Ambitious 24-year-old Renee´ Chester who is no stranger to the local fashion and pageant industries will be Guyana’s representative at this year’s Miss Global International Pageant billed for September 26 at the Grand Palladium Resort and Spa Hotel, Jamaica.
A confident Renee´ said that she remains steadfast and focused on the goal ahead since she knows she has just what it takes to outshine her 31 competitors as she plans to heat up the catwalk and bring home the crown for Guyana along with the coveted first prize of US$5,000.
Additionally, the winner can be expected to walk away with several other prizes, including passes to a number of Jamaica’s popular tourist attractions such as the Kool Runnings Water Park, Dolphin Cave, and Dunn’s River Falls just to name a few.
The winner of the pageant will also have a chance to visit London via a one year contract with London-based ‘In-style Model Management’ entity; one of the international sponsors of the pageant. Here, the queen will be provided with a wardrobe and a chance at developing the art of modelling.
The winning Miss, in addition to being crowned and capturing the first prize, will also be given the opportunity of selecting a charitable organisation of her choice in her country and to aid in developing that organisation.
In a recent chat with The Scene, the South Ruimveldt Gardens resident said that she is blessed with “beauty and brains”, a rare combination these days. As she puts it, her possession of these qualities is the trademark of a true queen and the hallmark upon which a beauty pageant stands.
It is a passion for fulfilling a personal venture of building self-esteem and representing Guyana on the international scene that has led the young woman to be a participant in this the twenty sixth staging of the pageant.
Founded and organized by national Jamaican franchise holder Lachu Ramchandani, the pageant which will see thirty two countries participating this year is aimed at giving each participant a chance to showcase their country’s tourist potential.
In keeping with the theme of this year’s pageant of “promoting and celebrating tourism through beauty and intelligence,” Renee´ said that she intends to make her country proud by marketing its unique tourist potential in order to sell Guyana as a viable tourist product and the ultimate tourism destination.
“I intend to put Guyana and its tourism potential on the map through my beauty and intelligence,” the Miss Global International hopeful said.
Renee´, who said that she has a passion for fashion, is known locally for participating in local advertisements, modelling and dancing. Additionally, she has been featured as a model in the Caribbean’s She Magazine. She has also taken part in fashion and modeling in Suriname, St Vincent, Trinidad, Venezuela and Barbados. “I am very excited, confident and anxious. I’m not nervous yet, but even with a few butterflies in my stomach, I know that I am capable of winning this competition,” Renee´ said when asked about her level of preparedness for the event.
When asked about the unique capability she possesses that can give her the edge over her competitors, she responded, “that would definitely be my persistence and resilience in rising to any challenge”.
Meanwhile, Wendy Walcott, local franchise holder of the pageant with whom The Scene spoke, said that she is confident that Renee´ will be an exemplary ambassador for Guyana and ultimately whisk away the crown because of the confidence she has in herself and the experience she brings to the game, having participated in pageants before.
Acknowledging that not many persons are aware of the pageant, Walcott who was Guyana’s 2006 participant in the pageant, placing among the top-ten said that she will be working diligently over the next year on properly organising the event so that Guyana’s participation can be an annual one.
According to Walcott, unlike the random mode of selection that was used for Renee´s participation at the pageant this year, a local pageant will be held in the future from which the ideal participant will be selected based on criteria to represent Guyana at Miss Global International. The franchise holder told The Scene that auditions for next year’s pageant to determine who will represent Guyana will commence by the end of the year. She said that this year, 24 models were selected by local Storm Talent Agency and after interviews were conducted, Renee´ was selected as the best among the lot.
Walcott said that she intends to make this pageant one with a difference by ascribing to it international pageantry standards.
The franchise holder told The Scene that Renee´ will be sponsored by local Storm Talent Agency in addition to Designers Olympia Small Sonaram and Deryck Moore including other international bodies such as House of Collection by Rodney Prescott and Ripper Water Sport which are both Barbadian companies for which Renee´ models.
Renee´ leaves for Jamaica on September 21, one week ahead of the grand finale where she will participate in the preliminaries of the pageant which includes the talent and national costume segments. On pageant night, the contestants will then compete in the swimsuit, evening gown and intelligence segments.
According to Walcott, it is her desire to make it publicly known that the event will be a properly organized annual one and will see participants participating every year as opposed to previous years when on occasions Guyana had no representative at the event.
