Seventeen year old Roda Alfred is building a name for herself in the fashion industry, and has just been invited to represent Australia in an international modelling competition.
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It hasn’t all been easy for Roda. She arrived in Launceston when she was four after her family fled war-torn Sudan. “The war in South Sudan was just about to break out so my parents moved to Egypt and then from Egypt they moved here.”
She is now looking forward to a brighter future. She has been selected to compete in the Faces of the World international modelling competition and invited to participate in the Melbourne Spring Fashion Show.
“I’m going to the Melbourne Spring Fashion Show just to get a feel of what it's like and I’ll be backstage,” she said. “I might be with a designer for one day, following them around and seeing what they do and then I might be with a model the next day.”
But Roda is hoping to have a chance to prove herself on the global stage. “About two weeks ago I was invited to the Face of the World modelling competition to represent Australia,” Roda said.
The competition is in Birmingham, England and is a big break for Roda. She has two weeks to raise $2000 to fund her passage there.
She has set up an online fundraising campaign to try and raise the money. She is not new to fundraising, she has an ongoing commitment raising funds for the Children's Cancer Foundation.
Roda had no experience when she decided to enter her first beauty pageant in 2014, but just wanted to give it a go. “I went into pageantry and the fashion industry in Melbourne loved me and they’ve been inviting me back to different shows, different pageants ever since,” she said.
Roda wants to take her modelling as far as it can go, “I would love to end up walking for a major fashion house.”
Right now through, Roda still goes to school at Launceston Church Grammar. Her modelling commitments do mean she misses a lot of class though.
Roda has not forgotten where she came from. She is aware of the ongoing conflict in her country of birth, and speaks regularly to her extended family in South Sudan. “We were planning on going back this year but now there’s no way to get in safely or get out safely,” she said.
To donate to Roda’s campaign visit www.gofundme.com/rodaalfred.
