That’s me, in the black suit last Saturday night. I’m a VIP at a beauty pageant for university students, a Miss something. When this picture was taken, I had just nervously placed shrouds or ribbons or whatever they’re called on some of the pretty girls you see pictured.
Jealous?
The Vietnamese love beauty pageants. There almost always seems to be some going on around the country at all times (People even run their own on forums and social networks). Many are run by university student associations (which are controlled nationally by the government), and this was actually the second one of those I’d been to this year, in that same building, and the third I’d been to in Vietnam over the last calendar year.
While the idea of looking at pretty girls for a few hours sounds good in concept, it really isn’t. I’d characterize these pageants as:
- Overly long. No matter what the schedule says, it’s going to be late. This late one I went to was running over 1 hr late according to schedule. Even when the organizers know it’s running late, they don’t cut parts to meet schedule, they just let it go on and on. Miss Hanu (Hanoi University) last year went to 1AM in the morning after starting around 7PM! Too many stages, too many painful sections. 2 hrs should be the maximum.
- These pageants don’t really care about the girls. They make them work and get up at 6AM for makeup and parade them around so they can take photos and do things, all for the honor of the schools they represent, but in the end, they don’t take care of them. I’ve seen this behind the scenes.
- They don’t prepare the girls. I feel like these pageants can be torture tests for the girls. Making girls do talent acts when they probably in fact have no special talents they should showcase. Do an interview section in which the girls obviously don’t know how to answer the question. These girls don’t have special people on hand to prepare them and get the ready mentally and physically. These, for the most part, are just normal women. Is it really in their best interest to shove them up there and watch them fail? Is that what an audience wants to see? I want to see the best of these girls, I would hope they enjoy the experience and feel good about themselves afterwards. From what I’ve seen, I really don’t think that’s the case.
I doubt you’re jealous about my VIP status, and nor should you be. It’s a long show, where you feel for the girls, but also hate why there are so many things wrong with the pageant itself. I happened to be a VIP because my company helps sponsor/organize these pageants with universities throughout Vietnam and on Saturday, I had to represent the company to give prizes to some of the winners and have my picture taken.
See below for more pictures, and click here to go directly to the album.
So much sympathy for the ladies, Michael. (;
P.S. Love the new theme. Tres chic!
Thanks! I’ll be writing a post on that soon. Having a guy (not the original author) finish it and hopefully it will be bug free and optimized soon!