Bullied for being too beautiful, the student battling to be Miss World
STUDENT Natasha Hemmings is determined to be crowned Miss World next month – to silence the university bullies who taunted her about her good looks.
The 20-year-old Miss England claims she was targeted by ‘jealous’ students during her first year studying English at Nottingham University. Now on a gap year, she said: ‘I would so love to win Miss World, and have some of the students see me win.
‘To be catapulted into what I’m doing now, with the possibility of becoming Miss World, gives me back some of the confidence I lost. I felt I didn’t fit in with the other girls at Nottingham University, and quickly became isolated.
‘Usually bullying is about the insecurity of the bullies. I think it probably was to do with my looks
‘One girl didn’t like me at all and, maybe because she was struggling with her weight a bit, I think perhaps she was jealous of me.’
Natasha said the taunts took a nasty twist when food was spattered all over her door: ‘One day I hadn’t cleared away my food tray [from the canteen] and someone placed it on the floor outside my door. I went out to ring my boy- friend to fetch me because I didn’t want to stay there that night.
‘When I returned, the food had been thrown all over my door. So, for most of that year, I used to get takeaways and eat in my room.’ Natasha also said the fact she would stay working in her room also caused jealousy: ‘They hated the fact that I’d stay in because they seemed to think I was trying to get one up on them.’
The determined student kept her beauty ambitions a secret, fearing it might provoke further hostility.
Natasha – who is dating Charlie Jordan, a ‘very supportive’ 18-yearold sales manager – said: ‘I didn’t tell any of the other students I was entering Miss England.
‘By then I had so little confidence in myself and didn’t think I had a chance of winning, so didn’t want to face them if I did badly.’
If she wins the final in Sanya, China, on December 19, Natasha, from Nantwich, Cheshire, will delay her return to university to focus on her Miss World duties, so will start her second year with a different set of students.
But she may not return at all if an alternate career takes off. She is a budding opera singer who trained at the Northern College of Music, and will be demonstrating her abilities in the contest’s talent round. She said: ‘I’m hoping to showcase my singing on a world stage. It’s my passion. If I fulfil my dream to become an opera singer, I may not return to uni.’