has, after all, already won over the parents. The rest, as they say, is timing.