My prediction wins the crown again! This is the first time since the year 2000, that I correctly predicted the winners of both Miss USA and Miss Universe. If I can correctly predict Miss Teen USA, it will be the first time that I correctly predicted all three for the same year. However, Miss Teen USA is often a different ballgame so I'm not expecting that to happen. Venezuela finally captures its fifth Miss Universe crown thanks to the stunning, vivacious Dayana Mendoza. 'Dynamic Dayana' topped my predictions this year simply because she outpersonalities everyone else. Not since Alicia Machado, (Venezuela's last Miss Universe who won in 1996) have I seen a Miss Venezuela bring this much laughter, excitement, and bubbliness to Miss Universe. Princess Dayana is dynamism and brought Venezuela its long awaited and much deserved Miss Universe crown after 12 years of no winners, several runner ups and two shocking and undeserved exclusions from the semifinals in 2004 and 2006. Venezuela was long overdue for a Miss Universe win and what better place for Venezuela to win it than in another country that starts with the letter 'V', Vietnam! Dayana has the glamour, the spirit, the undeniably sensational body and worked that gown in true Venezuelan style. She was universally favored and a lot of people fell in love with her after watching her closeup on the Miss Universe website. When asked what article of clothing she couldn't do without, she replied 'panties' and immediately caused a laugh out loud moment. From that moment, Dayana upped her edge that much further. Dayana, you had us at 'panties'!
Prior to the pageant, we had three special competitions which were: the Ao Dai (Vietnamese traditional outfits) competition, the National Costume competition and the Vinpearl swimsuit award. Venezuela's Dayana Mendoza won the Ao Dai competition with Vietnam, Thailand, Kazahkstan and India as finalists. Mexico's Elisa Najera won the Vinpearl swimsuit award with Colombia, India, Spain and USA as finalists and then Thailand won the National Costume competition with Albania, Colombia, Dominican Republic, India, Kosovo, Mexico, Peru, South Africa, Venezuela and Vietnam as finalists. El Salvador won the Congeniality award.
I'm sure you noticed the new crown. This year, Mikimoto's crown which debuted in 2002 has already been replaced by this new crown unveiled and created by CAO Fine Jewelry. I've heard varying opinions of this crown. Some say it looks very regal and eloquent whereas others think it belongs in the 80s and a lot of people don't seem to like the gold color because the Miss Universe crown is normally silver/white. In commemoration of the new crown, I thought we would take a trip down memory lane examining the Miss Universe crowns in history in a little segment, I like to call...
"Tom's Crown Affair"
The first Miss Universe crown in 1952 adorned the head of Finland's Armi Kuusela who was crowned by actress Piper Laurie. Thank God it was the only year that crown made an appearance because it was just too small and looked like a throwback to ancient British crowns. The next year, Christiane Martel of France wore a golden star-topped crown which also only had a one year appearance. From 1954 to 1960, we were given the laurel wreath star-topped silver crown as shown here modelled by Miriam Stevenson in 1954 and Linda Bement in 1960. Linda Bement then modelled the new 'orbit' crown perhaps more suited to the Universe title, which was also worn by the 1961 and 1962 winners, Marlene Schmidt of Germany and Norma Nolan of Argentina, respectively. Both the 1961 and 1962 pageants coincidentally were hosted by the legendary talk show host Johnny Carson. 
In 1963, we saw the first draft of the longest-running crown, which had the design of the woman in the center holding a scepter. This beautiful design became increasingly perfected around 1973 and held steady as the crown that everyone would come to associate with the Miss Universe pageant for many years and to many people will remain the eternally official Miss Universe crown. It adorned the heads of Miss Universe winners for almost 40 years up until 2002 when the new Mikimoto sponsor pearl crown, bearing a striking resemblance to the NBC peacock logo made its debut. The next year, the Miss Universe pageant moved from the CBS network to NBC which brings us to the present and the new CAO Fine Jewelry crown for Miss Universe 2008 in Vietnam. Rumor has it that this crown may only be for this year. If we revert back to the Mikimoto crown next year, it will be the first time in history that an old crown returned.
On to this year's pageant happening for the first time in Vietnam in Nha Trang. Riyo Mori, Miss Universe 2007 danced in the opening number like the true dancer she is. Jerry Springer, host of "America's Got Talent" and Spice Girl, Melanie Brown (aka. Mel B. or Scary Spice) served as fine hosts this year. Jerry didn't pull many antics and he was good with his comic timing. Both Jerry and Mel recently competed on 'Dancing With the Stars' as well. I thought Mel should have won her year but she was edged out by the smiley race car driver Helio Castroneves. The opening with the National Costumes was very nicely done. It was good to have captions with the names of each delegate and a full body shot showing the whole costume and then closeups of the faces. Riyo also looked great as she greeted the audience, you could tell she had hair extensions though. She also displayed her knowledge when she mentioned that she was the second Miss Universe from Japan after 48 years and she is still keen on starting her own dance school.
When it came time to announce the top 15, the delegates looked fabulous in their glittery Scala dresses by Sherri Hill. The top 15 was a bit disappointing though. I only picked 6 of them and 2 alternates which clearly shows some pretty poor nonsensical preliminary judging but c'est la vie. Russia, Italy, Czech Republic, Hungary, Japan, South Africa and Vietnam were the ones not in my list at all. I did have Czech Republic, Vietnam and Japan as suspects and a few called South Africa but I don't think anyone called Hungary. I guess it just made it that much easier for Dayana to ease her way to crown. So what happened to my girls that didn't make it? Well, first up was India's Simran Kaur Mundi who I pointed out was the only delegate to place as a finalist in all 3 of the previous competitions (Ao Dai, National Costume and Vinpearl swimsuit) but some thought she came across as more arrogant and conceited than confident and she maybe could have used more toning of her abs but I thought her performance overall was strong. Puerto Rico's Ingrid Rivera was another shocker to be absent from the finalists. Much ado was made about the fact that Ingrid had been seen hanging around Donald Trump over the year and lest we forget, the notable incident when it was highly publicized that someone allegedly pepper sprayed Ingrid's gown and makeup at the Miss Puerto Rico Universe pageant. Who knew this meant that Ingrid would be left out entirely. I thought she would earn a high placement because she certainly had the body, gown and presentation skills. She also placed as second runner up at Miss World 2005 and gave a strong performance there as well.
Some thought her styling was a bit 80s but I like the big pageant hair and thought she was a great contender. There was a rumor floating around that she wasn't too happy with how her preliminary interview went but the exclusions of India and Puerto Rico seemed to have been done on purpose. Did you notice that I predicted India and Puerto Rico, who won in 2000 and 2001 respectively to be in the 2nd and 3rd runner up positions but in the actual results, Russia and Dominican Republic, who won in 2002 and 2003 ended up occupying those spots in reverse? Isn't that strange?? Also among the shocking exclusions was Panama who delivered in all categories and had a great gown presentation. Canada was also strong in swimsuit and gown but probably not as strong in interview. Croatia was also a decent contender and I thought it was finally time for them to make it as their delegate was good. Brazil also had a good contender. No idea what happened there. Trinidad sent a buff, well interviewed girl in Anya but Trinidad was denied this time. It was notable that Trinidad returned this year after an absence last year which broke the 4 year streak they had in the semifinals. I loved the sassy style of Denmark's Maria Sten-Knudsen but she was denied yet Denmark had two unexpected placements in the two years prior to this one. Korea's Sun Lee didn't really come across as warmhearted as her predecessor Honey Lee who placed in the top 5 last year but of Ines Ligron's girls, they gave it to Japan instead. As for my two alternates that made it, I regret not including Colombia as I didn't see it then but I do now. However, I didn't really think much of Spain and I still don't. Overall, I still think my list was better than the actual list.
I totally was not expecting that to happen again to Miss USA two years in a row. As Crystle was descending down one step, she fell on her backside and then got right back up applauding herself. After the pageant, this fall was what made the headlines in the news shows and when interviewed about it, Crystle said that she had stepped on bugle beads attached to the train of her gown designed by Carlos Alberto of Puerto Rico and it was like she was on roller skates. Rachel Smith, Crystle's predecessor, of course also had the fall but Rachel still advanced to the top 5 yet Crystle had to settle for 8th position with a score of 8.05. Some people thought it was Jerry Springer's fault for calling her a little too soon while the dancers were performing and then having to call her again but Crystle still looked composed at that moment before the fall. Another thing, I want to point out was that some people thought that if the scoring was based on averages of both swimsuit and gown that Crystle would have advanced to top 5 over Russia since she had a high swimsuit score but actually Crystle would have placed 6th and Spain actually would have advanced if the scores were based on averages but the swimsuit scores are erased when the top 10 are announced and they begin competing anew for the top 5 spots. The conspiracy theorist in me that refuses to leave is a little suspicious that Miss USA of all delegates would fall two years in a row. The train itself could have caught the edge of her heel but I'm not going to think about it too much or the fact that it was all over the news the next day. I did sense that something would happen to keep Crystle from the Miss Universe crown and this ended up being it. Next followed Dominican Republic and I was glad that she made it and that she wore this gown because I was just aching to know how people would react to it. It was the notorious see-through gown with conveniently placed bits of mirror also worn by a previous Miss Venezuela contestant. Marianne was very daring to wear such a sexy gown and I admired that and it ended up propelling her to the top 3. Russia followed in a cleaned up version of Oxana Fedorova's gown but she ended up looking like a total wannabe and lacked originality. Italy followed a basic black gown with the scarf around the neck but again she was just there and had no really strong presence. Venezuela completed the competition with the vibrant yellow gown reflecting her sunny personality and I loved the twirl she did to flutter and open up the skirt. 'This show really is live.' declared Mel B. after witnessing Crystle Stewart's fall.
Dominican Republic was asked by Donald Trump Jr. what the biggest sacrifice she ever had to make and how she handled it. Dominican Republic greeted the Vietnamese audience and then through her translator said that in reality, she has had to work since she was really young since her parents were divorced and it's very difficult to leave childhood behind. Notwithstanding, the fact she feels the sacrifices are well worth it because she saw her mother up there in the audience crying for her and she has continued and everything has been worth it. It was also a nice answer. Next up was Mexico who was asked her question by Roberto Cavalli. The camera did this extreme closeup of him giving this creepy, borderline ravenous/wolvish look to Miss Mexico after he asked 'Mi amore', when a woman is truly (cue horny sigh)... satisfied???... We could see his hand holding the microphone but I want to know where his other hand was since it seemed like it was holding his 'other microphone' if you know what I mean... I was just in stitches after seeing the way he asked this question and the interesting thing is Cavalli has judged several times before and even married the 1st runner up to Miss Universe 1977, Eva Duringer of Austria. Elisa handled it very well though and calmly greeted the Vietnamese audience. She said she thinks a woman can feel satisfied when she has a balance in her life, when she has mind, soul and all the feelings at the same level. It's important to have a balance between family, between your job and between your community. I will say that I was surprised that Mexico ended up 4th runner up after giving this answer. Perhaps it was because Cavalli was expecting a different type of answer or maybe it had something to do with the booing that Miss USA had to endure last year when the pageant was held in Mexico and this was some sort of background way of punishing those members of that audience. Russia was asked by Eesha Koppikhar if there is still discrimination against women and what can be done about it. Using her translator, Russia answered that she thinks that in our times women have become smarter and stronger so she thinks women can not only have a successful career but raise wonderful children and I think in our time, women will be better. Russia managed to sneak ahead even further to the 3rd runner up position.
