Naijasinglegirl: Beauty pageant gone sour

During my first year in the university, I fell prey to the virus called October rush.

When the boys were not worshipping me, the girls were trying to cajole me into becoming their ‘little friend’.

I was on top the world. My new found ego also affected my behaviour at home. I no longer got involved in domestic chores like ‘the dishes’.
I mean why should I? When I was a princess in a 5,000 plus organisation.

One day, one of my male admirers handed me a poster.
It was a call for contestants for a beauty pageantry.
The star prize was a sleek red KIA motor for the queen.

”You are beauty and brains. You must contest! It would be an honour to manage you at no cost”

That was him trying to convince me.

That evening, I downloaded a photo of the KIA and photoshopped a picture of me inside.
Oh boy! We were a perfect match.

My challenge was, I didn’t have sufficient money to take care of my form and costumes.
I had to lie to my dad I needed money to undertake a GST project.

“A project in your first year? Which University does that” he yelled.

Notwithstanding his suspicions, he still handed me the money as he’s not the sort of person to withhold any resources needed for his children academic pursuit.

The day I went to pick up my form, panicked gripped me immediately I stepped into the office.
The chief organiser was far from what I expected.
He had the face of a thief!
He had use yellow dye to color one side of his hair and his oversized suit coupled with his thin frame made him look like a yahoo boy that has been through a lot.
When he noticed I was skeptic to part with my money, he told me these magic words.

”My God, the driver seat of the KIA motor will fit this your small fine body. Or won’t you like to ride it to school?”

I happily handed him my money and tipped him extra eight hundred naira.

They never bothered to camp us which was an offbeat for a typical beauty pageant.

Finally, it was the evening of the pageant.
I didn’t sight any KIA motor at the venue but I was still hopeful I was going to ride out with one.

We were nine contestants. I was contestant no 1.

First feature of the night was the unity dance. The DJ played Terry G’s ‘free madness’ while we freestyled in disunity .

Man!

I’m one of the worst dancers to begin with and I had already planned on putting efforts on other segments to make up for this.
While other girls were performing mad stunts. I was in one corner moon walking to ‘free madness’ while the crowd guffawed at contestant No1.

May the good Lord forgive me for my extremely terrible performance.

Next major segment was the talent display.
Prior to that, the MC told us to pick stage names for ourselves.
We were going to be addressed by those names rather than our number tags.
I picked the name ‘Lady Gaga’.

“Contestant No1 aka Lady GaGa, come show us what you got.” The MC announced.

My talent was acting. I had come to play the part of a prostitute.
As I made to begin, I scanned the crowd briefly.
That was when I saw them!
My parents in the second row!
What the hell were they doing there? How did they find out?
I almost collapsed in shock

 

It was too late to back down.

My parents presence made my talent take a 360 degrees turn.

I began playing the role of a pastor’s wife, preaching the gospel to the crowd with my shaky voice and watery eyes while the crowd laughed at the born again Lady Gaga.
Once again, I messed up so bad!

Eventually, it was time for the last segment. Our intelligence test.

We were told to appear in our dinner gowns .

“Contestant no1 aka Ladyyyy Gagaaa, which year was Nigeria born?”
“Ermmmmm…” I began stuttering.

My nervousness had affected my intelligence.
“19….60″ I spewed out after seconds of stammering.

“Oh nooooo” the crowd chorused.

I gave my father a cursory look.

The angry look he returned jolted my memory to 1914.

 

 

At that point, I just wanted the ground to swallow me completely.

In one night I had moved from hero to zero.

The red KIA was no longer my priority cos I knew I had lost all chances of ending up even as a runner up. All I needed back was my huge ego.

Winners were announced and just like I predicted, I came 9th position.

I took what was left of my dignity and hobbled backstage in shame, completely oblivious my parents had followed me.

The followed conversation ensued.

“Lady GaGa will you stop there!” My father ordered.

“Nigeria was born in. . . 1914″ I stuttered.

“Who asked you? So this is the GST project you used my hard earned money for LadyGaga. You thought your father is a stupid man?”

“I wanted to surprise you people with a car” I replied tearfully.

“Oya bring the car you won and drive us home. Idiot!”

One week after, while I doing my time, (I was sentenced to the kitchen indefinitely with hard labour)
I was told the chief organiser was also cooling his heels in Kirikiri.
The pageant was all a sham.
Aside the huge money we paid for forms, he also duped our supposed sponsor and got an extra N50000 from the queen to ship in her ‘imaginary’ KIA motor.
Pride had taught me the hard way.