It’s break time for these guys at final rehearsals for “Hari Ng Negros”, the annual male pageant held in Dumaguete last weekend. Every school, and every little barangay in Negros holds a female pageant at least once a year; so to be fair to both sexes, there have to be a few male pageants as well.
For the boys involved, it’s an exhausting ordeal lasting many months, with multiple screenings to pass, with many tiring pictorials to be endured to produce “The Look” that’s required; and then endless rehearsals for the show itself. But now it’s break time, and they’re just chatting on their phones and relaxing.
Why do they do it? Not for the prize money, which isn’t much. So it’s for personal ambition, possible future opportunity, or just to shine in what they see as an important event. And it means a great deal more to some of them.
Like this boy in the picture below. It’s break time for him too; but he’s not relaxing. He’s intensely dedicated, totally concentrated; he’s looking for any lack, any possible flaw in the image of himself created for this event; as though his life depended on it.
Guess who won.