Photos by: Ned Du
Written by: Jullianne Pham, Miss Social 2016
The Royal Court attended the Tet Sinh Vien Festival at Yerba Buena High School on February 11th. Quan, Savannah, and Alex arrived in the early morning to help set up the MVNCI booth. The ladies gave away Li Xi’s to children that stopped by the table, and they also made arts & crafts with paper crowns along with the children. Several visitors stopped by the booth to take photos with the Royal Court as the afternoon passed. By the time it was 3PM, the ladies went backstage of the high school theatre to help prepare for the Miss Teen Tet Pageant competition! Jullianne arrived just in time to begin preparing the contestants for their competition. The Royal Court felt so overjoyed to see all the lovely contestants again—time flew by so fast from the Miss Teen Tet mixer back in January!
The 10 contestants were split up into their dressing rooms as the Royal Court were assigned their duties. Jullianne and Alex helped the girls in their dressing rooms, making sure that they changed into their right outfit on time to go on stage. Savannah helped with the lights and sound, and Quan arranged the order of ladies from other pageants to help with the crowning segment. Seeing the jitters of the girls as they conversed backstage was so nostalgic for the MVNCI Royal Court—this was the Royal Court almost exactly one year ago! It was different seeing a whole pageant unfold from the other perspective. Watching the contestants dance, do their introduction, walk in their Ao Dai and evening gown, and answer the questions by the judges felt a lot less nerve-wracking than actually experiencing it themselves. It felt exciting and amazing for the ladies to become mentors and older sisters towards the contestants on their special evening—guiding, supporting, and motivating them through all the crazy, scary feelings that the Royal Court went through a year ago.