Cody Carlece Yerkovich is a former
beauty queen
A beauty pageant is a competition that has traditionally focused on judging and ranking the physical attributes of the contestants. Pageants have now evolved to include inner beauty, with criteria covering judging of personality, intelligence, ...
, model and
humanitarian
Humanitarianism is an active belief in the value of human life, whereby humans practice benevolent treatment and provide assistance to other humans to reduce suffering and improve the conditions of humanity for moral, altruistic, and emotional ...
advocate, she was the winner of the 2010
Miss New Zealand contest.
She comes from
Kaitaia
Kaitaia ( mi, Kaitāia) is a town in the Far North District of New Zealand, at the base of the Aupouri Peninsula, about 160 km northwest of Whangārei. It is the last major settlement on New Zealand State Highway 1, State Highway 1. Ahipara ...
in New Zealand's north. She is of Māori, German and Croatian heritage. At Auckland's
Sky City Convention Centre, she won the 2010 Miss New Zealand title, beating the other 15 finalists. She was set to represent New Zealand at the Miss World beauty pageant in November of that year.
Background
She has the distinction of being the first Miss New Zealand from the north of New Zealand.
Miss New Zealand
In September 2010, she was in
East Timor
East Timor (), also known as Timor-Leste (), officially the Democratic Republic of Timor-Leste, is an island country in Southeast Asia. It comprises the eastern half of the island of Timor, the exclave of Oecusse on the island's north-weste ...
to show support for the economic and cultural development in the country and to spend time with the local children she had been sponsoring. While there she met Amelia Amaral, a National Police of Timor-Leste officer, and she visited the Suai Early Childhood Center and orphanage where she also met with children sponsored by other New Zealanders. She also stayed with the New Zealand Ambassador there.
While in East Timor she attended charitable events with Nobel Peace Prize Winner and President of East Timor Jose Ramos-Horta
She traveled to South Africa as an ambassador for the New Zealand All Whites in the Fifa World Cup 2010 where she attended political and charitable events with Nelson Mandela.
She was tipped to win the Miss World crown by international pageant experts due to her exotic looks, height and graceful down to earth personality but certain issues arose out of her control. She cites the conflict between local pageant organisers as one reason.
['']New Zealand Woman's Weekly
The ''New Zealand Woman's Weekly'' is a weekly New Zealand women's magazine published by Are Media. , it had a circulation of 82,040, third by paid sales after ''TV Guide'' and ''New Zealand Woman's Day''.
History
On 8 December 1932, journalis ...
'', 26 July 201
Beauty Queen's shattered dreams by Andrew McNuitty
/ref>
References
{{DEFAULTSORT:Yerkovich, Cody
Living people
New Zealand people of Croatian descent
People of Tarara descent
Miss New Zealand winners
Year of birth missing (living people)
Miss World 2010 delegates
People from Kaitaia