Maya (right) and Christine who won the first and second places in the City Hall’s Unduk Ngadau Borderless pageant held at the Shangri-La’s Tanjung Aru resort recently.
KOTA KINABALU: Maya Hejnowska, 20, who is of Kadazan-Polish descent was crowned as the City Hall’s Unduk Ngadau Borderless queen recently.
Maya would be representing the Api-Api constituency in the upcoming Unduk Ngadau Borderless State-level pageant which will be held at the end of the month.
In her note in her social media account, she said that this was the first time she joined the Unduk Ngadau pageant and it was due to the encouragement of friends and families.
“I wasn’t planning on joining but friends and families encouraged me,” said the Universiti Malaysia Sabah (UMS) student who is majoring in music studies and the second child of three siblings.
She prepared for the pageant organised by the City Hall by brushing up on her Kadazan language while also undergoing the busy schedule of a student at UMS.
Although she grew up with Kadazan being the main language at home, she felt that there may be words and sentences that are not used by her family and hence, needed to improve her mastery.
“I bought a Kadazan dictionary and practiced,” she said.
Coming second place was Christine Regina Carmelita Manjaji who would represent Likas, while Sharlene Adelaide Alexandra, who won third place would be representing Inanam.
Fourth place winner, Emily Chung Yee Yen would be representing Luyang, while fifth and sixth place winners, Chee Nyuk Len and Vanessa Gray Chew Li Hua would be representing Karambunai and Darau, respectively.
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