Another Great Year for Latinas: Miss Universe 2008

Miss Universe 2008 was crowned last night on NBC. The pageant took place in Ho Chi Minh, Vietnam and the winner was Miss Venezuela, Dayana Mendoza!

First, I am going to warn you...I am a pageant-lover. I have loved pageants since the days of yore when the Miss America pageant was THE coolest thing for young women and every year millions of viewers tuned in. Well the Miss Universe pageant system, which includes Miss USA and Miss Teen USA, has since taken over as the pageant to participate in and watch. An estimated 1 billion plus viewers tuned last night to see 80 countries represented by some of the world's most beautiful women aged 18-26 compete for the title. P.S. Donald Trump owns the entire pageant system and Jerry Springer and Mel B (Spicegirls) were the hosts.

Below is the picture of the new Miss Universe. Tell me she isn't breathtaking! She's 22, 5'10'' and the cutest thing since Shiloh Jolie-Pitt!

She was my pick for the winner, even weeks before the pageant began. You can view every contestant, their model shot, swimsuit close-up, evening gown and national costume pics online at missuniverse.com. You can also find interviews, video and blogs for all of the contestants as well. I watched hers before the pageant, and I concluded she's pretty much perfect! Great interview, quick witted, funny, engaging, was very confident and spoke, in her interview, as though she was your best friend. Then of course great swimsuit body, looks and evening gown choice. And her English is pretty-darn good.

Let's recap. Here were my predictions for Top 15 and why. (In no particular order).




Russia; On looks only and watching her little video interview she was sexy, smart and sincere...three good adjectives for a winner.

Aruba; Cute girl, good interview. Sincere. Gorgeous face and hair.

China; To me China really brought it this year, from what I could see from pictures. Great body, evening gown, photogenic, etc. An obvious choice.

USA; We always make it to at least the Top 10, and this year we had a very very strong candidate named Crystle Stewart from Texas. She's virtually perfect, a Barbie - this may be her downfall.

Vietnam; not only is she the rep for the host country, she is just darling! Her interview is pretty good, too, she really tries hard to speak English and she has the best beauty mark since Cindy Crawford.

Dominican Republic; I was rooting for her from the beginning also. Strong competitor for this country this year. Awesome all around, at first look, but she has substance, speaks English well and had a really clever national costume as well.

Isreal; simply breathtaking. one of the most beautiful contestant of the 80.

Costa Rica; also breathtaking and, I really thought, she'd be one to beat.

Angola; Many of the African countries really brought it this year! Check out this brown beauty. Her looks speak volumes.

Puerto Rico; It's been a while since PR has had a great rep, and this year, they might make a come-back. She is stunning, clearly.

South Africa; finally a black woman from SA! And she is just adorable. Great smile, good figure: not too skinny but very fit. Pretty hair and skin tone. Let's see what she can do!

Mexico; Perfection. Simply perfection. I picked her to win (along with Venezuela). I predicted it would be between these two in the end. Amazing girl, inside and out. A 10 in each category, wait and see!

Venezuela; again, an obvious choice.

Tanzania; soooo cute, easy-going and confident in interview. Great smile and teeth. Hot body and very unique. She kept her hair curly! Great for curly girls everywhere, like me!

Singapore; Also a cutie. Nice interview, pretty good English. Uniquely intriguing features.

The Actual Top 15:
Mexico
Kosovo
Venezuela
Vietnam
South Africa
Australia
Japan
Dominican Republic
Italy
Colombia
Russia
Hungary
Czech Republic
USA
Spain

Below are my observations of the 8 ladies that I didn't correctly predict for top 15:

I definitely see why she was chosen. Strong candidate in evening gown and swim. Plus, facially, she was STUNNING...big lips, eyelashes, amazing cheekbones and eyes. Looked as though she belonged on a Paris runway.

I have no clue why they chose her. Must have been interview. She was BORING with a capital B. She looks hot here, but don't let this pic fool you. Her hair was limp and wispy. She just looked like any other brown-haired, pretty girl out there.

UGH, she looks like an anime character. Just because Miss Universe 2007 was Miss Japan, I feel like they chose her. She also has a bobble-head look here. In person, on TV, she looked more natural, but she cut her hair in a very fashion-forward style, which would have been cool, except it was an ugly, asymmetric cut that looked like it was from a techno music-video from the '80s.

I see how Australia got picked--she has a great body, but she was boring other than that. Just a usual pretty, dirty-blond. I would have loved to see China or Tanzania instead.

Another wild card. Colombia was an unsuspected favorite. Great body. Cute face. But it was a little generic-Latina. Not a show-stopper. Personality was great, though.

Hungary was another one out of left field. She was coy and intriguing, though. Cute curly hair! But she wasn't a stand-out.

Spain...YUCK! I did not like her. She looked manly and almost angry. Very dark features, so she didn't seem warm. Her teeth were kinda yellow too. Blah, didn't see that coming.

Czech was also a cutie and I could see why she made it. But she was ho-hum on stage. This pic makes her look really happy and friendly.



So after the swimsuit competition, I named who I thought would be the Top 10:
Dominican Republic
Mexico
USA
Vietnam
Russia
Venezuela
South Africa
Colombia
Australia

The actual Top 10 turned out to be:
Kosovo
Australia
Spain
USA
Dominican Republic
Mexico
Russia
Italy
Venezuela
Colombia

Again some surprises. From here, the ladies went on the evening gown competition. My favorite part! Here are some of my fave dresses from the top 10:

Miss Colombia, Miss Mexico and Miss Australia had some of my favorite gown choices.

My Top 5 predictions were exactly correct! After evening gown they narrow it to 5...here's who were picked:
Venezuela
Colombia
Mexico
Dominican Republic
Russia

Notice anything? Yep, four out of the top five were Latina ladies! This was their year. Though, it's not unusual for Latinas to sweep the board in pageants. 

Then it was on-stage Q&A time! Colombia stumbled, while she attempted to speak English instead of using the interpreter, and spent so much time looking for the correct English word that she couldn't properly answer the question and her answer wasn't good. Venezuela's answer was perfect. Equal amounts of spunk, smarts and timeliness. Dominican had a very honest answer that was a little somber, but it was her about her childhood so it was heartfelt and well-said. Russia also had a great answer. Mexico's answer was perfection as well. I was sure she was going to win. And if not her, definitely Venezuela. I didn't really care who got the RUs, just as long as it was between Mexico and Ven. for the title.



The acutal breakdown went like this:

4th Runner Up = Mexico (!?!?!?! utter shock)
3rd RU = Russia (expected)
2nd RU = DR (expected)
1st RU = Colombia (!?!?! bad Q&A she shouldn't have been ranked here)
and then Miss Venezuela as Miss Universe 2008




I was very very very very happy with the end result!

The Miss USA Curse

It happened for the second year in a row...Miss USA Crystle Stewart FELL smack-dab on her BUTT the moment she stepped out onto the stage during the evening gown competition. The exact same thing happened to Miss USA 2007 Rachel Smith last year at Miss Universe 2007! What are the odds?!?! Could it be foul play by a fellow competitor or just bbbaaaaaaaaaadddddd luck? Did someone smear butter, baby oil or Vaseline on her shoes? Check out the video clip below, it was the most-watched clip on YouTube today. All I could do was laugh (I know that's mean but it was funny!). And she looked pissed-off the rest of the night...

And here is the clip from last year of Rachel Smith falling also courtesy of YouTube.com. She still made it to the Top 5 despite falling, and because of that, the audience booed her when she was named to the 5 and when she was answering her on-stage question! This year, Miss USA did not advance to the Top 5 after falling.

WOW is all you can really say about that...along with watch the clip over and over and over. And the ladies fell in a similar way as well...strange.

If any of you out there in Columbus watched the pageant and have something to say...leave a comment!