She's Still A Winner, Baby

Many things to many people, Pia Wurtzbach was and still is a winner by all accounts. But as she continues to propel herself even further away from the shadow of the crown, we begin to meet the woman she always was and still is, raring and ready to dream big and go after things that are greater and grander than most of us are only so willing to imagine.

- Angelo Ramirez De Cartagena 

“I never thought that I would feel that need to be normal,” reveals Pia Wurtzbach from her regal perch, hair perfectly in place, her face dusted with speckles of last-minute shimmer and her nails, oh her nails, tactile and miniscule works of art fiddling about. It is a profession that is so earnest that it takes you back. The stillness becomes a little too palpable that you begin to hear the blinks of your eyes and the flicks of the aforementioned nails clicking against each other. But even before you tumble with a string of consonants and vowels, she swoops in to enlighten you with this unraveling of a new truth. “You know, when you’re trying out for a pageant, you’re a model or an aspiring actress…I mean, everyone’s goal is to be successful and with that comes fame. I thought that of all the years I have been training, I would be prepared for it.”

You would never expect that for someone who has been accorded the world, or well, the universe in this case, that something so essential and often taken for granted is something she holds on especially close to. Perhaps it is a bit unsettling, especially for simpletons like us who have known nothing but normalcy all our lives, but for the rare statistic of people who are celebrated and exalted, placed on a pedestal for the world to admire, it is something that they are stripped off almost unwillingly. Then and there, they become fragments of their selves, stepping into a role that is at this point, public property. “But it’s hard; it’s tough,” the eternal beauty queen confesses. “It’s fun for the first few years, and then reality hits you and you realize, this is my life now. This is what it’s going to be like this for a while, and it’s either I adjust and find happiness in it or you know, I’ll be miserable. So, I’ve been finding that balance.”