Miss Ghana Shows Off Costume

SAN JUAN, Puerto Rico (AP) - In a contest meant to showcase their homelands, Miss Universe contestants sashayed their way past a panel of judges in costumes that included a fighting cock and a poisonous fruit.

The African contestants mostly wore costumes representing the various tribes of their countries, while others like Miss Ghana, 19-year-old Precious Agyare, wore a giant West African basket on her head.

And then there were the feathers.

Donning a white traditional hanbok dress and an elaborate hairdo, Miss Korea - 23-year-old Sa-Lang Kim - won the costume contest Wednesday night, taking home $1,000 and a crystal trophy. The contest has no bearing on the May 11 competition being held on this Caribbean island.

Most of the beauty queens from the Caribbean and Latin America wore headdresses, some with a Carnival motif, others with indigenous themes.

Miss Puerto Rico, 20-year-old Denise M. Quinones August, wore a feathered costume representing a fighting cock. In Puerto Rico and many other places in Latin America, cock fighting is a popular sport.

Miss Bolivia, meanwhile, wore a slinky black dress draped with black and white feathers. She was supposed to be a condor.

The most unusual outfit was perhaps Miss Jamaica's. Wearing a bulging orange costume adorned by green leaves and a headpiece, 21-year-old Zahra Burton went as the Caribbean island's national fruit, ackee.

The fruit, when unripe, can be poisonous.