While Catriona Gray, who won Miss Universe 2018 in Bangkok on Monday, has flown back to the Philippines on a private jet, the 18-year-old entrant from Albania had a much rougher time getting home on Wednesday night, as Thai pageant fans had to raise money to pay for her excess baggage weight at the Suvarnabhumi Airport.
But they gladly did it because they just love this girl.
To make sure Trejsi Sejdini, widely referred to by Thai pageant fans as their “daughter” because of her young age, could bring all of her gifts and Thai souvenirs home, a fan who went to send her off at the airport shared her funny account of the moment the crowd had to gather up some baht to pay for Sejdini’s excess baggage weight when she didn’t have enough cash on her.
“If she didn’t get in some sort of trouble, she wouldn’t be our daughter. On the way to Thailand, she missed her flight in Turkey, and on her way back, her baggage weight exceeded the limit,” Korakot Mussamont Chansiri wrote in a Facebook post yesterday morning.
“All while Catriona was flying a chic private jet, our daughter was having her suitcases open trying to deal with the extra weight. She wouldn’t let the fans pay for her bag at first, but us moms did it anyway because we wanted her to bring back all the gifts,” she wrote, adding that the “fundraising” was over within 10 minutes because so many people wanted to help Sejdini.
They ultimately coughed up THB5,225 (US$159).
“I love this girl so much. My daughter is such a good girl,” he wrote.
Meanwhile, Sejdini also made an Instagram post about the Thai fans who came to cheer for her at the airport — many showed up with LED signs that said “Albania.”
https://www.instagram.com/p/Brkt54mh42M/
While Gray became a social media sensation for her “slow-mo twirl,” which resulted her in winning Miss Universe, Sejdini was admired by Thai fans from the beginning of the competition for her overt confidence and sultriness.
If we had to guess, the love for Sejdini started when a video of her slaying other contestants back home at Miss Albania Universe contest went viral in Thailand. Look at that walk:
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