A beauty pageant is a completion that has traditionally focused on judging and ranking the physical attributes of the contestants, although some contests have also incorporated personality traits, intelligence, talent, and answers to judges’ questions as a judged criteria.

 The history of such competitions may be traced from European festivals dating to the medieval era like the English May day celebrations always involved the selection of a May Queen. In the United States, the May Day tradition of selecting a woman to serve as symbol of bounty and community ideas also reflects the origin of such competitions.

Miss Tourism Tooro has been one such contest. However, some attributes stood out in the recently concluded beauty contest event held at Mountains of the Moon Hotel in Fort Portal.

UNFORGETTABLE SMILES

 These ladies seem to have been trained in the art of smiling. We may have a reason to ask why Mona Lisa became one of the most famous paintings of all time, and one possible answer is: because of her unique smile.

A genuine smile may be rated as a symbol of the highest positive emotional content. I had personally been so reluctant before embracing smiling until a good number of friends expressed concern over my always plain face.

 A genuine smile reduces stress that our bodies and minds feel, which is almost similar to getting a good night sleep. It also helps to generate more positive emotions within us and this is why we should embrace the art of smiling.

Whether the contestants’ smiles were genuine or not is a question for another day.

THE JUDGES' QUESTIONS

 Two questions stood out for me in the whole competition. The first was “who is the prime minister of Tooro Kingdom?” and the second “what is the cultural name given to a place where deceased Tooro kings are buried?” The contestants didn't have the slightest ideas.

Erosion is what happens when running water takes away a piece of the surrounding earth, but what I’m talking about here is called cultural erosion. When this happens, we lose our history, our reference points in life, and lastly the status quo.

As our old self-benefiting ways are being eroded, a new one is being deposited. I'm hopeful that I will like it, but it is with a twinge of nostalgia and fear for the loss of the old; our good culture.

THE OBSCURING MEDIA

 I always appreciate the presence and work of the media houses at such events, but I have an imputed belief that the right of one man to swing his arm ends where another man puts his nose. While doing their work in this event, the media personnel set up their cameras and stood behind them to capture the event. There would not be any issue with this, but the positions they stood in were exactly in front of many viewers. We have already seen some of the lessons that we pick from such events but the obstruction from the media team created some dissatisfaction. We hope to be respected more sometime in future, at future events.

All in all, congratulations to Gace Nyakaana who, on the historical Friday, was crowned Miss Tourism Tooro, after beating other five contestants. She becomes the third tourism ambassador for Tooro region since the regional preliminaries started three years ago.