Miss SVG 2000 - Juanita Phillips
Being crowned Ms SVG 2000 was one of the high points in my life. The experience was a pleasurable one and the support given were very encouraging, I owe special thanks to my sponsor Mr. Benjie Cottle and family, Ms. Angenella Young and Ms Idinga Miller and most importantly my mom Ms Anetha Phillips and sister Ms. Coleen Phillips, Tiwanda Roberts (niece), Mr. Shawn Jack, Mr. David ‘darkie’ Williams, to my close friends they know who they are and also to those who have not been mentioned. Many thanks to Ms. Sheridan Lewis for featuring me in this segment of her course work.
Wearing the crown of Ms. SVG was a tremendous honour; I truly consider the title to be of great importance. I anticipated doing well in the pageant whether or not it was in the favor of the judges ruling to give me the title or not. Thankfully it was.
Once in a Life Time Experience
Like any other participating contestant who have taken part in pageants, the nerves always tend to have you even towards the end of the show when you hear the Announcer/MC says “ And this years Miss (Whatever the tile is) is Miss… it’s nerve racking, trust me, but more than any other experience I’ve had with being nervous or scared, I know I had to confront my fears of having to deal with going out there and giving it my best, and especially having to deal with a crowd filled with mixed personalities, cause its obvious that everyone who witnesses the show is not rooting for you as there are other contestants, but its even those set of people you would want to try and win over as strange as it may sound. We really do much more work than people realize in preparing for these shows and that’s the best part cause we walk out of it with more experience than we expected.
Just a few words to share with young women who aspire entering the World of Pageantry, I will tell you it is a once in a lifetime experience. It’s about setting goals for yourself, (in this case the goal would be to win). Pageants are also very trying, you’ll get lack of sleep, have sick days, there may be contestants you can’t tolerate, but its all about being open to new life experiences, visiting new places, meeting new people and building on the life long friendships, cause I still have friends from pageants who I call, chat online etc., experiencing different cultures/weather patterns; and the best part for me was to try different foods/meals provided.
New Awakenings
Never mind that being involved in these shows has its disadvantages, you just have to know how to turn them around so that they work in your favor, use other peoples mistake to build and learn from them because that’s what pageants are all about being your personal best. This doesn’t necessarily mean that you must degrade or humiliate someone else to be excellent at what you are, but to also share your knowledge, that way things work out in the best interest for you and the other participant/s. All I’m saying is you should really make the best of it do it with no regrets and most importantly because you want to. Yes the product of pageantry is Beauty, Intelligence and maybe Talent, but it’s also about new awakenings.