new life with her Italian husband and a world of options awaits this hardworking former beauty queen and TV host

When Miriam Quiambao said "I do" on January 9 to her Italian boyfriend Claudio Rondinelli, she didn't just embrace a new life as wife. More significantly, she said goodbye to five years of hectic, non-stop work as television host, which in turn started practically right after she placed first runner-up in the even more significant (in our culture, at least) Miss Universe beauty pageant, in 1999. "I haven't had a vacation in five year! And now I'm thinking of being selfish, just traveling, enjoying R&R," she tells Metro a few days after her wedding in Boracay, and a day before she was to fly to Maldives, where she was to spend her honeymoon.

The lucky guy Rondinelli, is an Italian businessman based in Hong Kong for 14 years now, whom she met through fashion designer Rhett Eala. She was borrowing a gown from Eala, whom she had only known for a month, to wear to the 2001 Star Awards, where she as nominated for her hosting job in Unang Hirit. Quiambao remembers how, two days before the Star Awards, Eala excitedly told her about his single friend looking to date a model. "He had a picture of Claudio in his back pocket, and he just pulled it out and showed it to me," she says. He was good-looking, she says, but her eyes-and most probably her heart-were set on someone else at that time. Rondinelli was to arrive a day after, and, because Eala insisted, she agreed to meet him.

"Rhett called me, and I was with friends in Nuvo." It was raining, and Rondinelli was having a difficult time negotiating the roads, so Eala suggested that both of them just meet him in his hotel. "And I said, bakit ganoon, para naman ako 'yung lalake. Will a decent Filipina do that?" But since she couldn't say not to Eala, who eventually picked her up in the restaurant, she agreed to meet his Italian friend-only for half an hour, because she was already pooped and wanted to rest.

He wore jeans, a denim jacket and a blue shirt. He was nice, but she really was tired and left early. The next day, Eala called her to say "he was smitten" and that Rondinelli had something for her in the designer's shop. There were six bouquets of pink roses. She was touched. It had been a year and a half since she last got flowers form a man. Her last boyfriend, model Hans Montenegro, was sweet, but he wasn't into giving flowers. On the card, Rondinelli wrote, "Good luck!"

On the night of the awards, she as supposed to meet with Eala and Rondinelli again (turned out he was on another date with a model that time) but Quiambao was so tired that, when she got home, she fell asleep on the sofa in her gown and makeup. She woke up at 2 in the morning in a panic, remembering that she was supposed to meet with Eala and his friend. She called Rondinelli (who was by then apparently finished with his date) and said thank you for the roses, she hadn't received flowers in a while. He said he was glad that she liked the pink roses-and that he would be sending her the same "from now until the next time we meet."

They met after a week (he flew in from Hong Kong especially for that), but in between, he did keep his promise of sending flowers everyday. "Hanggang naubusan na 'yung florist said." When they met the second time, at The Tivoli Grill in Mandarin Oriental, there was a potted red rose on the table. Again, the florist had run out of pink roses! They met at 7 in the evening and stayed until closing time. It was obvious to both that there was something more than chemistry between them.

In a short time, they were already an item. "I'm easy," Quiambao jokes. "Araw-arawin mo lang ako." It helped that, in the past years, she had been dreaming of meeting a companion. "And when I met Claudio, I didn't want to let go of the chance," she says. In fact, a decade ago, she had told herself that she was going to get married at her current age, 28-not that she did anything consciously to reach that target. Things work out in a strange way for Quiambao; she has a special brand of extra-sensory perception about her future. When she was eight, watching a noontime variety show, she declared that she would end up on television. At 10, she blocked the TV set while her aunt was watching the Ms. Universe pageant and shouted, "I'm Miriam Quiambao representing the Philippines!"

All in all, Quiambao and Rondinelli had known each for just over a year before they tied the not. Actually, says Quiambao, he had proposed to her three months after they officially became an item-"but I didn't want it to be a whirlwind relationship, so I told him to ask me again in six months." He got back to her after the ninth month, by which time he had already build a new house in Hong Kong for them. "It's in Kowloon, with a view of a mountain in the back and the Hong Kong court on December 21, and in a church in Boracay two weeks after.

Quiambao was hands-on when it came to preparing for the church wedding. They chose wedding vows that captured what they essentially wanted to express, "being together but still cherishing our individuality." They chose Boracay because they both love the water and she wanted to "lounge around and not worry about how I look." It was a simple wedding with only 100 guests, close friends and first-degree family members. "Our friends said that it was the simplicity that made it beautiful," she says. She wore a Rhett Eala and a pair of Jimmy Choo stilettos, which she took off for the beachside reception.

They are both simple people, and Quiambao is relieved that there isn't much of a cultural divide between them. "As they say, Italian are the Filipinos of Europe and Filipinos are the Italians of Asia." Rondinelli is 34 and grew up in Thienne, although he now stays in Treviso, "a small but rich city near Venice" where he goes four times a year. He is very private, but not shy. Apart from his merchandising business(he sells expensive promotional items to big European companies), he also runs a restaurant-and-wine bar called Di'Vino in the Lan Kwai Fong area.

Clockwise form top left: Miriam and Claudio enjoying the beachside reception. She wore Rhett Eala; getting married at the Holy Rosary Church in Boracay; the bride-to-be watching two boys make a sand castle; the sand castle finished; Instead of a limousine, the couple rode a golf cart; she took off her Jimmy Choo stilettos as soon as she left the church and slipped on a mother of pearl and Swarovski crystal slave anklet; the couple cutting their wedding cake; and fun-filled reception where the men did the limbo rock.

Quiambao describes her husband as "charming and sweet and generous with himself." One time, when they were in Hong Kong, he was running late for a meeting, and she was till blow-drying her hair. He brought her breakfast and orange juice and spoon-fed her while she was blow-drying. "Amore, you're so sweet," she told him. "Amore, I just want to hurry up," he replied.

After their honeymoon, Quiambao will fly back to Manila to finish taping her lifestyle program on TV called "All About You". After that she will be based in Hong Kong but traveling a lot; they plan to go to Italy to ski, to Venice to attend Mai-Mai Cojuangco's wedding, later even to South Africa. She wants to study again (she is now a licensed physical therapist both in the Philippines and the US), maybe earning a master's degree in business administration. She also wants to learn Italian, and look for another career, perhaps in modeling or broadcast journalism. Whatever Miriam Quiambao ends up doing the next few months or years, one thing if for sure: It's going to be all about her-and she deserves it. - -