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Miss Clyde River credits seamstress aunt for win Joanne Palituq won for the second time, thanks in part to special dress
Cody Punter
Northern News Services
Published Monday, July 8, 2013
KANGIQTUGAAPIK/CLYDE RIVER
After three years of competing in the Miss Clyde River beauty pageant, Joanne Palituq knows that it's best to keep things simple.
Newly crowned Miss Clyde River 2013 Joanne Palituq, centre, stands alongside third-place finisher Tyna Atagootak, left, and second-place finisher Sally Arreak during Hamlet Day at the community hall July 2. Palituq is wearing a dress made by her aunt Nina Qillaq who is a seamstress. - photo courtesy of Peter Iqalukjuak |
"I was just trying to be confident and not stop smiling. And I was trying my best to keep looking at the judges so they'll notice me," she said.
Her experience and charm paid off this year as she was crowned Miss Clyde River 2013 during Hamlet Day at the community hall on July 2. As a reward for winning the competition, Palituq was given a free flight to anywhere First Air flies and a cash prize of $300.
It was not the first time Palituq won the competition, having won the first year she entered three years ago.
Palituq explained that while the actual competition is fairly straightforward, one of the most important things that judges look at are the girls' dresses. She said that most girls decided to buy their dresses. However Palituq decided to ask her aunt Nina Qillaq who is a seamstress, to make a dress for her in the hopes that it might help her stick out from the crowd.
Palituq described the dress, which could have made all the difference in the competition, as an Inuit-style dress.
"It was designed like an amautik on the bottom, which is a coat that you use to carry your baby with," she said.
Palituq said that her decision to get her aunt to make the dress was no coincidence because she was the one who made her dress when she first won the competition in 2010.
When asked whether she thought her aunt was a good luck charm, Palituq said it had nothing to do with luck.
"She's just good," she said.
Now that she has won for a second time in three years, Palituq's mother is urging her to take part in the Miss Nunavut competition next year. However, Palituq graduated and she hopes to go to college in Morrisburg, Ont., where she wants to study heavy machinery.
"I would love to do it but I don't know if I'm going to be able to, because school is more important to me right now," she said.
Palituq said she did not yet know where she where she is going to fly to with the free flight she won and that she wasn't sure what to do with her cash prize. However, she did admit that she had already spent half of it on the special woman who helped her win.
"I gave half of the $300 to my aunt for making the dress," said Palituq.
"I couldn't have won without her."
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