Happy Easter everyone!

Dennis, Athena and I just spent the holidays diving and taking in the breathtaking beauty of Palawan. The sights under and above the water were magnificent, a validation of the talent and love of the Great Designer in the heavens.

Taking in these beautiful sights gave me a renewed and brighter appreciation of everything. Nothing like something new and fresh for a better perspective in life—due to a place, or, in Maserati’s case, a brand-new model to show off.

Restyled Maserati

Maserati recently unveiled its 2018 Model Year lineup at the grand ballroom of the Shangri-La at the Fort. The grand launch and festivities were headed by Autostrada Motore Inc. big boss Wellington “Willie” Soong, with VIP guests that included Italian Ambassador Giorgio Guglielmo and Maserati regional sales manager Filippo Caracciolo.

Headlining the 2018 model year lineup is the restyled GranTurismo.

Maserati produces a complete range of unique cars with amazing personality. With their style, technology and innately exclusive character, the cars are immediately recognizable anywhere, delighting the most discerning, demanding tastes, and serving as an automotive industry benchmark.

The brand’s current ambassadors are the Quattroporte flagship in GranLusso and GranSport versions, the Ghibli executive sports sedan, the GranTurismo and GranCabrio sports cars, and the Levante, the first Maserati sport utility vehicle. A complete range as never before, with petrol and Diesel engines, rear or all-wheel drive, the finest materials and outstanding engineering, each of them redefines what makes an Italian sports car in terms of design, performance, comfort, elegance and safety.

Fila collaborations

Maserati also recently gave away three Maserati experiences as prizes at the 12th Fila Polo Cup, held at the Manila Polo Club. The 12th Fila Polo Cup, a mainstay of the Manila Polo Club, closed last March 18, and featured three matches by the country’s finest players.

The well-attended event likewise showcased an exclusive preview of the Fila Summer Collection, which includes the brand’s exciting and landmark move: Its first foray into the Generation Z market, with its Fila X D-Antidote and Fila x Staple collaborations. The D-Antidote is South Korea’s most-talked about brand among this generation of teenagers. Classic Fila colors and lines merge with D-Antidote’s street-smart, hip-hop style, celebrating the link between the cool cities of Seoul and London.

Style and streetwear glam are also showcased in Fila’s collaboration with the Manhattan-based clothing brand Staple.

Fila announced its support for Operation Compassion Philippines—iFoster Movers. Butch and Cris Albert have championed adoption and fostering as a more viable alternative to nurturing disadvantaged children, with nearly two million abandoned or neglected kids out there.

“Instead of placing the child under institutional care, fostering has been found to provide a better quality of nurturing, as the child enjoys a sense of family,” said Butch.

To know more, visit
operationcompassion.ph.

All-Filipino app

Still high on the spirit of helping fellow Filipinos, I was introduced to an app that is all-Pinoy for Pinoys. Recently launched to Pinoy bloggers, Kumu (in Beta) is a messenger app and media platform built by and for the Filipino community.

Kumu, short for Kumusta, is a messaging, calling and an entertainment app—at least for now, according to Ian Galliguez, PR and digital media head.

“In comparison, Facebook has been around for 14 years, Viber and Instagram for eight. There remains a massive but exciting gap between where Kumu is and where we want to be,” she added.

While the app in its baby phase is quite impressive (especially the six-way video calling; plus, it’s free), the people behind Kumu are banking on the community to help them build the app to what users would need. Consider this our digital bayanihan.

Led by young and passionate Pinoys from the United States and the Philippines, Kumu is poised to be in a good position, with the changing algorithms of Facebook, Instagram and Snapchat having left a lot of users unhappy with what they see on their timelines.

At Kumu, the vision is to harness the full promise of the internet and digital technology to unlock the power of the Filipino people. The internet can build stronger communities rather than divide them, make life easier instead of distracting us from what matters. Digital media can inspire us and broaden our imaginations. Kumu hopes to be a vehicle to make these possibilities real, and be a platform for the future of the Filipino community.

Kumu is now available on Google Play and App Store. Visit kumu.ph.

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at @seaprincess888.