Miss World Philippines 2012 Winners

Tweet

Queenierich Rehman, of Las Piñas City was crowned as the Miss World Philippines 2012 pageant, besting 24 other gorgeous candidates of the prestigious beauty competition.

The part-Morrocan Filipina, also won most of the pageant's special awards including Best in Swimwear, Miss Photogenic, and Miss Talent.

The 23-year-old Psychology major from Assumption College will be representing the Philippines in the international Miss World pageant to be held on August 18, 2012 in Inner Mongolia, China.

Here are the winners at the Miss World Philippines 2012 coronation night held June 24, Sunday, at the Manila Hotel.

Miss World Philippines 2012

Queeneerich Rehman (Las Piñas City)

1st Princess

Maryanne Ross Misa (Parañaque City)

2nd Princess

Vanessa Claudine Amman (Lapu-Lapu City, Cebu)

3rd Princess

April Love Jordan (Tondo, Manila)

4th Princess

Brenna Cassandra Gamboa (Laurel, Batangas)

Top 12 finalists:

Mariver Ocampo (Paombong, Bulacan)

Queeneerich Rehman (Las Piñas City)

Rufaida Babudin (Palawan)

Carla Terina Lizardo (Pasig City)

Marie Loraine Dione de Guzman (Sta. Mesa, Manila)

Kaye Wigand (Puerto Galera, Mindoro)

Maryanne Ross Misa (Parañaque City)

April Love Jordan (Tondo, Manila)

Vania Valeri Vispo (Pasig City)

Brenna Cassandra Gamboa (Laurel, Batangas)

Paulina Eliseeff (Quezon City)

Vanessa Claudine Amman (Lapu-Lapu City, Cebu)

Special awardees:

Best In Long Gown - April Love Jordan (Tondo, Manila)

Best In Swimwear - Queeneerich Rehman (Las Piñas City)

Miss Photogenic - Queeneerich Rehman (Las Piñas City)

Miss Talent - Queeneerich Rehman (Las Piñas City) and 

                    Marie Loraine De Guzman (Sta. Mesa, Manila)

Miss Friendship - Vanessa Claudine Amman (Lapu-Lapu City)

Best In Fashion Runway - Brenna Cassandra Gamboa (Laurel, Batangas)

Miss Philippines Prudential - Queeneerich Rehman (Las Piñas City)

Miss World Traveler - Queenierich Rehman (Las Piñas City) noypistuff

Miss Laguna World - Vanessa Claudine Amman (Lapu-Lapu City)

Miss Manny O’ Wine - Brenna Cassandra Gamboa ((Laurel, Batangas)

Samrt People's Choice - Vania Valeri Vispo (Pasig City)

Miss Olay - Vanessa Claudine Amman (Lapu-Lapu City)

Miss Pantene - Queeneerich Rehman (Las Piñas City)

Small-town Locals to Build “Courts of Inspiration” around Visayas & Mindanao

Tweet

Aray Natin, Galing Natin team and locals of Barangay Tabuc Suba, Jaro, Iloilo come together for the groundbreaking ceremony.

For a game that favors relatively tall people, it’s rather impressive how basketball has permeated Filipino culture. To this day, it is the nation’s most popular sport. Here, the passion is so great that you’d see people play it while wearing slippers, sandals, or sometimes, even barefoot. But nothing reinstates this fact better than the presence of basketball hoops everywhere—on the sides of buildings, in front of sari-sari stores, even in the middle of the street.

More than Just a Sports Venue

Basketball is so deeply ingrained in the local culture, that it’s hard to find a neighborhood that doesn’t have a basketball court tucked somewhere. Virtually every town has it. In fact, there are more basketball courts than there are barangay health centers. Moneyed districts may pride themselves with a “covered court,” while others will have at least some form of clay court.

Driven by the desire to provide their community with its first real basketball court, locals from barangay Tabuc Subain Jaro District were brought together to build their own “Court of Inspiration” under the campaign.

More than just being a location for recreation however, these places serve a bigger social purpose. Be it a council meeting or the barangay singing contest, basketball courts are default venues for holding community events. Is the school year about to end? There’s a good chance that the local public school will hold graduation ceremonies in there. Did a typhoon ravage the neighborhood? Expect the covered court to be turned into an evacuation center. In a sense, the place has become the de facto town square for most communities.

Inspiring Greatness

“To Filipinos, the basketball court is a symbol of the community spirit,” says Kristine Martinez, Alaxan FR Product Director, citing how a people bound by a common love for the game go to the courts not just to hone their skills, but also to bond with the rest of the community. “It’s a cultural icon, one that carries huge social impact,” she stressed.

Seeing the potential to drive social value, Alaxan FR is harnessing the power of the community through the Aray Natin, Galing Natin campaign—a collaborative effort between small-town locals to construct these symbols of community, and turn them into something that moves people to aim for greatness.

For its initial project, Alaxan FR chose Iloilo. Driven by the desire to provide their community with its first real basketball court, locals from barangay Tabuc Suba in Jaro District were brought together to build their own “Court of Inspiration” under the campaign.  Upon completion, the place will be filled with “Legend Markers”—marking areas with powerful messages conveying accomplishments and legacies of basketball legends—to inspire themselves to strive hard to accomplish the same. Through the effort, Alaxan FR aims to teach the locals to embody the values that make champions.

For its initial project, Alaxan FR chose Iloilo. Other Courts of Inspiration are currently in the works in various parts of the country. These are in Bacolod, Dumaguete, Tacloban, and Cebu for Visayas; and Cagayan de Oro, Zamboanga, Butuan, Davao, and General Santos for Mindanao.

Rewarding Greatness

Barangay Tabuc Suba is just the first of many places where Alaxan FR is building Courts of Inspiration, according to Martinez. Courts of Inspiration will soon break ground in nine other areas. For Visayas, they are to rise in Bacolod, Dumaguete, Tacloban, and Cebu. In Mindanao, construction will begin shortly in the communities of Davao, Cagayan de Oro, Butuan, Zamboanga, and General Santos. Through these projects, the campaign aims to give members of communities in different parts of our country pride in having personally built something that doesn’t just hone their skills, but builds their character as well.

“I was impressed at people’s willingness to jump at the opportunity to serve their community at our initial project in Iloilo and I believe I’d witness the same level of enthusiasm in the communities where succeeding Courts of Inspiration are to be built,” added Martinez. “For the noble effort that people have exerted for the projects, we’re planning to give them a special treat after the completion of the projects. That’s something they should watch out for,” she ends.

Mikee Cojuangco-Jaworski Covers Metro Magazine June 2012

Tweet

Mikee Cojuangco-Jaworski graced the covers METRO Magazine June 2012 Issue. Champion equestrienne, public speaker, and advocate Mikee Cojuangco-Jaworski tries on fashion for fun and realizes what style means to her in Metro Magazine's June 2012 issue.

Aside from Mikee, this style issue also offers interesting articles like "Secrets of Style Revealed: The Best Stores, Editor's Picks, Manila's Trendsetters, Tried and Tested Make-up," "+ Chic New Looks: Tailored Black Jackets, Rock and Roll Lace, and Languid Suits," and many more.

Shot by Marlon Pecjo, Mikee was wearing a pastel ensemble with gold jewelries on the cover. The now occasional actress and champion equestrienne still looks fabulous at 38. she doesn’t look her age, not to mention having three kids with husband Robert “Dudot” Jaworski, Jr.

Metro Magazine June 2012 issue is now available at all magazine stands and selected bookstores and supermarkets nationwide for only P150.

"Villancicos Ng Paskong Pilipino" , a concert at San Agustin Church in Intramuros

Tweet

I enjoyed watching  "Villancicos Ng Paskong Pilipino" , a concert featuring Spanish and Filipino villancicos, held at the historical San Agustin Church in Intramuros  last night, 
Dec. 6.

The “villancico” is an old music form from Spain and Portugal that has come to be associated with Christmas. This hopes to create awareness about the Filipino villancico heritage and to bring back memories of Christmas celebrations in the Spanish era. Aside from the traditional songs introduced into the country by the Spanish religious orders, Filipino composers have also tried their hand in writing villancicos. Among these are those discovered in Santa Clara Choir Books that date back to 1871-1874. Many of us heard this for the first time in the concert.

Novo Concertante Manila

Performing the villancicos were the Tiples de Santo Domingo and the Santo Domingo Male Chorale known as the oldest boys’ choir in the Philippines conducted by Eugene de los Santos and the Novo Concertante Manila with Arwin Tan as conductor.

Santo Domingo Male Chorale 

Also performed were Thea Perez, soprano and Cynthia Sy, soprano; and Alejandro D. Consolacion as the organist.

Tiples De Santo Domingo members continuing their tradition and celebrating musical supremacy since 1978.

The program  showed the traditional Nacio Nacio Pastores, a Villancico from Calahorra; Villancico A Pastores de Belen by Marcelo Adonay; Pastorale by Johann Sebastian Bach featuring Alejandro Consolacion II on the organ. Villancico Pilipino, La Virgen Lava Panales, Que Tranquilla esta la noche and Silencio pastores by Rosalina Abejo featuring soprano Thea Perez; Payapang Daigdig by Felipe de Leon; the traditional Noong Araw Ng Pasko and Noche Buena; Simbang Gabi by Lucio San Pedro; Pasko Na Naman by Felipe de Leon; and Ang Pasko ay Sumapit with Consolacion on the organ.

The finale song was Ang Pasko Ay Sumapit originally by Vicente Rubi in Cebuano and later given Tagalog lyrics by Levi Celerio is one example. So is Felipe de Leon’s Pasko Na Naman.

We were surprised by the great performances and feel Christmas carols , historical and Spanish traditional. I hear and sang inside my heart, the harmony and melody  thru the church and liturgical use of Christmas carols.

A little history of Villancicos: 

The first specifically Christmas hymns that we know of appear in fourth century Rome. Latin hymns such as Veni redemptor gentium, written by Ambrose, Archbishop of Milan, were austere statements of the theological doctrine of the Incarnation in opposition to Arianism. Corde natus ex Parentis (Of the Father's love begotten) by the Spanish poet Prudentius  is still sung in some churches today.

In the ninth and tenth centuries, the Christmas "Sequence" or "Prose" was introduced in North European monasteries, developing under Bernard of Clairvaux into a sequence of rhymed stanzas. In the twelfth century the Parisian monk Adam of St. Victor began to derive music from popular songs, introducing something closer to the traditional Christmas carol.