China’s next top model….
Now they are looking for China’s next big face. Four days of workshops, photo shoots and interviews will be held June 25 to 29 with a grand finale where the winners will be picked on June 29. “We see a growing demand foreign faces in modeling in China as a result of the growth of Asia’s fashion industry,” says James Ho, president of Vancouver-based ITM International Top Model Corp., who is hosting the search in conjunction with New Silk Road Company modeling agent in China. Women ages 16 to 25, who aspire to become an international model can download an application at www.itmmodel.com. 

Can’t believe this type of show is so much successful! Wimpy, wimpy-

Czech supermodel Karolina Kurkova (nicknames Kaja, Kinka, KK, Karo, KoKain etc…) and Latin pop star Shakira received awards for their humanitarian work and then watched a fashion show featuring clothes from nine developing countries partly made by women trying to escape poverty. More than 400 fans and fashionistas joined guests for the two events and a panel on Poverty, Women and Human Rights on Monday. It focused on the success of small microcredit loans which hundreds of millions of women have used to start businesses and the need to help the one billion people who still live on $1 US a day or less. The nonprofit organization Women Together, which is currently concentrating on providing small loans so low income women can produce textiles, sponsored the awards and the fashion show. It honoured 10 women and two organizations.
Kurkova was honoured for working for the welfare of children through organizations such as the Beautiful Life Fund and Free Arts. She opened the fashion show saying the designers were introducing fabrics from traditional weavers to the western world of high fashion.
The audience, which included Nane Annan, wife of Secretary General Kofi Annan, applauded loudly for the high-fashion clothes from Colombia, Panama, India, Uruguay, Bangladesh, Mexico, Morocco, Peru and Brazil. In addition to Shakira and Kurkova, many others winners showed up to accept their awards - a Spanish contemporary sculpture.
They included Ela Bhatt, founder of the SEWA Co-operative Bank in India which has provided microcredit loans to 800,000 women; former Spanish Red Cross president Cristina Macaya; Brazilian writer Nelida Pinon; and Consuelo Ciscar who has promoted cultural and arts programs in Valencia, Spain. There was disappointment in the crowd that several famous winners sent representatives to collect their awards including actress Angelina Jolie, Queen Rania of Jordan, Senator Hillary Clinton, and Kerry Kennedy who founded a human rights centre named after her late father, Robert Kennedy. The two institutions to receive awards were the Washington-based nonprofit, Finca International, which promotes microfinance, and the Spain’s Porcelanosa Group, one of the world’s leading tile and bathroom and kitchen manufacturers.

Good job, tho Karolina should consider ordering her own life before saving the world. snuff snuff….