By Tejas Shastry

People say beauty, or “?ep” in Vietnamese, is only skin deep, and that could be said for all the contestants of the Miss Vietnam Kentucky 2007.

The Vietnamese Alliance of Louisville hosted their first Miss Vietnam Kentucky beauty pageant on Sunday, at Iroquois High School. The pageant was just one part of a program that contained a myriad of performances, all celebrating the dawn of the Vietnamese New Year.

The pageant resembled any other pageant with its traditional dress, swimwear and formal dress competitions. However, in between stages of the pageant were skits and dances that allowed the program to illustrate Vietnamese culture to a crowd more than 900 people.

All 17 contestants of the pageant had different personas and talents that highlighted the large Vietnamese community in south Louisville.

Among the contestants were five University of Louisville students: freshman Tanya Thao Le, a chemistry major, junior Tuyen Minh Nguyen, an interior design major, freshman Trang Hunyh, a freshman accounting major, Duyen Michelle Nguyen, a finance and political science major, and Thuy Huynh.

After three rounds of competition, Duyen Michele Nguyen was named Miss Vietnam Kentucky 2007. “I was so shocked and surprised,” she said.

“The reason this pageant is so important, is because it marks a beginning of a new tradition in the Vietnamese community,” Duyen Michele Nguyen said earlier in the competition.

“As a woman, you only have so many years of youth,” she said, “and you want to embrace that, so when you get older, you can say ‘I was pretty.'”

One highlight was an appearance made by Miss Kentucky 2007 Michelle Banzer, a U of L senior studying computer information system this year, who crowned the winner of Miss Vietnamese Kentucky. In 2006, Banzer, who is half-Vietnamese, became the first minority to ever win the title of Miss Kentucky USA in the state’s history.” I think the pageant went wonderful. Even though it was our first pageant it came together so well,” said Thao Tran, a graduate student in the U of L Kent School of Social Work and a pageant committee member. It was common to find students from the U of L Vietnamese Student Association helping out and organizing the event.

The production also included traditional and modern interpretations of Vietnamese culture, ranging from students dancing to Vietnamese pop music to a dragon dance.

“The pageant was a culturally enriching experience,” said freshman Elizabeth Farrar, a Fine Arts major who attended the event. “It’s nice to know that the contestants from the University of Louisville are still involved in their communities.”

Pageant contestant Le said, “I think it’s important to have an event like this, to help bring the community together.”