Looking for the fur to fly and the claws to come out? Maybe not. Looking for something classier where mature, elegant women try to gracefully outdo each other? This could be it: the battle of the ‘renaissance’ women – 28 and above – tonight at the National Cultural Centre for the Ms Guyana Renaissance title.
The pageant, which is promoted as one with a difference, provides a stage for mature, multi-tasking, with-it women and it promises to be an entertaining evening with the ‘older girls’ doing their thing in different segments including talent.
The pageant is coordinated by Negla Brandis and is being held under the theme ‘Visions of our Culture’. It is expected that tonight the ladies will showcase their accomplishments, inner beauty, leadership skills, cultural awareness and talent. Each of them had to research some aspect of Guyana, base their talent piece on what they would have learnt so that it reflects some aspect of Guyana’s culture in dance, song, poetry or monologue or by playing a musical instrument.
So who would it be tonight? Who will woo the judges and the crowd and walk away with the coveted crown to be chosen the mature queen of the year? There are eleven of them trying to take that crown and it promises to be a showdown worth every dollar.
Would it be the Caricom Secretariat receptionist, Nicola Meyers who is a mother of two and had told us she was doing it just for the fun?
But then the International Relations University of Guyana (UG) student will have to ensure that she steals the limelight from the youngest of the lot, Diann Williams, who is a second-year student at the Cyril Potter College of Education.
However, the 28-year-old teacher does not have the crown sewn up solely because of her age because up comes 47-year-old Gillian Dyer who is also a teacher moulding the nation’s children with her job at the Sacred Heart Primary School.
Dyer had said the pageant is a challenge as she is competing against younger women but from what we heard this woman is certainly a force to reckon with. And then again they all have to face off against the 38-year-old UG final year student, Dawn Edwards, who in addition to being part of the pageant has been recording reggae and gospel genres as she loves to sings and sees herself as a singer.
But how can you rule out Audrey Thompson, the administrative assistant at the Ethnic Relations Commission (ERC) who views the pageant as a “breath of fresh air”?
The 40-year-old is also a second-year Social Work student at UG and she and the others have to come good against the ‘funny and down to earth’ 35-year-old Acting Assistant Commissioner of the Guyana Revenue Authority, Simone Beckles.
While Simone sees herself as a ‘people’ person she would certainly have to do well to win over the hearts of the judges ahead of the 29-year-old Lourianne Pluck, who has some experience under her belt in the world of pageantry. Pluck, a poolside hostess at Le Meridien Pegasus Hotel and also a customer representative at Zermatt, had told The Scene that she started modelling since she was six-years-old and has entered many pageants and won a few crowns to boot including Miss Berbice, Miss Lions Emancipation and was the first runner-up in the 2001 Miss African Heritage.
Freelance journalist and home-based care coordinator at the Linden Care Foundation, Cathy Wilson also stands a chance of carting off the coveted crown. The 34-year-old Wilson, a mother of five, has so far said she is enjoying the pageant.
Then there is Leslie Quallis, the revenue management supervisor at the Guyana Power & Light Company who like some others has entered a pageant for the first time. The 43-year-old would not have entered the pageant if she had to parade on stage in a bathing suit but fortunately for her the ‘big girls’ don’t have to do this.
There is also Barbara Marshall but unfortunately The Scene does not have much information on this Guyana Micro Project employee but from all indications and what we have heard she is not to be ruled out of the contest.
And last but certainly not least, is Gem Sanford-Johnson, the lawyer who wears many hats as the President of the Guyana Association of Women Lawyers, the Vice President of the Guyana Bar Association, and Vice President of the Organization of Commonwealth Caribbean Bar Associations (OCCBA), a Director on the Legal Aid Board and a member of the Rotary Club of Demerara. She was the only delegate who kept her age a secret but age is only a number – no barrier and this contestant has what it takes.
So let the countdown begin and may the best renaissance candidate win!
