107. Miss Italia- I was a Beauty Queen...

Semi-Finals for Miss Padania 19 July 2008
at the Hotel Primavera - Godega- Italy

In the year 1966 I was a Beauty Queen candidate for the Wednesbury College of Commerce Rag Queen Title. The Jury told me I had charm, (I would have said cheek) to sell. However, a five foot nothing individual can’t possibly become a beauty queen, now can she? So I came fifth, which made me feel quite chuffed and was for me my personal revenge on all those males who totally ignored me in the bloom of my years because I looked like someone who suffered from stunted growth instead of a young lady in flower.

If it wasn’t that Italy was playing against Georgia, last night, for the world football championships in 2010, we would have had to put up with another evening of the Miss Italia competition which will be on every evening until the finals on Saturday. There will be dances, songs, special guests, interviews from what these ladies do in their free time to what they eat for breakfast and such totally inconsequential things, for the whole of the near to three hours for each of the four evenings preceding the finals.

Of course so as to give the event some depth they will find some philosophical argument to get these ladies to discuss upon with terrorism, religion, politics and anything personal exempted. At a guess this year it could be anorexia since one young lady has been criticized by the organizers for wearing a size bigger than the minimum one on the adult market. However, being the organizers who have made the criticism, I doubt it such will be chosen. It seems all the “Miss” must be, without exceptions, a bag of bones.

The Local Jury

It’s not that I’m against beauty competitions, even I, was a beauty queen candidate as I mentioned earlier, but I wouldn’t like to say how much such competitions are capable of establishing any kind of beauty and how much depends on bureaucracy. However, to some extent they can be fun even enjoyable, this I can verify personally since I was invited to take photos at one of these semi-finals.

Finalists with owners of the Hotel

Each area has its own Miss to send to join the 100 finalists for the title of Miss Italia who are chosen throughout the summer. Some contests take place on beaches, some in city squares, others, like the one I went to, in hotels. As the hotel premises are too small for a Miss Italia semi-finalist, a special structure was temporarily set up and here a stage, the kind used for fashion parades was erected. The local jury which consisted of the owner of the hotel, members of the Municipal authorities and even my own vet, were sat on make shift tables and chairs in a row beside the stage.

After we saw the girls parade in jeans, evening dresses, sponsors wear, and some musical interludes, came the girls in green bathing suits for the challenge to gain the title of this semi-final called “Miss Padania”, named after the Northern part of Italy which in the times of Cato (230 B.C.) was called Gallia.

When all the Miss were selected, from Miss Long Legs to sponsors products, Miss Padania was elected and got to pose with the rest of the winners and any of the jury who were still around and awake.

I think in my next entries I will concentrate on other beauties that can be found around here- starting from the hotel itself where the competition took place... The owners here have inserted a feature that I have yet to see in any other hotel.