WITH the 2020 Myrtleford Show cancelled due to COVID, many of the prize winners from the 2019 event didn’t have a chance to take their works to the higher levels of competition.

For Myrtleford’s Maddy Geddes, that meant her bid for North East rural show junior ambassador was put on hold.

“The main part of being a junior ambassador is the competition of being a junior ambassador,” the 19 year old said.

“You have to be interviewed, at the next stage there’s an interview and you have dinner.

“It’s similar to how the princess gets chosen; you have to do a speech as well.”

Maddy entered the wider competition after being a young ambassador for the Myrtleford Show.

“I’m basically a liaison between the show society itself and younger kids, encouraging them to enter competitions and all the events in the show,” she said.

“On show day I just help out; I encourage my friends to enter all the competitions, all the art events like that.

“For the Myrtleford level I had to enter some sort of item, I entered a carrot and date muffin; that was the regional level then it went to district, which was Wangaratta, that’s where I was interviewed.

“The next level is Bendigo in June or early July, where they have a big dinner and the speech and all that.

“It’ll be interesting.”

The interview process is an exhaustive one; the judges can ask the junior ambassadors almost anything.

“The last time they asked me about the microns of my own sheep’s wool and that completely stumped me,” Maddy said.

“They ask you questions about your own cattle and sheep if you mention stuff about that, they ask you about your life experiences, what you’ve been doing in the community.

“That’s what being an ambassador is about, it’s about being involved in the community, so I talked about the SRC and clubs I’m a part of.

“Then they ask you about what you could do to make the show better; one of the questions was ‘what would you think is a good things to do to get young people involved in the show?’”

For Maddy, participation in the show is the real draw, open to anyone to enter almost anything.

“It’s the kind of thing you don’t know if you like it unless you try because you can literally enter anything into a show,” she said.

“I know there have been heaps of art projects I’ve done at school, and you can enter them into any show and you might even win a dollar or two.

“Anyone can do it.”