Miss International, Day #4/ Interviews and Teen Prelims

This was by far one of the most nerve-racking days yet. The pageant interview tends to be equally as terrifying as it is exhilarating for me. I love being able to share the ‘real me’ in a face-to-face conversation with the five people who hold a portion of my destiny in their hands, but with that being said no matter how much you prepare there is always a smidge of unknown and the reality that you just might not be the person that they are looking for this year. All you can do is prepare to be the best possible version of yourself and hope that the title is part of God’s plan for your life.

I felt as ready as I possibly could have been walking into those interviews (well aside from the hair crisis that I found myself in that morning!) and was thrilled with the way that the interviews unfolded. Looking back on the experience I am confident that the job of Miss International just wasn’t supposed to be part of my story; I couldn’t have been more prepared. The truth is that all of us were there that weekend following the same dream of becoming Miss International 2013; obviously only one of would walk away from the experience with the large, oversize crown though. What I found to be most important thing that I took away from this experience was the knowledge that dreams change lives. The world is a much more beautiful place when you are motivated and striving to better yourself. I literally woke each morning, and went to sleep each night of the months leading up to the pageant with a smile plastered on my face! How lucky was I to get the opportunity to represent the beautiful state of California for an international title? I walked in believing that I was a winner, and today the same belief holds true; I’ve said it once, I’ll say it again, a wise person of my past stressed to me that a crown and sash doesn’t bring worth to a person, it’s the person who wears them that bring value to the title, not the other way around. We all hopefully walked away better people from this tremendous experience! 

After interviews we rehearsed the show again, and that evening us Miss contestants got the opportunity to sit in the audience and cheer on our teen-queens as the took the stage for their preliminary competition. I might be a little biased, but my teen-queen, Jayne Giest, rocked the stage!