Tricia Centenera: Taking the high road

CEBU, Philippines — With painful experiences come lessons learned and fashion blogger Tricia Centenera is ready to channel all of that when she gets up close and personal with empowered women from all walks of life as host of Metro Channel’s “Driven.”

In an interview during the recent Metro Summer Soul beach party at the Azure Beach Club of Crimson Resort and Spa Mactan, the model explains why she accepted the gig in a heartbeat.

“I said yes because I genuinely like helping other women by sharing my own stories. Rounding up all these women of substance and finding out their stories so they can help other women is just a way of paying it forward,” Tricia begins.

“The concept of the show is pretty new to the Philippines, and it really spoke to me. It came from the heart so I hope that Filipinos embrace it as much as I have.”

The producers of “Driven” were aware of Tricia’s much-publicized 2016 split from ex-husband Gab Valenciano (son of Gary Valenciano and Angeli Pangilinan) allegedly due to infidelity on Gab’s part. They must have thought Tricia’s way of handling the ordeal made her a perfect host for “Driven.”

“I had so many opportunities to lash out and kind of do a tell-all on my ex-husband and his family being such inspiring Christians. I just thought to myself, I don’t need to do that,” Tricia shares.

Last March, Tricia finally broke her silence on the matter via a blog entry entitled “OK Let's Talk About It” on a day that could have been the third anniversary for one of her and Gab’s three wedding celebrations. Tricia wrote how she and Gab (who were married in a civil ceremony in America in October 2014, and had two other celebrations: one in Tagaytay on March 27 and another one in Boracay on March 31, 2015) met on what was supposed to be the eve of their anniversary, surrounded by friends and family. Tricia revealed how they are now friends, and that he is happy for her and her new beau.

Both in the process of healing, Tricia also addressed Gab’s detractors, saying she believes he is a good man who just happened to make mistakes.

“I need to concentrate on myself, I need to heal and better my own heart and have more healthier thoughts and so I did that [healing] and wasn’t doing it thinking that anyone was really paying attention. But some people were and I gained respect for it,” says Tricia, noting how people commended her for not sinking her teeth onto Gab and taking him to town for his betrayal.

But that experience isn’t the only thing that makes Tricia. At 17, she was a pro dancer who travelled all over Asia and Australia as part of an Australian Cabaret show.

In 2007, Tricia got involved in a car accident. But despite the threat to her life and being told she might never walk again, Tricia was back on her feet after three months.

Raised in Sydney by Filipino parents (her dad is from Naga while her mother hails from Manila), Tricia is of Filipino-Spanish descent and is the youngest of five sisters (one of them is Vogue Australia Fashion director, stylist and fashion icon Christine Centenera). The model, actress, and host is a beach bum and a puppy lover.

Armed with the lessons she’s learned, Tricia adds that she feels no apprehension talking about her own story.

“What makes the show work is because it’s really two women sitting on a couch talking about what every woman has been through. So many of these conversations are already happening in homes, in your couch, and in your kitchen. We’re just trying to crack that open. It may look peachy-keen and rosy on the outside but we’re all going through something. It’s okay not to be okay—that’s the message,” Tricia says.

But Tricia is also cautious not to open any wounds or pressure guests into telling their stories.

“We need to make sure that we interview women who are willing to share and open up their lives. We don’t necessarily need to dive into what it was because we don’t want them to relive what they’ve been through. We want to know how they bounced back, how they got back on their horse, how they moved forward and came from the darkest of darks and into sunshine again. The show is quite a new concept, and some women who get on the show get all ‘Oh I don’t know if I’m going to be talking about this’—and I always say: Don’t say anything that you don’t want to say.”

She says not all the themes discussed in “Driven” are those of angst and pain. There are also stories of self-discovery and women who, despite being successful in the eyes of others, felt empty one day, had the courage to leave all that behind and found happiness in serving others.

“It doesn’t always have to be a story of darkness. It’s not always from a tragedy. From triumph comes greater triumphs as well,” she says.

“We don’t feel alone because we’re all going through something. It’s important that we stand by each other, and a smile can go a long way. A little message of a little bit of something about what you’ve been through can move somebody else. You probably don’t think that it’s something, or you think your story is nothing but it can be the world to somebody else going through it.”

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