Reigning Miss Free State Queen, Lungile Carol Mazibuko was born in Harrismith and grew up in Qwa Qwa, both in the Free State. She\u2019s the second born from a family of five. She attended Retief pre-school in Kestell and then she moved to Ed-U College until grade 4. In grade 5 she moved to Bloem where her mother had moved to 2 years before and she went to Calculus, Roseview Primary and started her high school career at Eunice Girls High.<\/p>\n
Her love for the spotlight started in pre-school when she started dancing at Retief. She loved having to wear heels and dressing up and eventually she started competing in pageants but says she never really won anything then. In Roseview one of her teachers started to groom her for modelling and that\u2019s how she fell in love. Her parents didn\u2019t really mind the modelling in the beginning, however in high school as it started to demand a lot of Lungi\u2019s time and attention, that\u2019s when they started to have a negative view of it. \u201cThere were more opportunities. There were photoshoots and certain clothes they didn\u2019t like and it didn\u2019t make sense to them, especially the time I spent modelling. They didn\u2019t think it makes money or that it\u2019s a career or a path that one can venture into and live like that\u201d she says.<\/p>\n
In high school from grade 8 to 11 she only did pageants and in matric she didn\u2019t do any modelling at all because it demanded too much of her time. In matric she discovered that she might have a learning problem. \u201cI didn\u2019t know what it was but I knew I had a problem. Luckily I had a friend who would assist me in reading and writing, in matric. I passed very well because I had someone who was assisting me. Only when I got to varsity did I discover that I have dyslexia.\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cOf course I was very disappointed in my high school that they never picked it up in the 5 years I was there. So when I got to UFS and discovering that I\u2019m dyslexic, I was put on the special programme and my varsity years were extended.\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cIt was very painful for me to discover that so late in my life and my family did not believe me. They thought I was just not doing well.\u201d Lungi says. In her first semester when she realized she wasn\u2019t doing well in some of the most basic modules, she sought help at the Health and Wellness Department on campus. They then sent her to a psychologist who conducted a series of tests on her and then sent her to do another reading and writing test and that\u2019s when they made the discovery that she has dyslexia and they then had to move her to the disability units. \u201cIt was very sad. I cried because I did not see anything wrong with myself\u201d she said.<\/p>\n
She had several tutors at her disposal while at the disability units who helped her do very well in her studies. During all of this is also when she discovered that she has bipolar disorder, and although she\u2019s not a \u2018pill\u2019 person, she figured out a way to cut down on her medication and manage her episodes. She always says \u201cI may have bipolar, but I am not bipolar\u201d.<\/p>\n
On what prompted her to seek help and get diagnosed with bipolar disorder, Lungi says it\u2019s attributed to the trauma inflicted on her from having been raped by one of her cousins when she was in grade 4. When she had first reported the incident to an adult, she was told she was just imagining things so that\u2019s why she blocked it out and didn\u2019t take it seriously even though it happened more than once. Her mother had already moved to Bloem at the time so she couldn\u2019t tell her either. In grade 9 she had a breakdown and that\u2019s when she told one of her friends about the ordeal and her friend explained to her the intensity of the offence and encouraged her to tell her mother. She had had such a bad breakdown that she walked from Eunice to Charlotte Maxeke street, formerly known as Maitland street downtown, to SAPS head offices where she told her mom what had happened to her as her child. Her mom broke down and that\u2019s when her process started when her mother took her to a psychologist. After confiding in her mother, Lungi fell into a deep depression which led to a bipolar diagnosis.<\/p>\n
On the challenges she has faced as a model, she says \u201cnot getting paid, being exploited, people saying they will do something and not following through with their promises\u201d. However she says that everything she has gone through has made her develop thick skin so comments such as \u201cyou\u2019re too skinny\u201d or \u201cyou don\u2019t have the right bone structure\u201d literally just bounce off her.<\/p>\n
Her proudest achievements include Miss Glamorous, where she gained a sponsor from TVL which still dresses her today as she\u2019s the face. She also became the face of Tellen Management from her Miss Glamorous days, which opened a lot of doors for her. She then started to do only ramp work and then model of the year for Free State Fashion Week in 2017 and became the face of Free State Fashion Week in 2018. Lungi was recently crowned Miss Free State on the 1st<\/sup> June 2019. Personally, her biggest achievement is that the work she does is very different and extraordinary. \u00a0Her older sister is her biggest inspiration because believes that her sister has faced so much adversity but still has so much drive and lust for life. Her sister is also her biggest cheerleader.<\/p>\n Lungi says her perseverance and resilience is what makes her a woman who rocks. At some point in varsity, her parents had lost faith in her and would not pay her tuition fees and she decided to get a job, and she still passed. Her dreams include being on the cover of GQ magazine and representing the Free State on an international level.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" Reigning Miss Free State Queen, Lungile Carol Mazibuko was born in Harrismith and grew up in Qwa Qwa, both in the Free State. She\u2019s the second born from a family of five. She attended Retief pre-school in Kestell and then she moved to Ed-U College until grade 4. In grade 5 she moved to Bloem […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":6314,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_et_pb_use_builder":"","_et_pb_old_content":"","_et_gb_content_width":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[4],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-6313","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-blog"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/bgr.digitalshero.co.za\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6313","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/bgr.digitalshero.co.za\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/bgr.digitalshero.co.za\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/bgr.digitalshero.co.za\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/bgr.digitalshero.co.za\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=6313"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/bgr.digitalshero.co.za\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6313\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/bgr.digitalshero.co.za\/index.php?rest_route=\/"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/bgr.digitalshero.co.za\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=6313"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/bgr.digitalshero.co.za\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=6313"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/bgr.digitalshero.co.za\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=6313"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}