Gabriele Raine Abellana Baljak (born 1996) is a Filipino-Australian former beauty queen. She was Miss Cebu 2016, and is a

public speaker Public speaking, is the practice of delivering speeches to a live audience. Throughout history, public speaking has held significant cultural, religious, and political importance, emphasizing the necessity of effective rhetorical skills. It all ...

model A model is an informative representation of an object, person, or system. The term originally denoted the plans of a building in late 16th-century English, and derived via French and Italian ultimately from Latin , . Models can be divided in ...

researcher Research is creative and systematic work undertaken to increase the stock of knowledge. It involves the collection, organization, and analysis of evidence to increase understanding of a topic, characterized by a particular attentiveness to ...

and

scholar A scholar is a person who is a researcher or has expertise in an academic discipline. A scholar can also be an academic, who works as a professor, teacher, or researcher at a university. An academic usually holds an advanced degree or a termina ...

Early life

Baljak was born in

Sydney Sydney is the capital city of the States and territories of Australia, state of New South Wales and the List of cities in Australia by population, most populous city in Australia. Located on Australia's east coast, the metropolis surrounds Syd ...

Australia Australia, officially the Commonwealth of Australia, is a country comprising mainland Australia, the mainland of the Australia (continent), Australian continent, the island of Tasmania and list of islands of Australia, numerous smaller isl ...

, and moved to

Cebu City Cebu City, officially the City of Cebu, is a Cities of the Philippines#Legal classification, highly urbanized city in the Central Visayas region of the Philippines. According to the 2020 census, it has a population of 964,169 people, making ...

Philippines The Philippines, officially the Republic of the Philippines, is an Archipelagic state, archipelagic country in Southeast Asia. Located in the western Pacific Ocean, it consists of List of islands of the Philippines, 7,641 islands, with a tot ...

as a child. She is also of Croatian descent. She attended

Cebu International School Cebu International School (CIS), was founded as the Cebu American School in 1924, and renamed in 1973. It is a co-educational day school, non-profit, non-sectarian institution, governed by a ten-member Board of Trustees. The current legal status ...

and is currently attending the

University of South Australia The University of South Australia is a public research university based in Adelaide, South Australia. Established in 1991, it is the successor of the former South Australian Institute of Technology. Its main campuses along North Terrace are ...

(UniSA).

Miss Cebu 2016

On the first night she was awarded two of the four awards given, Miss

Epson Seiko Epson Corporation, commonly known as Epson, is a Japanese multinational electronics company and one of the world's largest manufacturers of printers and information- and imaging-related equipment. Headquartered in Suwa, Nagano, Japan, t ...

for her knowledge of Cebuano history and Best in Funwear in her two-piece creation by Mike Yapching. On the final evening she was named as

ABS-CBN ABS-CBN is a leading Philippine media and content company. It serves as the flagship media brand of ABS-CBN Corporation, a subsidiary of Lopez Holdings Corporation. Once the country's largest free-to-air television network, ABS-CBN has since ...

's Kapamilya Star of the Night and Best in Evening Gown wearing designer Dino Lloren.

Researcher and scholar

While at UniSA, Baljak was awarded th
UniSA Vacation Research Scholarship
resulting in her first co-authorship for an editorial publication focused on 'Healthy Sleep and Nursing' in the Australian Journal of Advanced Nursing. Then in December 2023, Baljak was awarded th
New Colombo Plan Scholarship
program by the Australian Government.

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Baljak, Raine 1996 births Filipino female models Australian female models Models from Sydney Living people Filipino health activists Filipino women activists Austrian health activists Austrian women activists Cebuano beauty pageant winners People from Cebu City