Becoming Venezuela

A Conga Line Of Suck-Holes?

I note this article today with a bit of a laugh. Depends on how you look at it, Jennifer Hawkins' surprise win as Miss Universe has kind of *inspired* Australia to send its models to the Miss Universe pageant with the hope that something sticks.

Jennifer Hawkins may have got off lightly in a strapless number but her successor, Michelle Guy wasn't so lucky in 2005 in a Crocodile Dundee-inspired get-up.

Then there was last year's contestant, Kimberley Busteed, who paraded for an estimated television audience of 3 billion dressed as a Bondi lifesaver.

This year organisers opted to play it safe, calling on the sleek - and commercially savvy - designer Jayson Brunsdon - to create the costume for the 2008 Australian contestant, Laura Dundovic, to be worn at the finals in Vietnam on July 14.

Yesterday, Dundovic paraded the dress for the first time, a cascading organza number with a wooden boomerang neckpiece, which she described as "very comfortable".

The pageant experience is a first for the 21-year-old model and psychology student from Dural in Sydney's north-west, who was encouraged to enter by her modelling agency.

Dundovic told SiT she was hoping participating in the competition would lead to a media or television career.

And so it goes. Which reminds me of Venezuela, a nation which prides itself on winning such contests. Just looking at Wikipedia, I note that the leader board goes:

USA: 7
Puerto Rico: 5
Venezuela: 4
Sweden: 3
Japan, Australia, India, Trinidad&Tobago, Thailand, Finland, Philippines, Brazil: 2

A closer examination reveals that if you include the 2nd, 3rd and 4th runner ups, Venezuela comes a close second behind the USA. I guess there's a long way to go yet before we start producing the kind of Miss Universe types in the same league as those produced by the beauty pageant power house that is Venezuela.