I have always been a big fan of our good friend Pol Medina, Jr. and his “baby” Polgas, the anthrophomorphic dog of the Sungcal family of the very popular comic strip Pugad Baboy.
Aside from finding out if my articles submitted to Youngblood were already published, reading the weekly Pugad Baboy was one of my main reasons for having the Philippine Daily Inquirer newspaper every Sunday back in the 90’s. I would cut out the comic strips from Inquirer and paste them on an old and unused photo album as one of my favorite weekend hobbies.
Then Pol Medina, Jr. launched his “very best of Pugad Baboy” and the very first compilation book of his comic strips published on Inquirer. I had to save money just so I could buy Pol’s book by then.
Good thing one of my cousins is a big fan of Pugad Baboy as well and I didn’t have to buy the succeeding editions of Pugad Baboy collections. Nanghihiram na lang ako. 😛
Ang Pakikipagsapalaran ni Pepot Kuripot at Dora Gastadora
And so my being kuripot (frugal) and big fan of Pugad Baboy gave birth to the bright idea of writing my own comic book in the same tradition but will mostly focus on frugality (and occassional stinginess) and impulsiveness of the two lead characters.
In collaboration with my advocacy partner and visual artist Des Feliciano, who is also the Director for Artist Missions of Angat Pilipinas Coalition for Financial Literacy, the characters Pepot Kuripot and Dora Gastadora were created.
Pepot Kuripot is not your ordinary matipid Makati employee. He seldoms buy food for breakfast and lunch around the business district. He always brings his baon and never takes the taxi cab to and from work. He just loves the jeepney and MRT rides (kahit pumila sya ng matagal at makipagsiksikan sa gitna ng pawisang batalyon ng mga Pilipinong manggagawa.). 😀
Dora Gastadora is the social climbing officemate of Pepot. She has 4 credit cards from 4 different banks. She loves grabbing a cup of Starbucks coffee every morning and never skips at that. She loves to party on weekends. Shopping is the name of her game.
Interestingly, despite the differences in the lifestyles and the everyday cheesy arguments of these two Makati yuppies, Pepot and Dora are BFF’s (bestfriends forever, you dork.). Will they be forever friends only? Will one of them influence the spending habits of the other? We shall find out when we launch the comic book soon! 🙂
There will be humor, serious money conversations, shopping tips, social-climbing satire, subversiveness(?), commercialism, political overtones, environmentalism, hypocrisy, generosity, faithfulness, finance trivia, stock market, scam issues, educating the common Pinoy about personal finance, and a whole lot more. The possibilities are endless! Parang Pugad Baboy nga eh.
Got ideas for Pepot and Dora to fight over or agree upon? Send them in the comments section below and subscribe to BurnGutierrez.Com for FREE updates on the country’s first ever personal finance-influenced comic book.
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