Reactions and Loucid Intentions

For weeks, fellow Cebuanos continue to share more unpleasant experiences in the industry as well as positive and negative reactions toward my most recent three-part article, "Let This Be Known," via e-mail.

As I was scanning through all of the letters, this one especially caught my attention. And it's not just because it involved three very beautiful and popular Cebuano women, but mostly because it questioned the credibility of the most prestigious beauty pageant organization in the country today.

Lou,

I read with interest your TalentScope column entitled "Let This Be Known" which was about discrimination and deceit, and I couldn't help but agree on the unfortunate experiences of our fellow Visayans or Cebuanos who were robbed of the opportunities for fame and glory by their Manila counterparts in the contests that they were in.

One such experience that comes to mind was when the then Ms. Cebu City 1998 and Ms. Cebu Toursim 1st runner up Mary Jane Pahang joined the Binibining Pilipinas 2000 pageant. She was one of the 30 hopefuls selected by a panel of judges out of more than a hundred applicants that year. She emerged as a press favorite and we saw her face splashed in the papers as the most likely to win beside the photo of the eventual winner whose name I no longer remember because she appeared to have vanished after winning the title.

Ms. Pahang even recounted that during the pageant finals, the eventual winner was visited by no less than the chair person of the pageant and given advices on what to do onstage like forgoing hair pins holding her hair because the eventual winner looked better with her hair down. To make matters worse, after the pageant, this same person even approached Ms. Pahang and told her that if she came back the following year, she would be assured of a title!

Another incident involved the Ms. Cebu Tourism 1999 winner Ms. Menchu Antigua when she joined in 2002. Ms. Antigua related that since the candidates were not allowed to bring their own make-up artists, they had to rely on the services of the official make-up artist assigned to them. To her horror, the official make-up artist didn't do justice to her face. Ms. Antigua is naturally gifted with a gorgeous bone structure being a Spanish mestiza and is actually very articulate. But she was never noticed in that pageant. Both Ms. Pahang and Ms. Antigua are very articulate women which was quite apparent during the pageant interviews and activities so the organizers who already had their favorites had to make sure they wouldn't reach a point in the pageant for them to display such skill, otherwise it would become obvious that they were rigging the contest.

It also happened to another Cebuana who was crowned Ms. Cebu Tourism years ago, Yedda Marie Kittelsveldt. Yeddah Marie was the prettiest and most articulate of the top three winners and she would have made an ideal candidate for the Ms. Universe pageant instead of the winner that year. She was given the Bb. International title, which does not necessarily showcase her intelligence and verbal proficiency in that pageant.

And everyone wonders till today why we no longer have Filipino Women winning international or world titles when in fact the problem lies in the corruption and dirty tactics of the organizers of that national competition. What kind of message are we sending across to our hopefuls from the province and what kind of values are we handing down to the next generation? I'm sure that when they read this, they will deny it to high heavens but look at their results after Gloria Diaz and Margie Moran? The results speak for themselves.

What good would blowing our horns be for those in the runner-up positions? Nobody remembers the second best. Our representatives are quite simply not the best for us or for the world. When India decided to make changes in the way they chose their representatives, they suddenly emerged as a strong contender every year for the crown aside from the usual favorites from USA and Venezuela.

Filipino Women can very well stand tall beside such beauties. We just have to choose the most suitable and most deserving. Most often than not, the most deserving are always bypassed by the personal whims and caprices of the power movers of the pageant to the detriment of the Filipino psyche.

Hope this can be an eye-opener for the organizers of the pageant. Thank you Lou and more power!

Disappointed Cebuano

Personally, I have also come to hear of such talks from some my friends in the fashion industry years back, however, I would still like to give the pageant organizers the benefit of the doubt and urge them to contact me for their reaction or statements pertaining to the allegations stated above. I would also like to get the views and sentiments of the three women mentioned in this letter for first-hand information about their experiences.

This may, however, seem to many that we are sour-graping over our losses in these pageants, one can not blame my letter sender for his thoughts and views, for hearing such disturbing information will certainly cause anyone to question the credibility of the organizers.

I would like to address the concerns brought up by some of my readers regarding the expose I had been writing about over the past few weeks. Some of them were concerned that I may be discouraging the Manila producers from investing in the city for much-needed projects and events for our Cebuano artists. This holds true for producers whose intentions are as impure and offensive as those mentioned in the letters I received from fellow Cebuano artists. Those producers - we would rather not have in our city. It is important that they know we are aware of such possibilities and for many of us in the industry, to be more cautious in our dealings with them.

I would also like to clarify that I am not generalizing nor am I putting down the producers from Manila. Throughout the 14 years I have been in the industry and after meeting over countless of producers from Manila for projects held in Cebu as well as in Manila, none of them have given me any ill-fated experience similar to those that have been mentioned in my previous article. In fact, I continue to hold a very pleasant, professional relationship with these Manila-based producers as well as event organizers in Cebu to this very day. However, some of my fellow Cebuano artists are not as fortunate as I am and they have every right to be heard. I am quite certain that these artists have shared their experiences with many others and if indeed there is no truth to what they are saying, it is also not fair to these producers. They too have every right to clear the issues raised against them and air their side of the story through my column.

E-mail me at [email protected] for reactions, experiences and more.