MANILA – Basketball superstar Kobe Bryant captivated the hearts of tens of thousands of Filipino fans during his one-day stay in Manila to promote his new line of shoes and to encourage kids to pursue their dream in sports.

“I love Manila,” a beaming Bryant told a crowd that started gathering at 6 a.m. Sept. 5 outside a store in Taguig City. “The energy here is off the charts,” said the star of the Los Angeles Lakers.

Manila was the first stop of his tour of Asian nations sponsored by Nike.

Bryant’s first trip to the Philippines was a decade ago. Bryant arrived at 6 p.m. Sept. 4 by private jet and alighted near the International Cargo Terminal of the Ninoy Aquino International Airport where he was photographed by a select group of photographers and TV crew. The protocols adopted have been described as more restrictive than those enforced during visits of heads of state, diplomats and other dignitaries.

However, no interviews were allowed.
The plane was a 10-seater Gulf Stream, from Honolulu, Hawaii. He was accompanied by bodyguards.
Bryant’s Manila stop is part of his Supernatural Asia Tour 2007, to launch a basketball footwear named after him. Early the next day, Bryant mingled with children from a Pampanga elementary school at The Fort at 2 p.m. and then “share his training regimen” with young Filipino basketball players at the Philippine Sports Arena later in the afternoon.

Bryant’s next stop was Taipei, Hong Kong, Shanghai and Beijing.
Despite his tarnished record in the US, Filipino kids looked up to him as a role model, a tag that he didn’t try to avoid.
“The important thing to remember when people talk about role models, they assume role models are perfect," Bryant said. “Nobody’s perfect.” The key, he said, is not to duplicate mistakes, and to try to give back to the community with charity and efforts to spread the sport. Talking about competing in the Olympics, Bryant said: “When you have an opportunity to play for your country, it’s even more special. The whole country gets behind you.”

Bryant said he has taken off 20 pounds since the end of the NBA season, partly by paying attention to his diet for the first time. “My primary focus this summer was defense,” he said. “I had to guard smaller, quicker players. I wanted to get back some of the agility I had in 2000,’ without losing strength.
What has he been eating?
“Grass,” Bryant joked, before saying he had to give up fast food and some of his decadent favorites, apple pie with ice cream, chocolate cake and sugar cookies. “I can feel the results already,’ he said.
The Nike store, in the Fort Bonifacio area, was festooned with a poster promoting Bryant’s new shoe, the Kobe II.
At P7,000 (about US$150), the shoes represent about six weeks’ pay for the average Filipino. But the mostly middle-to upper-class crowd waved his jerseys and raised the old model shoe when he came out of the store.
Arms went up as one, cell phones snapping photos.
A jeepney with Bryant’s big photo was also on display in Manila.
Construction workers at two adjacent buildings stopped what they were doing and gathered on the roofs or clung to scaffolding as supervisors tried to get them back on the job.

Bryant, who later gave a basketball clinic, laughed as the crowd chanted his name, then MVP. He appeared to be most touched when children of a school that is getting a new basketball court, donated by Nike, gave him a framed collection of crayon drawings they had done of him.

‘Keep your dreams alive," Bryant said. “Keep going after it.”