Remember when we congratulated Nica del Rosario and Justine Peña when they got married back in August? Last weekend, del Rosario finally got to sing her latest track on marriage equality titled “Balang Araw” during her 12th year celebration concert of the same name.
On the “Balang Araw” stage on Dec. 3, del Rosario got to sing with the likes of Ogie Alcasid, Johnoy Danao, her wife Peña, and the couple’s furbaby Willow. Among her hits that she performed were Sarah Geronimo’s “Tala” and former Vice President’s Leni Robredo presidential campaign anthem “Rosas.”
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But let’s get back to the track making the LGBTQIA+ community hopeful and emotional. Released on Nov. 18, “Balang Araw” contains del Rosario’s feelings about getting legally married in another country and not having their union recognized at home.
The singer-songwriter shared one incident that pushed her to write the song. “The night before our flight back home to Manila after getting married in Sydney, we had to fill out an online tracing form called One Health Pass. As I was going through mine, I stopped at one question: marital status,” said del Rosario. “It stared right back at me, almost mockingly, like it knew that despite our magical, joyful wedding just a couple of days before, I had to begrudgingly mark myself as ‘single.’”
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“‘Balang Araw’ is for every person in our community who continues to hope and fight for what we stand for: to be treated as human beings, to be given the same rights as everyone else. Makukuha rin natin ang ating ‘balang araw,’ pero sa ngayon, mahalin muna natin ang isa’t isa,” del Rosario added.
We’re lucky to have artists like del Rosario and Peña openly comforting and fighting with others who are also pushing for marriage equality. We all deserve it.
Photo from Nica del Rosario’s Instagram
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