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Negative comments and weight
Comfortably seated on a luscious cream sofa in her Almond Street home and sipping a cup of tea -- her two-month-old son peacefully resting in a car seat opposite her -- Mandy first spoke about some of the comments made when she won and how she reacted to them.
"It's hard to figure out what the ratio of positive comments to negative comments were at the time. Because... even though [the negative comments] might just have been five per cent of the comments it would seem to be so much bigger because you are taking it very personal," Mandy said.
But she recalled that people were really nice to her after she won. "I remember anywhere I went people would come out on the streets and wish me luck just like that. People I didn't know, I mean, vendors on the road and taxi drivers. It was a really wonderful thing, so I have to say that I had a lot of positive comments.
"The few negative comments that I had I think came from the fact that everybody's idea about beauty is different. So not everybody is satisfied with what you portray as beauty, especially when you are portraying beauty for a country like Guyana which has six races and different ideas of what traditional beauty is."
She pointed out that it would have been hard to satisfy everyone, but noted that from a bloodline point of view she would have satisfied most. Mandy is of mixed race.
Mandy said the one negative comment that she remembers most was that she needed to be slimmer. "There is nothing to do except lose weight. I mean there is no whining about it or saying it is not true. What you have to realise is that you are going for a beauty pageant; that's what you are going for. I mean when you signed up, you signed up for a beauty pageant, you didn't sign up for a personality contest or something like that. So you have to try and be not everybody's idea of beauty but certainly the more obvious. And unfortunately the world is not just ready for generously proportioned beauty right now."
Mandy said she entered the pageant at 144 pounds and she arrived in London at 128, losing some 16 pounds for the Miss World contest. And how did she do it? Her mother put her on a strict protein diet which did the trick.
"It is hard when people are telling you, you look fat, and you have just won a beauty pageant", she said. Tapping her fingers on her temple as she spoke, Mandy said the truth is there are many rules to winning a beauty pageant on the local level, but the rules at the international level are very different. According to her the national competition exposes more of the girl's personality, her culture, her hopes and dreams and things that make her human, as well as her physical appearance. "But it does more of the personal, human side than the international pageant. When you go to that international pageant, before you get to open your mouth and say I am really nice and I have a great character, you [have] got to be beautiful; because that is the entrance qualification. After that they are going to find out about your personality and your winning ways."
Mandy, who is 5 ft 10 ins -- the same height as Rahaman -- said it was important to note that at that height 128 pounds is underweight for a normal person, but regular weight for a beauty queen.
At present Rahaman weighs 149 pounds and her trainers are hoping that she would weigh 133 pounds by May 29. Mandy said while it may prove to be difficult for Rahaman, it is possible as she lost some 15 pounds within 14 days. Mandy gleefully recalled that at 128 pounds she could have jumped into any swimsuit. "You are not shy anymore. I mean you couldn't get me to put on a swimsuit for love or money, but at 128, man you want bikini I will wear a bikini."
Mandy on Mia
Mandy knows Mia but did not see the pageant. She says Mia's strong points are "she has this very sparkly, energetic personality. She's got confidence. She speaks well. She is bright. She smiles. And she is very outgoing -- that is one of her best things."
According to Mandy, if Mia lost weight it would amplify her personality and would give her that added burst of potential.
Asked what advice she would want to give Mia in dealing with the criticisms levelled at her, Mandy said "... It is also thought that criticism is not always well-intentioned, but just because it is not well-intentioned does not mean it is not useful."
She pointed out that someone might criticise you for the worst possible reason, but it might be the truth. She said it was hard to get past what one might feel is a personal negative attack, but if enough people say the same thing then it might be something one would want to look at and work on.
She warned Mia that there would be lots of criticism and even though she might hear good things she would feel that all she is getting is criticism. "And it is part of the game, it is unavoidable and you have just got to put your head down and remember what the job is [that] you went there to do. No matter who says what...."
A bit of a blur
What does Mandy remember about that September 10 night when she was crowned Miss Guyana?
"I remember going through the pageant almost in a bit of a blur," Mandy said. She said that unknown to the audience, so many things happen backstage. One she could vividly remember was that the one girl's sponsor did not turn up with her national costume so she put on someone's old dress, tied her head in a bandana and plucked up the courage to go out on stage and gave it her all. "Now if I didn't get my national costume that was made for me, I do not know if I would have been brave enough," she said.
Mandy said she had lost so much weight that the gown that she finally wore, which was strapless, had a hard time staying up because she was so slim. "So I spent the whole night with my hands glued to my sides trying to keep the dress up." Mandy still has the dress hanging in her wardrobe, but she can't wear it now.
When they announced the second runner and then Prudence Lewis as the first-runner-up it took her a few seconds to realise that she had actually won.
"It was such a wonderful night (laughs). That pageant was one of the bravest things I have ever done in my life," she declared.
She said Banks DIH was the best sponsor in the world since she was made to feel as if she were a princess before she had won. She had a chauffeur-driven mini van before the pageant and it was equipped with a bar and the driver was at her disposal.
"They spoilt me rotten, rotten," she said.
Not competitive
How has Mandy's life progressed since that day in 1988?
The young woman said when she returned from the Miss World, she did not handle the aftermath very well because she had never really been a competitive person. Apart from not being competitive, Mandy said she was not accustomed to trading on just what she looked like. "I had a really hard time with people talking to me as if I was stupid. They assume that if you were in a pageant you are not too smart."
Mandy said that for about a year after she returned she was bulimic (binge eating and throwing up). She said she did not talk about the problem for years, but she finally got herself out of it. Now she is encouraging young ladies who are interested in entering a Miss Guyana pageant who want to know more to feel free to ask her.
"At the time I had nobody to ask and all the people that were involved they really didn't have any idea. The promoters, they didn't know what was involved," she said. According to her, during the period before the Miss World pageant, she was told about all kinds of things about Guyana, but that was not what winning the pageant was about. "None of it is useful for the purpose of winning a pageant, because that's not the kind of question they ask you. They ask you about women's issues, about world events and human crises. So they are going to ask her, how does she feel about women in the work place? What does she think should happen to Miss Universe if she gets pregnant during her reign?" She said Mia would be asked tough questions that she would have to answer on the spot.
After the pageant, Mandy completed her degree in marketing at the University of Florida and returned to Guyana and worked at Laparkan for a while. She then returned to the USA where she completed her MBA, after which she took time off and travelled. "I had a great time," she gushed. She later worked as a financial analyst in the World Trade Center (which collapsed on September 11, 2001) and returned to Guyana in 1997.
She joined Industrial Engineering on the East Coast where she is still employed.
She first met her prince charming in 1992, but it was a very brief encounter. She met him again in 1998 and the romance blossomed. She married Godfrey Statia last year April and had their son Louis in February.