Orange girl on her way to becoming Miss Galaxy

Orange local, Ashlyn Narayan will be competing in this year’s Australian Miss Galaxy Pageant.

A21-year-old medical science student at the University of Canberra, being on the pageant stage is a world away from the lab work she aspires to do, but Ashlyn’s excited to give it a go.

With a supportive mother who encouraged her from a young age, Ashlyn decided to try her luck and applied.

Shortly after which she was accepted and sent her tiara and sash.

“I’ve got a lot of family support. Ever since high school she’s told me I should do it,” Ashlyn explained.

Founded in 2011 the Australian Miss Galaxy Pageant aims to provide motivation and tools for all the women to become the best versions of themselves and role models for others. They use charity work, community involvement, volunteering and overcoming fears in order to achieve their mission.

More than just a beauty pageant, Miss Galaxy prides itself on the belief that all women are worthy of the chance to become the best versions of themselves. For that reason, there is no criteria surrounding background, body type, marital status or levels of experience.

“Miss Galaxy is really accepting of all people – all personalities and everything. They’re really open to body weight, size, anything,” Ashlyn said.

So, just what does it take to become Miss Galaxy?

“They look at how you carry yourself, how you answer questions under pressure, there’s lots of photoshoots,” Ashlyn explained.

For former winner, Shikye Alyce Smith (Miss Galaxy Australia 2016 and 2017) the pageant was an important step to her building a career as a singer, dancer, model, presenter and mental health advocate. Obviously inspired by the experience, she has been the National Director of the pageant since 2019. The Miss Galaxy finals will take place in Sydney May 3–6, 2023.

Kinross Wolaroi School is a co-educational, K-12, day and boarding school located in Orange, NSW, educating generations of successful students for over 130 years.

The school fosters respectful relationships as well as a sense of pride, loyalty and kindness. A vibrant co-curricular program ensures students are fully engaged and challenged.

“Kinross Wolaroi School immerses your child in a diverse and expansive academic and co-curricular program that fosters a strong sense of self. Our unique opportunities empower students to define what success is to them.”

Dr Andrew Parry, Principal

To learn more, contact our Admissions team on 02 6392 0303 or email admissions@kws.nsw.edu.au

This was a song with a heartrending story of a breakup of a relationship which occurred during a ball and was written in 1891. The music has certainly altered since Charles K. Harris’s day, but has the romantic atmosphere changed?

A ballroom was a place where people could get together in romantic circumstances, dancing the night away to the music of a live band.

What stamina we had in those days!

I remember in the 1970s, driving sixty kilometres to a bush ball, dancing away the night, eating a huge cooked breakfast and driving home again.

In towns I lived in, and the balls I went to, Frank Bourke and the White Rose Orchestra supplied the music and played all night long. Frank was a country boy from Narrabri, who much preferred playing the piano to farming, and he and his band played at most of the balls in the west during the second half of the 20th century.

Keith Rawsthorne, a member of the Oral History group, remembers annual Balls: “In Forbes, we had regular Balls, all popular and all well attended in the Town Hall. The Scots Ball was very bright with Scots pipes and drum bands and the piping of haggis.” There were also the Catholic Balls with,