The announcement came quietly, as it often does now.
A list released, names scrolling past on screens, congratulations stacking up in comment threads. Families exhaling. Years of waiting resolved in a single word: passed.
What caught my attention was not the rankings, but the geography embedded in some of those names. Mindanao. Either by birth, or by the decision to study law there. Either by origin, or by choice.
To study law in Mindanao is to learn early that the law is never abstract. It arrives carrying history, land, faith, grievance and hope, often all at once. The courtroom does not float above society. It sits squarely within it.
For many of us who grew up with the South in our bones, the law was never just a profession. It was an expectation.
I was expected to become a lawyer. Not loudly, not cruelly, but clearly. I was born into a family of lawyers, where the law was understood less as prestige and more as duty. It was assumed, almost inherited, like a second surname.
It did not happen. At least not in the way imagined.
And yet, I have never been far from its shadow.
For my father, becoming a lawyer in his young adulthood opened doors that widened the road ahead. He often described himself as a small-town boy who found a way to serve beyond the limits of place.
That grounding later shaped civic work rooted in participation and representation, including the formation of the United Muslim Democrats of the Philippines — a belief that Filipino Muslims could engage democracy not from the margins, but from within its institutions.
That history matters now, as a new generation crosses the Bar.
Among those who passed this year are Atty. Alyssa Fatima Guinto Sali and her father, Atty. Alnasul Kahil Sali, who took and passed the Bar examinations at the same time.
In an interview with Radyo Pilipinas Tawi-Tawi, Atty. Alyssa spoke plainly about how that moment came to be. A fresh graduate of the Ateneo de Zamboanga University School of Law, she chose to take the Bar immediately, while her studies were still fresh. Her preparation was practical: Study well from the first year because everything returns during review, keep old notes and stay close to the Bar syllabus.
She also spoke about knowing one’s learning style. Her father learns best through listening — video lectures and discussions. She prefers reading and revisiting written notes. Law school, she said, trains endurance in reading, because in the Bar examination, comprehension matters as much as recall.
Faith had a steady presence throughout. Atty. Alyssa shared how constant prayer and trust in Allah (SWT) sustained them. She welcomed the Supreme Court’s provision of prayer rooms at testing sites, a small accommodation that meant a great deal to Muslim examinees.
For Atty. Alnasul, the journey unfolded differently. He completed law school in 2018 but chose to prioritize family and work upon returning to Tawi-Tawi, delaying the Bar.
Years later, circumstances aligned. Father and daughter prepared together, prayed together and took the licensure exam side by side.
They both passed. Two generations. Two seasons of life. One threshold.
Atty. Alyssa also offered a simple hope: That legal education is becoming more reachable, and that more young people from Tawi-Tawi will step forward to serve.
I did not become a lawyer. That truth has long settled. But I recognize the weight of what it means when others do — especially when they carry with them places and people that history has too often sidelined.
The Bar has been crossed. The work, as always, begins after.