"I would like to make people aware that as Afghan women
we are talented, intelligent and beautiful"
Vida Samadzai, Miss Afghanistan Earth 2003
Vida Samadzai made all kind of controversy
and ovations of people for daring to wear a swimming suit
in Miss Earth 2003 beauty pageant, in Manila, Philippines,
the news across the world in a time where Taliban Culture
was much known because of repression and human rights violation
toward Afghan women.
 Vida
was born and raised in Afghanistan, but left for the United
States in 1996 to escape the turmoil of civil war and the
rise of the Taliban religious movement; She is a student at
California State University - Fullerton and has a double major
in Advertising and Speech Communications, She speaks five
languages fluently and is involved with helping the Afghan
Refugees in Pakistan.
However Afghanistan's first minister Habiba Surabi condemned
to Vida Samadzai, saying that “appearing naked before a camera
or television is not women's freedom but in my opinion is
to entertain men,"
According Surabi, in Afghan culture women should not demonstrate
their worth using their "beauty or bodies" but by their skills
and knowledge.
"In the name of women's freedom, what this Afghan girl has
done is not freedom but is lascivious," the minister said.
 
However Vida won the pageant’s first “beauty
for a cause” award for her dedication and self-sacrifice
as a volunteer fund-raiser and as a founder of an Afghan women's
rights organization.
 
Vida Samadzai is the first Afghan in participate in a beauty
pageant and the second "Miss Afghanistan" because 32 years
ago Zohra Daoud, was elected in 1972, but she never compited
in an international pageant.
Thank you Eduardo and Lestat (Mexico)
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