Meet Darna’s dance partner

Liza Soberano (left) with
Ryan Christopher Pajanustan

It could either be a teener’s worst nightmare or dream come true.

What if your graduation ball photographs went viral? Who would want those awkward snapshots immortalized in cyberspace ad infinitum?

Recently, actress Liza Soberano’s grad ball pictures resurfaced in the interweb and, as expected, they assumed a life of their own—inspiring a slew of random quips from netizens who had time to spare.

Snooping around in the comments section yielded the name of the boy in the photos: Ryan Christopher Pajanustan.

A Facebook user even posted a more recent photo of Ryan in the same thread.

A little more digging led to Ryan’s own FB page, which eventually led to this online interview.

“First of all, Liza was not my date then,” Ryan told the Inquirer. “She was just my dance partner in the cotillion.”

He could no longer recall the details of that day—except that the party was held on campus when they were still in grade school.

“I remember that she only had a small circle of friends, but she was quite known all over the campus,” he recounted.

Ryan surmised that one of his classmates had grabbed those grad ball pics from his FB album. “It was a prank. It was all a joke.”

Some netizens were quick on the draw, labeling the pics as fake and insisting that they had been photoshopped.

“That’s their opinion,” Ryan remarked. “Only I and a few people knew about it. I don’t really bother with [bashers’ comments].”

In any case, he hasn’t heard from Liza since high school.

“I transferred school after graduating from sixth grade,” he related.

He also doesn’t keep abreast of the latest goings-on in Liza’s show biz career. “I didn’t get to see the movies or TV shows she was in,” he explained. “I seldom watch television.”

Show biz is clearly not one of his interests. Apart from computers, he’s into drawing and sketching. “I want to pursue art … aside from being computer literate.”

As for his supposed latest photo that was posted online?

No, it wasn’t recent, it turned out. Ryan pointed out that the pic was taken when he was a freshman in high school. He’s now a senior in college, taking up information technology.

He clearly has his sights elsewhere. So, Enrique Gil need not fret. Ryan isn’t aiming to be Liza’s screen partner, nor is he inclined to be this Darna’s Ding.