Miss Japan

Mima Hiroko

What are your interests and what do you enjoy doing the most?
I am crazy about sports, especially basketball which I have been playing since I was a child. I have also been a competitive high jumper since Junior High School. I enjoy hanging out with my friends and love animals. Relaxing with my family and watching DVDs is always nice too.

What is your career ambition?
I want to use my title as Miss Japan, and hopefully Miss Universe, to launch a career in the media industry where I hope to work as a sports reporter, sharing the joy of sports, one of my greatest passions and my subject of study in university, with the world. Also, because I dealt with a nerve disease called Guillain-Barr$B!&(Bsyndrome in junior high school, I feel like I can empathize with children who are sick and hospitalized and want to use my career and fame to raise awareness and money through charity and speaking events for children's hospitals. I am a believer in the therapeutic model of treatment espoused by Patch Adams and the Gesundheit Institute which emphasize the powerful connection between environment and wellness, especially for children in hospitals. This is a holistic model of treatment that I wish I had had access to when I was a sick child.

What is your proudest personal accomplishment?
That would be when I moved to Tokyo to enter university. By moving to Tokyo my life has changed so much through meeting many new people and experiencing so many new things that would never have happened to me had I stayed in my hometown of Tokushima.

What is something unique that has happened to you; some interesting thing about you?
I think the most amazing thing that has happened to me is the fact that Hiroko Mima, a normal college girl from rural Japan who some may have considered a Tomboy of sorts because of my love for sports, became Miss Universe Japan 2008. Making possible the seemingly impossible has given me such hope and created new dreams and possibilities in my life. If I can do this, so can other young women. I want to share this message with other young women in Japan and around the world who are looking for positive role models and, for whatever reasons, may think that they are not beautiful. Becoming Miss Universe Japan has taught me how true beauty is a combination of intellect, curiosity and concern for the world and those suffering around us, and physical beauty that is refined through building greater self-confidence and knowing how to take care of one's body and appearance.

What do you want the judges to know about you?
I have loved sports since I was a child. I started playing basketball when I was in elementary school and then, after suffering a bone marrow disease that left the right side of my body incapacitated for 3 months when I was 13-years old, I was told that it would be very difficult to return to playing on my school's basketball team. Wanting to keep engaged in sports, the track coach at my school suggested that I try out the high jump which he said wouldn't require as much stamina and would probably be a possibility for me after I recovered from my illness. I have since become engrossed in high jumping and have competed 7 times at the Japan National Track and Field Competition. The impact of this physical struggle was later compounded when my father was suddenly killed in a car accident three years ago. I was close to my father and his unexpected death was a big shock to me. Despite the pain, my father's death ended up bringing my family closer together and made me realize that we only live once and shouldn't live with regrets. Since then, I try to seize every day as if it were my last and strongly believe in not hesitating to pursue my dreams and new challenges, such as I did when I applied to Miss Universe Japan. I am ready for the exciting and demanding challenge of both getting to know so many amazing women and competing with them here at Miss Universe.

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