Till the end of 2022, Tarere Obaigbo held the crown of Mrs Nigeria, a position which qualified her to represent the country last December at the Mrs World beauty pageant in Las Vegas, USA.
Mrs Nigeria and Mrs World pageants, lest we forget, are meant for married women who still have what it takes to flaunt as beauty queens. Tarere Obaigbo has been flaunting more than beauty, though
A model, realtor, environmental activist, culture promoter, poet and painter, she is also the President of Young Members Council, FIABCI Nigeria.
Her reign as Mrs Nigeria, which culminated in the Mrs World pageant last December, left her with pleasant memories, which she shared with Daily Sun: “The experience was very exciting. There was a whole lot of grooming and training whereby we had to do the walks and interact with each other. For me, I felt I had to finetune my skills with regard to international engagement.”
She got to meet several people from across the world from different cultures, and learnt new things about their countries. Among others, she interacted with Mrs Ukraine, Mrs Japan, Mrs Ghana and Mrs Nepal.
“These women are already established in their own countries,” she said, “and these experiences were empowering and inspiring for me, because, sometimes we got to share our knowledge and personal obstacles. You got to learn about some similarities here and there. You got to learn how to do catwalk, learn new ideas and new ways to solve problems. So it was very inspiring for me.”
Blowing her trumpet isn’t among her characteristics, however.: “Authenticity was something I realised made me stand out. From day 1, I went there thinking I would like to represent Nigeria as much as possible, which was why I went there with my gele headtie. I even got to show Mrs Norway how to tie a head tie, which she actually did.”
During her reign, she took up sanitising the environment, especially in Lagos, where she and a team of volunteers were picking up littered plastic bottles by the seaside, as one of her pet projects.
“Ecoprolive, which I am a part of, is mainly focused on maritime. Lagos is one of the highest contributors of water bottles around the sea in the world. So we retrieved some bottles, just a small fraction, but there is still work to be done,” she conceded.
Obaigbo is sold to enlightening Lagosians and beyond on the importance of keeping the environment clean, recycling wastes, upcycling and properly disposing off non-bio biodegradable items and hazardous waste, and all that. She reiterated: “There is still work to be done, and I think that’s what you can get from national and international partners and even more volunteers. The more people are conscious of cleaning the environment, the better for us and the world.”
What’s her greatest challenge during her reign? Her answer would surprise you: “My greatest challenge during the pageant was mostly myself. There were many personal struggles. It was the first time a Nigerian had participated in the Mrs World beauty pageant, so I had nobody to turn to for advice. There was also the fact that I had no major sponsors but a few people who were so kind to participate in a few projects,” she said.
The Mrs Nigerian team also helped a bit. Apart from that, it was like going into the dark and trying to figure some things out for her. Some of the contestants at the global outing were professional pageants, but she was merely doing the first international pageant as a mature woman.
So, “it was really tough and conflicting for me, because a lot of times, I had to go through a lot of personal struggles, like rocking my afro hair. Every time I went out, I had to consciously style my hair. It took a lot of personal struggles for me to make such fashion and cultural statements, despite limited sponsorships,” she said.
Without her hubby and family, she wouldn’t have achieved what she did in 2022 as Mrs Nigeria: “As a married woman, it’s important to have your husband’s support. It’s a partnership. The person you are going to partner with will also know who you are and what you are all about. Marriage is about being open to each other. My husband really helped me, empowered and encouraged me. It’s about marrying the right person.”
Obaigbo is a member of the International Real Estate Federation, and presides over the Nigerian branch. She explained that FIABCI was meant for young professionals in Nigeria to get to interact with international real estate professionals. Also, “We do exchange programmes whereby members of FIABCI get to travel to other parts of the world and get to learn about their real estate programmes. Sometimes you get sponsorships.
“We also have an internship programme for young professionals where they can get to travel to Germany or to Europe or the Americas and get to work with a particular organisation to learn from them and get to see what’s happening on those areas, be it architecture or engineering or brokerage, and get to bring back that knowledge back to Nigeria.
“Right now, I want to put a lot of emphasis on creating awareness, because there are lots of Nigerian students who can benefit from the FIABCI programme, but many of them are not aware. They don’t even know that we have scholarships for young professional members, exchange and internship programmes which they can use to empower themselves.”
She is also the mastermind of Gathering Africa, a bimonthly convergence of writers, artists, thespians and philosophers at Victoria Island, Lagos.
“I am excited about the progress made so far and the possibilities — the fact that there are many participants from the audience who started with us two years ago and can see the growth between when they started and now; and there is so much that can be achieved,” she offered.
She added: “Sometimes during Gathering Africa some of the ideas being discussed are very close to home. We are very passionate about them, and we sit among like minded people. You learn from them and get inspired by them. Philosophy, poetry and art are things that stir the soul. It’s not something that you can witness and be the same. You will be a changed person, a more refined person. I think there is still so much more that can be done.
“So far, I am really excited by the impact. We also have a scholarship programme that we give to young writers or artists who can paint and create something around a particular theme. Once in a while, they call to tell me what they have been doing. It shows the future is bright.
“These minds are like a stone that sharpens the edges of the word with new ideas. For those of us who are writers, the more you get to interact with others, the more you rub off on them and they rub off on you, the better for the economy.”
She is a poet with three published books, and she is looking forward to publishing more books this year. “As a poet,” she said, “my inspiration comes from how I am feeling at that moment. Some of the things that stir my emotions are through day-to-day activities in Nigeria. Even when I travel round the world, some of these experiences inspire me to write or paint them to see them realised in colours.
“As an artist, there are always some concepts in my head I want to put down on paper or on canvas. It is an avenue for me to express myself to release emotions that build up. Poetry and painting are a therapy for me.”
Of course, her experiences as Mrs Nigeria and her involvement at the Mrs would, where she emerged a semi finalist, one way or the other, find a place in her poems and painting.
She concurred: “Immediately I returned from the global pageant, I started painting, and this is part of what is going to be in my exhibition I will be doing sometime this year. The Mrs Nigeria experience and Mrs World experience are something that pushed me to a new type of emotion, because, when you experience it moves you. That’s where paper and canvas comes in. It helps me understand my environment and helps me express my experiences.”
Her publishing outfit, Oreimi, has published The Virgin Widow and The Wretched Millionaire.”These are awesome books which are available online on Amazon,” she informed.
Though Nigerians have issues with reading books due to social media and information influx everywhere,
Again, “Literature has always morphed and expanded its way of reaching people. At the end of the day, social media is a form of literature. It’s the same way we had griots in the past, who spoke literature, and theatre artists, who performed it, and later newspapers to read and books.
“Literature is constantly evolving. It has always been people escaping from reality, learning about themselves, their past and their future, and imagining what’s unimaginable. Literature has always been a form of art that reflects life. Literature will never disappear, even now we have skits and social media.
“People’s attention is getting shorter and shorter, so literature is being broken down. At the end of the day, it’s being read and enjoyed. But a book will always have its audience. Not everybody is going to be an extrovert. I am an introvert, and we are here reading good literature and enjoying our mutual companies. Mind you, there are also extroverts who also read. People will always read.
That’s why we keep on publishing and creating the best form of literature the mind can create.”
Who knows, one day somebody could pick one of Oreimi’s books and turn it into a film. “Oreimi has some books in the pipeline to be published this year,” she announced with glee.