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Quotable Quotes 2011

"And the "Miss USA is anorexic" posts begin! hahaha! All I can do is shrug and laugh it off. Definitely not having that convo again.. For the record, I am 100% healthy. I see doctors & I have a nutritionist that I work very close with. My super fast metabolism is genetic.." - Alyssa Campanella (Miss USA 2011) on anorexic issue

My Miss Universe Experience

I remember it very clearly

I live a life without major mistakes

“I’ll make sure they’ll remember my name a hundred years from now.”

What happened in Vegas

Bb. Pilipinas - Universe 2010
Venus Raj

Dream what you want to dream; go where you want to go; be what you want to be, because you have only one life and one chance to do all the things you want to do. — Unknown

A common adage says that we only live once so we should make every moment in our life meaningful. I consider myself very lucky because I was given the chance to represent my country in one of the most prestigious beauty pageants in the world. An acquaintance once told me that I should be very thankful because many girls are wishing to be in my shoes. My Miss Universe experience is surely the most wonderful journey I have ever taken. I’d like to share some of my most unforgettable moments during the Miss Universe pageant in Las Vegas.

Sandra Inez Seifert Miss Philippines-Earth 2009: The beauty queen as an advocate

Miss Philippines-Earth 2009
Sandra Inez Seifert

The world of beauty pageant through the decades had defined the image of a quintessential beauty queen. She is a beauty cool under pressure, complete with a saccharine smile, flawless skin and a confident bearing that commands attention.

But for one Visayan girl who won in one of the most prestigious pageants in the Philippines, being a beauty queen means beauty beyond skin deep. She said that you can be serious in your attempt to win, but that doesn’t mean that you have to lose yourself in the process and more importantly, you should have more on your mind than the title, the sash and the prestige that goes with it.

If these statements are an indication that there’s more to Sandra Seifert’s pretty face, then the lad by all means deserves the beauty queen title of Miss Philippines-Earth.

“A lot of people think that beauty queens are all about being pretty and winning titles—that it’s not about the substance or wit of a woman but more about her physical appearance,” Seifert relates to The Manila Times. Exuding a confident aura, the seriousness of her tone is an inkling that she was back on stage to prove something.

“In some pageants, that’s true because their intelligence evaluation is only about 10 percent of the total score,” she states, continuing, “The beautiful part is, not all pageants are like that.”

Crowned Miss Earth Philippines on May 10, 2009 at the Araneta Coliseum, Seifert bested 49 others as the country’s next environmental ambassador. Seifert succeeded 2008 grand winner, Karla Paula Henry. She will be representing the country in October for the global Miss Earth beauty contest.

Seifert had a previous failed attempt at the Binibining Pilipinas title stemming from the issue of her photo in swimsuits appearing in a men’s magazine. She narrates that all these trials sweetened more her Miss Earth victory. “When I was younger, I was fond of watching beauty pageants. I would challenge myself by trying to answer the questions the contestants would get,” she reminisces.

During the interview, Seifert was lounging comfortably in a sofa without the trappings of a beauty queen. She carries the laid-back radiance of a 25-year-old girl who was on her way to fulfilling a landmark role in her life.

Born Sandra Inez Seifert, the half-European-half-Ilonggo beauty shares that she owes her beauty to the strong German features of her father, Harald, and the tender glamour of her Filipina mother, Zenaida. She reveals that her family encountered some financial hardships in the past but quickly adds that despite the difficulty, she considered them to be very blessed.

“I had a pretty good childhood,” Seifert narrates, continuing, “I was really, really pampered. I have three brothers. They are all younger than me but they are all taller than me.”

At the age of 14, Seifert was approached by a talent scout who asked her if she wanted to be a model. Though she immediately grabbed the offer, it took her about 50 attempts before she landed on her first legitimate modeling project.

Her perseverance was paid off with a promising career. To date, she has already done several national and international commercials and fashion shows. Seifert displays a penchant of involving herself with social issues through her work and through the media. She even worked with showbiz old-timer German Moreno in his late night program Master Showman.

To beef up her portfolio, Seifert once posed in a photo shoot wearing a two-piece swimsuit in a bedroom setting. The photo, which was done in good taste, was published in the men’s magazine FHM.

Seifert recalls that at that time, she considered those photos no more than a mere attempt to showcase her range as a model, not realizing that it would make a controversial impact on her career. In those days, she is not keen on joining beauty contests even when people were goading her into it. “I wasn’t really up for it. I wanted to just continue going to school and pursue a chosen profession,” she says. Later on, the photos eventually got in the way of her dreams of winning a prestigious beauty contest.

Seifert got her degree in Nursing from the City University of New York in the United States. Before getting her license last year, she excelled as a campus leader and honor student. These accomplishments allowed her to be more confident and more knowledgeable regarding communication and advocacy.

When she came back to the Philippines, the call to join another beauty pageant again came knocking on her door. She took the plunge the second time around.

Candidate number 13

Early this year, Seifert joined the Binibining Pilipinas. “Most of the girls in that pageant were very beautiful—like professional models or beauty queens and the competition was too intense,” Seifert recalls.

Despite her popularity as a contestant, controversy hounded the half-European, half-Ilonggo beauty. Seifert was later to be coined “The candidate with the unlucky number 13,” because of her disqualification after the Binibining Pilipinas organizers discovered her past stint with FHM. She was disqualified from the competition days before the coronation night. The pageant organizers stated that the publication of her feature in such kind of magazine made her unqualified to continue competing in the contest. “Since they did it the last minute, it was really a shock for me,” Seifert laments, adding, “I pleaded through my attorneys, for the organizers to reconsider my case because it’s not like I hid it. It’s just that they never addressed it and a lot of people here knew me already so I thought they knew. I am a professional model. I didn’t want to endanger my reputation so I worked with a professional team and the real story is: we just shot for a portfolio. And since the photographer, worked with FHM a lot, they saw the photos and they wanted to release it. If it had been Preview or Mega that saw those photos first, they probably would’ve been the ones to release and I think that that wouldn’t have been used against me. I think they just used the labeling of FHM and the connotation that goes with it.”

Seifert had considered the whole affair water under the bridge and had already moved on with her life.

She’s thankful because not only that it made her a better person but through it, she learned how many people love and support her.

“I heard a lot of inspiring things during the coronation night. I was there and I received my own flowers from people who believed in me and there were some people who even cried.”

The Binibining Pilipinas’ rejection of her, opened a lot of doors. It caught the attention of another beauty contest: The Miss Philippines-Earth .

A beauty for a cause

A brainchild of Philippine-based Carousel Productions, the first Miss Earth beauty pageant was launched in 2001 with the aim of promoting the preservation of the environment. One proud distinction of the Miss Earth contest is that all its contestants are involved with environmental causes and its winners are expected to participate in international environmental projects. The latter caught Seifert’s fancy.

“Before I joined Miss Earth, I did my research just to see if I wanted to do this,” she shares, continuing, “Before, people would ask me, ‘Oh did you join Miss Earth for vindication?’ I said no because I didn’t want to waste my time and Miss Earth’s time just to get back at people. That’s childish. I want to do something and to put my time in something I believe in and that would allow me to generate more good.”

Fresh from her failed attempt at the Binibining Pilipinas title, she stressed that she was not afraid to join Miss Earth and likewise, Miss Earth was not afraid to have her. That despite her being a former “FHM girl” she could represent the country in the pageant’s campaign for 2009.

“When I came to Miss Earth, one of the judges during the screening said, ‘Before anything else, I would just like to tell you that I don’t think there’s anything wrong with what you did at FHM,” Seifert says with a proud smile. “When I joined, I made a promise to myself to do my best and to have more fun because in Binibini it was like a competition every day. You couldn’t value friendships so much because we were placed in situations where you have to be really competitive. I didn’t want to be that way anymore. Instead, I should be genuine about everything.”

Like in Binibining Pilipinas, Seifert became a crowd favorite in Miss Earth as well. She showcased her vast knowledge of environmental issues as well as the poised she earned from years of professional modeling. She points out the difference of her experiences joining the two pageants: “I looked younger compared to how I looked in Binibini because in Miss Earth we were encouraged to go for a more natural look. In Binibini, we were made up everyday. I also looked happier and not so haggard because our schedules were more spread out. We got more rest opportunities. Everything was very natural. It was also very soothing. In Miss Earth, we could sit, unwind and act natural. In Binibini, we always had to be so ‘perfect’ and poised even when there were no judges around.”

She also notes that being a Miss Earth candidate allowed her to be herself than just being “Candidate No. 13.” “But of course, the competition was just as tough,” she stresses.

Seifert stayed focus. Faced with two question-and-answer portions, she took the opportunity to share her cause with the audience and quoted Ghandi by saying “In gentle ways you can shake the Earth.”

Beyond environmentalism

After bagging the Miss Philippines-Earth title, Seifert believes that there’s still a lot to be accomplished.

“I have a lot of plans—short term and long term. I definitely want to raise more awareness in the advocacy that I started with as a candidate in the Miss Earth pageant, which is waste management. During the contest, I spoke about a Republic Act 9003. It exists but only a few local government units, at the moment, are enforcing it. We need to get more people involved. That’s one of the things I wish to achieve during my reign as Miss Earth—to increase the number of participants getting involved in addressing this issue. And since I have access to the media, I would love to start a show wherein we could help raise environmental awareness as well. That would be for my long-term goal. A short term goal perhaps would entail getting a segment in one of the current TV shows.”

Seifert also tells of plans with a global scope, “Global warming is still a big issue. I think that even though they have these protocols like the Kyoto protocol, where they try to reduce carbon dioxide emissions by five percent, we don’t really see that much of it yet. People are still burning fossil fuel. I think we need to understand that there is a need to not just focus on the immediate returns of businesses we’ll have. I agree with [President Barack] Obama. We should always encourage people to shift to renewable energy because it doesn’t just solve the environmental problem; it also solves the long-term financial problem.”

An avid traveler, she also wants to see more of the Philippines before she represents it on October. And still, she maintains that although her duties are arduous, she will not let it overwrite who she is as a person.

“It’s good to be proper, refined and womanly but women should also be like girl scouts, ready to roll their sleeves to work.” Seifert says pertaining to how she willingly went through garbage clean up in an episode of the TV show Matang Lawin.

As the reigning Miss Philippines-Earth, Seifert believes that there is indeed a lot of pressing environmental issues but as a “queen” and as a woman, she expresses on fulfilling additional missions.

“I want my fellow queens and others who are aspiring for the title to always go for what they believe in and not let anyone discourage them. I noticed that a lot of people who would join this did it just for fun. I’m not saying that’s wrong, but I think that it comes with a responsibility and it comes with an opportunity to inspire people. That’s what I want to achieve: to change the perception most people have of beauty queens.”

With that said, it is clear that Sandra Inez Seifert is not just another beauty queen with a saccharine smile.

Featured Article: Sandra Inez Seifert Miss Philippines-Earth 2009: The beauty queen as an advocate originally appeared on Manila Times on 07 Jan 2009.

To Miss Universe —And Beyond!

Bb. Pilipinas - Universe 2007
Anna Theresa Licaros

MANILA, Philippines – My most distinct memory from the Miss Universe pageant this year was that of Miss France holding a cheeseburger served us at Hard Rock Café Mexico. Holding half a burger with her delicate fingers, she looked at me and said: “Ye know, Tu-ress, ze first thing I learn to zay in eve-ree langu-egh is ze word, hamburguer.”

I looked at her, nodded and bit into my burger. I was so hungry after all that walking up and down the Basque de Chapultepec in four-inch heels. It’s not easy being a beauty queen. Try fitting a mirror, lipstick, lip gloss, face powder and extra eyelash glue into a tote and carrying it around with poise while you negotiate palatial staircases in your heels and miniskirt. Every day was a marathon for us at Miss U.

Meanwhile, Miss France continued her train of thought: “Like here in Mexico… zey call it hamburguesa. What about you, Tu-ress? What do zey call it in ze Philippines?” I was taken aback. I’m a pretty articulate person with above average capacity for witty retorts, but in this pageant, all sorts of questions were hurled at me from nowhere! It was like the question and answer portion, only worse: they were mostly everyday stuff about me and my country that I never really thought about before joining the pageant. I tried to buy some time by sipping my Coke light, sin hielo, lest I find myself running to the loo every five minutes. I struggled for the Filipino word for hamburger: Ham-barger?

Oops, too late. Someone mentioned another topic and the conversation shifted. Ham-barger it was. I reeled at the thought of how this might affect how the Philippines is perceived by the next person that Miss France meets to whom she repeats this conversation. That was my everyday reality as Miss Philippines in the Miss Universe pageant. I ceased to be just Theresa or Tu-ress to Rachel/Miss France. I became the Philippines.

Early on, I became aware of what representing my country really means. Having to wear the banner “Philippines” across my breast every single day kept me on my toes, careful of how I’ve been projecting myself and of everything I say or do. To some extent it was scary, but also a source of pride. Every smile I flashed, each pose I struck was done with the thought that it should be my best because this wasn’t just about me anymore.

For the most part, the other contestants were fantastic. Contrary to popular belief that women who join beauty pageants are airheads or bimbos, most are college graduates with full time jobs in their own countries. They are opinionated and know what they want.

When I came back from Mexico, I was always asked if acts of sabotage really took place during the pageant. (Reportedly the most controversial in years, the 2007 Miss Universe pageant saw Miss USA being booed by some Mexicans unhappy over a pending immigration bill in the US, Miss Sweden pulling out after complaints in her country described the contest as degrading to women, and Miss Mexico being asked to change costumes because the original was deemed in poor taste.—Ed.)

I’m happy to report that I didn’t experience any such incident firsthand. The closest thing to intrigue that I encountered was a remark from a fellow candidate that was perhaps meant to psych me out. During one rehearsal, I was called onstage to do the evening gown pattern, after which I had to look at the camera and pose. Suddenly, everyone was clapping and cheering. I must have done something right, I thought.

Indeed, when I got off stage, Miss Tanzania approached me, saying “Girl, that was an amazing face!” Most everyone thought so, except for Miss Bolivia who told me flat out: “You look dead onstage. Your eyes are just blank. Maybe you should, like, move your eyebrows or something.” Just friendly advice, she said, because she wanted me to do well. That was odd, I told her; another candidate had just told me the exact opposite. Miss Bolivia simply rolled her eyes and said I should trust her instead. Well, I thought afterwards, when you do something significant, you’ll get both good and bad reactions.

As an insider, I also learned that the Miss Universe organizers and production team wanted to veer away from the traditional pageant look and feel. They discouraged stiff and exaggerated posturing and encouraged sexy, relaxed, fluid and model-like movements. A Miss Universe, said our catwalk teacher, Lu Sierra, must know how to smile. She hated it when the contestants sported sexy I’m-gonna-eat-you-alive looks. The pageant organizers had a “look” in mind and I was personally sold to the subtle but sexy models’ stance that they advocated.

There were so many things to learn and it wasn’t always smooth sailing. There were really days when I just wanted to put a paper bag over my head and not wear any makeup. I had to keep telling myself that I was in Mexico to do a job and that the job requires me to put on makeup at five in the morning. So I’d just shake off whatever negative feelings I felt, play some dance music and sing along while putting on my pageant face. That was how I got through the doldrums.

Apparently, I did that so well that some contestants would ask me to close my eyes so they could check out my eye makeup. They said they liked the way I blended the colors. One photographer even took a photo of my right eye. Just my right eye! He said it looked so beautiful that he wanted a shot of it. My thanks go to Jay Lozada, Allen Rosales, Lia Ramos and Jenny Tan for selflessly sharing their makeup tips with me.

That kind of team work, or collaboration, also defined my Miss Universe experience. There were so many teachers who shared their knowledge with me, as well as family and friends who flew all the way to Mexico to become my cheering squad and support group. I got a lot of joshing when I gave my guest list: 25 people strong. Not bad for a pacific islander who lives roughly 12 time zones away. It was the kind of support that others could only envy. My roomie, Miss Thailand, wanted to “borrow” a brother because she didn’t have any family around during the pageant. I gladly obliged, telling the bunso in our family to go wild when Thailand gets called. I think he did go wild —for all the girls—so that was substantial compliance.

The reality of representing one’s country can be daunting, but it also enhanced me as a person. While it might have been a source of insecurity to pose beside Barbie lookalikes, it boosted my confidence nonetheless. I looked at them and felt that I deserved to be there. Cheesy, I know, but when I stood there in high heels beside the most beautiful women in the universe, something changed. I was no longer a passive participant to whom things happen; instead, I chose to embrace the experience and learn from it. That made all the difference for me.

More than just another beauty pageant, this year’s Miss U put things into perspective for me. In a nutshell, my 30 days in Mexico with 76 other women from all over the world was a crash course in culture, diplomacy, confidence, and worst of all, geography. I’ll always remember— with amusement tinged with shame—how I had managed to put so many countries in the wrong continent and historical era and unwittingly displayed such ignorance by asking the delegate about it. So, I asked Miss Egypt, “You’re from Cairo. How are the pyramids?” She smiled and giggled: “They’re in Giza.” Getting my witty retort mode back, I countered: “Well, maybe if you’d take me around the Middle East one of these days, it won’t be so confusing.” As she wiped her fingers on a tissue, Miss France interjected: “Isn’t Egypt in Africa?”

Licaros is a junior at the UP College of Law. She plans to visit Egypt and see the pyramids next summer, and find out how they say “hamburger” in Arabic.

Featured Article: To Miss Universe —And Beyond! originally appeared on Inquirer.net on 28 Aug 2007 11:30:00.

Happy to be a Binibining Pilipinas reject

Sandra Inez Seifert

MANILA, Philippines—Miss Philippines-Earth 2009 Sandra Inez Seifert sympathizes with Maria Venus Raj, the embattled beauty queen whose Binibining Pilipinas-Universe crown still hangs in the balance.

“I can relate 100 percent to what she is going through,” said Seifert, a Filipino-German model and nursing graduate. “I wish [Venus’ case] had been handled another way.”

Last year, contest organizer Binibining Pilipinas Charities Inc. (BPCI) had disqualified Sandra from the competition two days before pageant night in March, due to her photos that appeared in a men’s magazine in 2007.

Venus was stripped of her title last month due to alleged misrepresentation—specifically, inconsistencies in her official birth records.

Both girls have claimed they were not given time to answer the accusations against them.

“It’s tough, what [Venus] is going through,” Sandra told Inquirer. “I had a very strong support group; I hope Venus had that kind of help around her,” she added.

Sandra said she hoped BPCI also learned from the experience. In hindsight, she admitted she is grateful for her disqualification, since it paved the way for her joining the rival Miss Philippines-Earth pageant. “As ‘Miss Philippines-Earth,’” she said, “I was able to touch many lives.”

Close second

Her victory as Miss Philippines-Earth led to her participation in the Miss Earth pageant in Boracay, against some 80 international delegates. She placed second to Brazil’s Larissa Ramos and also won the “Miss Earth-Air” title.

A new Miss Philippines-Earth will be crowned tomorrow night in a water-theme pageant to be held at the Manila Ocean Park.

Catherine Untalan, executive director of the Miss Earth Foundation, said the pageant is looking for “a well-rounded person, someone worth looking up to.”

The Miss Philippines-Earth pageant will be telecast April 25, 10 p.m. on ABS-CBN.

Featured Article: Happy to be a Binibining Pilipinas reject originally appeared on inquirer.net on 22:14:00 04/22/2010