Filipino Pride: The Apprentice Asia & FIBA Asia

The Apprentice Asia

I used to tune in the Apprentice in its early days. I know Donald Trump can be cheesy but what can I say? The concept of a business/entrepreneurial reality show is just something that interests me despite it's potential cheesiness. 

I haven’t tuned in to any of that last few seasons though so I really didn't make a point of tuning in to the Asian version until I found out a Filipino won. I was able to watch a replay of the season finale on AXN. I must say, Jonathan Yabut makes me proud. His performance on the show was impressive and his personal story is a good one.

"you're hired"

He mentioned that he was also a fan of the show from its early days and was familiar how the game was played and so he played it well. His opponent, the Singaporean lawyer, strikes me to be very true to her roots, in that Singaporeans are seen to be more stiff and more clinical. The stereotype is that they are achievers and competitors, yes, but are also seen as too academic. During the final task and the last boardroom interview, it seemed to me that the Singaporean girl somewhat cracked and at some point she was in tears. She kept on saying she has a mix of smarts and emotions. I don’t know if that convince me. I guess, it didn’t convince Mr. Fernandes either.   

Meanwhile Jonathan Yabut mentioned that he used a brand of Filipino "diskarte" with regards to his strategy. And, really, in life and in business, it can't be all straight laced rules. Life is unpredictable, circumstances are unpredictable and certainly business is unpredictable. So, I suppose a pinch (or more so) of "diskarte" is a good thing to utilize in The Apprentice. 

Jonathan Yabut is certainly a good story. He was educated through scholarships and remained an achiever through his stints in the corporate world.  After his Apprentice win, he was quoted as saying "When I wear this Filipino flag pin, it's not because I'm too nationalistic. It's because I want to serve as that inspiration to the rest of my country that there is hope, that I represent that hope in them, sir. That despite the fact that you may be from poor beginnings, you can make it big"

I don’t know, but it’s these things, (relatively) small victories that we Filipinos also should celebrate.

I like the idea of Jonathan Yabut. His message is simple yet it is positive and it is about hope.

He is a positive representation of the country, a nice counter image to all the negative things that the world has assumed / may assume about Filipinos.

FIBA ASIA

Round 2, Group E rank #1 team is the Philippines!

Must say, the sometime sports groupie that I am was quite happy that I was able to catch the game that put our team in the top spot (Philippines vs. Hong Kong) despite the fact that it was such a terribly slow and sadly pathetic game.

More than half of the time Hong Kong was playing poorly and, unfortunately, the Philippines played worse than them. For a while, I wasn’t sure what to think (because I haven’t watched any of the FIBA games so far). So I was like: Was our team so poorly formed? Why is this group of guys playing worse than UAAP teams? Isn’t this supposed to be the national team? How did we even win our other games? How did we get to round 2? So the other countries were even worse than these 2?! What is happening?!

SLOW: Hong Kong vs. Philippines 3rd Quarter - 37 vs 36 score!

Afterwards, I read online that apparently some players got injured and were sore after the Philippines vs. Qatar game. So the plan was for these star players to get reduced playing time while the other players are left to work against Hong Kong, which hasn't won a game in round 2. Unfortunately, this plan backfired when Hong Kong actually tried to play to win, even if it won't make a difference for their standing (they will be eliminated regardless).

BUT ANYWAY, it all ends well as the Philippines eventually won against Hong Kong and, as a bonus, topped Group E in round 2. So, it’s on to the Quarterfinals against Kazakhstan we go on Friday.

Little victories – is what I said that we should celebrate so, ok, let’s celebrate this first then.

First place in Group E: feels like 2^nd place overall, for now.