kawawang janina

And here I thought beauty pageants are utterly boring, if not entirely foolish.

The last pageant I watched in full was in 1994, the glorious age of Sushmita Sen and Charlene Gonzalez. Imagine such lavish spending made by the Philippine government at the time of great brownouts. But all those dark thoughts suddenly disappeared when Miss India gave a bright and shining answer to the question “What is the essence of a woman?” For a while there I thought I saw a white light beaming from behind her head like a halo.

What is the essence of a woman? Whatever that is I don’t think it can be found within the contest’s rigid system that seeks to give a quintessential definition of beauty and of a woman’s very essence. While I understand that the Miss Universe Pageant only seeks to unite a highly diversified “universe,” it does so by disrespecting differences in race, color, culture, ethnicity, and socio-economic background. Let me explain.

Whenever you watch a beauty contest, doesn’t it remind you of a scene from Star Wars, the part where the military droids prep for attack? Each time I watch these ladies prance around and strut their stuff in front of a million eyes I get scared. It’s like being haunted by a horde of Stepford Wives. They all look so serene and perfect, like not a strand of their hair is out of place. It’s even hard to imagine these girls pooping or even sweating.

Because of a certain standard that the judges and we, the spectators, have unconsciously set in our minds, every contestant looks pretty much the same—same long beautiful hair, same height, same bony face, same waistline, same cup size, same set of even, white teeth, and—because speaking in English in the question and answer portion garners an extra point—same manner of speaking. I even heard there’s a particular school that specializes in training young girls to walk, wave, and talk like supermodels or beauty queens. Brrr. The thought just made me shudder. I would rather watch America’s Next Top Model because at least the ladies there have an ounce of oomph, zing, and personality.

It is this this freakin’ standard that has encouraged these people and everyone else to look the same. I mean how could you set one standard of beauty for all the women in the world? Some have even taken drastic measures to try to recreate themselves into the image and likeness of Barbie. In the Philippines, the fascination with the tall, fair-skinned, and malnourished girls continues. Never mind that this country lies on the equatorial zone and naturally our skin looks sun-kissed all year round. Never mind that the bridges of our Asian noses are naturally not as “high” as our Caucasian counterparts. If here, skin whitening pills have replaced vitamin supplements, in other parts of Asia, Blepharoplasty, the eyelid incision that creates the canthal fold, and breast augmentation have become the latest fashion must-haves. In all parts of the world, except in India, Africa, and South America, eating disorders such as bulimia and anorexia have also become commonplace.

Now that everybody looks like everybody, how then do you distinguish who among the clones deserves the highly coveted crown? Yes, dear Janina, this why they conceived a marvelous thing called the question and answer portion.

I will not state the obvious anymore. The mob has spoken, and the upper crust of the social divide has already hurled a mouthful of expletives. In a country where the majority of the younger work force are call center-trained, not being able to speak in straight English is a mortal sin. But just a few words of caution to the high and mighty: feigning an American accent doesn’t give you any claim to fame. It doesn’t make you a genius, because if it does you wouldn’t be taking in calls at ungodly hours for a relatively higher salary (I say relative on account of miscellaneous expenses like hospital bills).

Sadly, it has been generally acceptable these days for beautiful people to be just that: beautiful. And how easily do they get away with the cruel realities of life by ending up married to powerful politicians and business magnates. Just smile, darling, you don’t need to talk. Laugh all you want but whether we admit it or not, we have bred, nurtured, and encouraged the propagation of the likes of Janina San Miguel. Filipinas are known for their resilience, perseverance, and wisdom and they thrive overtly in almost every corner of the world. But we’d rather put the crown on Janina’s head because unlike them, her physical features fit perfectly well into the global standard. GMA-7 came to her defense by implying that nobody has to be smart in a Miss World competition because judges only look at a contestant’s stance. After all, it’s merely a popularity contest, right? Whatever.

But I think to say that she's “bobo” just because she struggled with the universal language is an overstatement. Although when I think about it, if she answered in Filipino, what would she have said? But the thing is I don’t think anyone should equate intelligence with English proficiency. I used to have a classmate who can talk in English for hours without making any sense (and yeah, he flunked logic, took summer classes). On the other side of the ring are very talented regional poets who could not even pronounce “angel” with the proper phonetics.

But what makes Janina a rare exception is the simple fact that she is a beauty queen, and by being so she has a very rare opportunity to represent the country before the world. Most of the aspirants think only of the glamour, glitz, and the post-pageant showbiz career that come with being beautiful, completely overlooking the hard work that must be done away from the limelight. As they say, with privilege comes great responsibility—and I’m not just talking about taking regular doses of beauty sleep. Maybe she’s not “bobo,” just a little irresponsible and naïve. But if she’s wise, she should have known that nobody goes to war without sufficient training and powerful armaments. And if she felt she’s not ready yet, I mean what’s a few more years of waiting? After all, she’s only seventeen years old, right? And we will probably see more of her because as she said, this is just her first beauty pageant ever.

Meaning there could be more. OMG.