FIL-ITALIAN BEAUTY WINS MISS EARTH PHILIPPINES 2018

20 year old Fil-Italian beauty Sylvia Celeste Cortesi was crowned Miss Earth Philippines Sunday night at the Mall of Asia Arena.  She bested out 41 other hopefuls and succeeded Karen Ibasco who also won the Miss Earth 2017 title last year.

Responding to the final question "The deterioration of Boracay left our President with no choice to close the island for six months for rehabilitation, what should be done to make sure that what happens to Boracay will not happen to other tourist destinations?  Cortesi said she agree with the decision of President Duterte and argued that there's a need to uplift the drainage system and better cooperation among owners of business establishments in line with environmental requirements.

Crowd favorite Halimatu Yushawu representing Zamboanga Sibugay, was crowned Miss Eco-Tourism.  Halimatu, who's half-Ghanian half-Filipina, exceeded the 30 second limit to the final Q&A and received 3 or 4 bell warnings to end her answer. She gave a good answer but somewhat struggled in the middle of her deliberation.

Another favorite, Zahra Bianca Saldua representing Las Piñas, was crowned Miss Earth Philippines-Air. Saldua is a practicing Muslim and was the only one wearing a different swimsuit covered with a golden  shawl wrapped around her lower waist and a long white silk robe.  She gave a spontaneous answer to the final Q&A and many thought she was going to win the title but nevertheless the eventual winner Sylvia Cortesi is equally beautiful and both deserves their respective crown.

Here's the list of Final Winners:

Miss Earth Philippins  2018 - Sylvia Celeste Cortesi (Fil-Rome)

Miss Earth Philippines Air: Zahra Bianca Saldua of Las Piñas City

Miss Earth Philippines Water: Berjayneth Chee of Balingasag, Misamis Oriental

Miss Earth Philippines Fire: Jean Nicole de Jesus of San Rafael, Bulacan

Miss Earth Philippines Eco-Tourism: Halimatu Yushawu of Titay, Zamboanga Sibugay

The show was hosted by Robbi Domingo and will be aired next Sunday the 27th, before ASAP.  It should have been aired today (Sunday) but the time slot has already been reserved in favor of the live telecast of ongoing NBA games in the U.S.  So NBA games is more important than beauty contest LOL.  

GOSSIPS, SASH AND CROWN

There have been a lot of allegations flying around saying that the results of the just concluded Miss Earth pageant were biased and partial to other delegates in favor of the hometown girl.   Karen Ibasco bagged the 4th crown for the Philippines and though she made her countrymen proud, not everybody was happy including local fans.  Her pictures have been the subject of  ridicule by angry fans around the world specifically from Puerto Rico, Mexico, Thailand, Indonesia and sadly including the Philippines. Unconfirmed reports had it that even the national director of Miss Earth Venezuela called Karen "ugly"on national television.  Poor Karen, it’s not her fault if the judges chose her.  To watch the pageant, please click this link

The Philippines has won 3 Miss Earth crowns over the past 4 years including a back to back win in 2014 and 2015, not to mention the numerous top 4 placements almost year after year.  However some are quick to defend saying that this is not a surprise at all since the Philippines has been consistently winning in major international pageants specially during the last 8 years and has now joined the ranks of the elite group of pageant powerhouse countries like Venezuela, USA, Puerto Rico, Colombia and India.

I want to be fair and honest as much as I can, the truth was that during the pageant, I was thinking if Karen clinch into the top 4 she would surely nail the Q&A and she could easily win the crown and this is exactly what happened.  I felt that if  Philippines win this year, it may not do any good to Miss Earth and the organizers would be flooded with complaints; this early there are reports that several countries intend to boycott the pageant next year. 

Yes, Karen is bright no doubt, she's articulate, graduated cum laude, teaches physics at a reputable school and all that stuffs, but Miss Earth is still a beauty pageant. While other major international pageants like Miss Universe and Miss World chooses their winners based on beauty, poise and personality, Miss Earth chose to be different.  They are looking for a girl who could best fit the role of an ambassadress to promote environmental awareness.  Yes Karen possesses the qualities and the passion however it does not make enough sense if the Philippines win most of the time in her home country as the other girls have also prepared hard for the pageant so why not give others a chance? What's the use of holding pageants and invite the world to join if the host's representative gets special treatment? Remember the winner of Miss Earth Air this year is also half-Filipina.  And how many half-Filipinas placed in the past? I feel that Miss Earth should limit the number of  Filipino judges to two only to eliminate favoritism. Karen was also voted “Darling of the Press” at the press presentation held a few days prior the coronation night. When she was announced the winner I overheard a certain TV entertainment commentator say “ano ba yan?” (which literally means “What is that” or  it could also mean “what the hell” if meant negatively).  The local press tend to favor the local girl and this is where lies the problem.

On a positive note, this year's edition has leveled up in terms of production values, stage and format.  The opening number was upbeat and unique so let's give credit to Carousel Productions, they hit it right this time.  I wished they give more air time for the swimsuit segment as it was rather too short.  The choice of guest performers and emcee were great.   

Miss Earth is a valuable pageant and I’ve seen several videos showing  environmental advocacies of individual candidates and I must say I am really impressed. There were numerous pre-pageant activities promoting environmental causes.  It would be a good idea if they trim down the number of competitions a bit. The girls are divided into 3 groups and consider this - each group will go through various competitions such as swimsuit, evening gown, resorts wear, national costume and talent competition and each competition are held separately in different venues.  In addition there are 3 other main competitions - the body and form category, intelligence and beauty of face competition (whatever they call it where girls did not wear make-up at all).  The pre-pageant activities were enormous and the candidates visited various in the country places like Ilocos, Zamboanga and Batangas to name a few. 

To sum it up, the judges have spoken and their decision is final. Let's give Karen a chance and prove her worth and I am sure she can do it.  I hope the organizers review the whole process and come up with ways in order to avoid further negative discernment from national directors of participating countries and of course the fans. 

MISS EARTH 2017

The 17^th edition of Miss Earth concluded last night in glittering rites at the Mall of Asia Arena with representative of the host country The Philippines winning the title for the 4^th time.  26 year old Physicist Karen Ibasco bested out 87 delegates.  Her victory is met by angry protests from pageant fans online stating that the contest is allegedly rigged favoring the homegrown delegate, however many agree also that Miss Philippines delivered her answer well enough and got the judges’ nods (more than half of the judges were foreigners).  But if you read comments in forums and facebook pages, all we read are harsh comments against the results of the pageant.

Miss Earth 2016 Katherin Espin of Ecuador crowns her successor Karen Ibasco of the Philippines

The 3 Elemental Queens are : Miss Air 2017 - Australia (Nina Robertson), Miss Water 2017 - Colombia (Juliana Franco) and Miss Fire 2017 - Russia (Lada Akimova)

Other Finalists :

Top 8 : Czech Republic (Iva Uchytilová),Thailand (Paweensuda Drouin), Netherlands (Faith Landman),Venezuela (Ninoska Vasquez)

Top 16: Angola (Ermelinda De Matos), Bosnia & Herzegovina (Lela Karagić), Cameroon (Angele Kossinda), Guatemala (Maria José Castañeda), Switzerland (Saraha Laura Peyrel), Tonga (Diamond Langi), USA (Andreia Gibau) andVietnam (Le Thi Ha Thu).

Crowd Favorites

During the parade of nations, Misses Philippines, Thailand, Colombia, Indonesia, USA, Venezuela and Netherlands received the loudest cheers from the crowd.   The delegates dazzled the audience as they introduced themselves in the parade of nations in their spectacular earth warrior costumes.  I love the opening number, it was unique and very modern; Carousel Productions hit it right this year.

James Deakin of CNN Philippines hosted the pageant. I hope they will hire him again next year as he did a great job (except that he tends to exaggerate a bit when he announces the name of countries), but all in all he did a good job. International R&B Shontelle (from Barbados) and Indonesian Violinist Iskander Widjaja were guest performers.

Semi-finalists shows their best form wearing Ricky Abad swimwear.