ILS-people

For many, beauty pageants are a means to gain exposure and to further one’s career. For Veena Goel, the reigning Miss California 2005, they offer a different opportunity. Since the age of 19, she has entered and won several pageants, using the money to finance her education.

She entered the Miss Los Angeles County beauty pageant in 2001 because “I was really excited about the scholarship money they were awarding,” she said.

Taking a year off to finish her studies, Goel later won the title of Miss Orange County and was named second runner-up at the state level. “This year, I started really working hard, because I knew I had to start my master’s program,” she said.

Winning the title of Miss Southland this year earned her another $1,050 before claiming the grand prize of $10,000 as Miss California.

Born in Laguna Hills to a Delhi-born father and an Indonesian mother, and a graduate of Laguna Hills High School, Goel channeled so much of her energy into winning scholarship money because at the time, her brother was going to medical school at USC with the help of her parents.

While an undergraduate at UCLA, Goel decided to major in sociology. “I’m a people person,” she explained. “I love figuring out how people react in different situations, and that’s exactly what sociology is.”

Meanwhile, the pageants taught her “how to be my best self and be OK with that, and to have people know my views, despite what they think, so I was not afraid to share with people who I was and what I believed in, in that you are your own destiny,” she noted.

For her talent segment, Goel chose Bob Fosse’s “All That Jazz” from the film “Chicago.” “I loved that film, and it was one of those songs that just jumped out at you, and I always wanted to dance to that song,” she admitted.

She was particularly inspired by Catherine Zeta-Jones’ performance in the film. “She has great showmanship,” Goel noted. “She really reaches out to an audience, and I respect that as a dancer and a performer. And I love the way she can sing and dance, and that’s something I can’t do. I’m not a singer.”

Goel began studying dance at the age of three, concentrating mostly on classical ballet and theatrical jazz. “I once took classes in Indian dance for a show that I was performing in, but that was just for a few months,” she confided.

“I’m very much a perfectionist, and doing classical ballet is a great way for me to exercise and express myself and still use that perfection type of personality that I have. And jazz pushes me to learn new things as far as leaps and turns that have great show value.”

Though Goel loves dancing, she has no intention of turning professional and intends to pursue it more as an avocation while she focuses on becoming a dietitian, a profession in which she can reach out to young women suffering from anorexia and bulimia as she had done as a teenager.

Goel was 13 when she began suffering from bulimia. “That’s a huge transitional time for adolescents,” she contended. As she was making her own transition from elementary school to junior high school, “I was going through puberty, my body was going through a lot of changes, and my self-confidence was very low at that point, which I think is natural.”

A boy schoolmate one day told her that if she were thinner, she’d be more attractive. “I was perhaps five pounds overweight, if you can call that overweight,” Goel recalled. “But from the time he told me that, I never looked at myself the same. I always saw myself as overweight, even though I wasn’t.”

Her parents were unaware at first that there was any problem. “At first, they thought, ‘Oh, she’s eating great’, and I would spend more time at dance, because I love dancing,” she said.

“But then, all of a sudden, I began dropping 15 pounds, 20 pounds, 25 pounds, and they began to notice that I looked very unhealthy, I was disinterested in life, and it was really tough for them. And they were in denial for a very long time, like most parents are.”

Goel battled anorexia and bulimia for nine months when her brother, by then a doctor, pointed out the symptoms to her and convinced her that she indeed had a problem. “That really turned it around for me,” she said. “It took me a good two years before I really found out how I could help myself.”

Anorexia and bulimia “are mental diseases, and what was hard for me was that I knew I needed to gain weight but I didn’t want to,” said Goel, who admits she is still in recovery. “So it was just a constant battle of what I knew I should be doing and what I wanted to do.”

Since the age of 15, Goel has managed to keep her eating disorder under control and in the interim acquired a stronger sense of self. Entering beauty pageants helped considerably.

“The great thing about Miss California is that it’s just not about physical beauty, it’s more about your mental sharpness when they interview you,” she asserted. “You have to look physically fit, but it’s not a beauty contest by any means.”

The judges score the contestants by awarding 40 percent of their score for the personal interview, 30 percent for the talent portion, and 10 percent each for the swimsuit segment, the evening gown segment, and the on-stage questions.

Whereas most Indian American families do not want their daughters participating in beauty pageants because of the required swimsuit segment, Goel’s parents had no qualms at all.

“My parents have always looked at (the Miss California pageant) as a scholarship organization, with the sole purpose of the betterment of young women,” Goel said.

“They always believed it healthy to have a healthy mind, body and soul, and part of that is being physically fit. I think going out in a bathing suit shows the true sense of confidence. I don’t look at it as a bathing suit competition; I look at it as a competition of confidence on stage.”

For those Indian American parents who are reluctant to have their daughters enter beauty pageants, “the scholarship money alone makes it worth it,” she advised.