Victoria Chuah trusts in God’s plan
Victoria Chuah greeted the exuberant school children wearing her sparkling crown and glittering Miss Virginia sash — her first stop on a tour of Virginia schools after months of parades, grand openings and charity fundraisers.
“It’s really so fun to meet all the kids — everyone’s so excited to meet Miss Virginia,” said Chuah. “The kids just immediately want to run in and hug you. You feel like a Disney princess.”
Winning the Miss Virginia scholarship pageant meant Chuah received $22,500 to pay off her student loans. But it also gave her an opportunity to meet people, share her story and promote a cause near to her heart — advocating for adults with autism.
Chuah, 22, grew up in Ashburn where her family attended St. Theresa Church. Her dad, Chong-Ket Chuah, is an engineer and her mother, Ann Hebda, is a dentist.
“She’s the best dentist in Ashburn or the world,” said Chuah.
Her younger brother, Luke, is on the autism spectrum.
“That inspired so much of my Miss Virginia social impact initiative,” she said. “As he’s become an adult, it’s clear how few programs there are for adults with autism and my family has discovered how difficult that has been to navigate.”
She works to support and promote organizations that help adults with autism, such as Loudoun Therapeutic Riding and SourceAmerica, which helps people with disabilities find jobs.
As a teen, Chuah attended Thomas Jefferson High School for Science and Technology in Alexandria. She participated in her first pageant her junior year.
“I wasn’t sure about the pageant girl stereotype, whether people were going to be mean or not welcoming but everyone was so nice,” she said. “And aside from that, it was very inspiring to be in a room with such accomplished, well-spoken young women. I met some of my really good friends through doing pageants.”
After high school, she attended the University of Pittsburgh and obtained two degrees in four years: a bachelor’s and master’s in computer science. After completing her year as Miss Virginia, she’ll start working as a software engineer in New York.
“(Computer science) is very satisfying to do since it’s so much problem solving,” she said. “When you do get through a big project, it’s very gratifying to see everything work together. It’s also really exciting to be so up to date with technology.”
In college, Chuah also pursued extracurricular passions such as ballet, which is her Miss Virginia talent. She was the president of the improv club, host of the school’s late night talk show and was involved in student government.
Chuah is the first Chinese American Miss Virginia, and she loves being able to celebrate her culture and hopes to be an example for Asian American girls. Recently, in her role as Miss Virginia, she went to the Chinese American Museum in Washington to celebrate their Mid-Autumn Festival.
“That was something I never thought I would be able to do,” said Chuah, who describes herself as proficient in Mandarin. “It was so special.”
Throughout her life, Chuah has relied on prayer and trust in God’s plan to face all kinds of challenges.
“(With Luke), there’s been some tough times, many moments of thinking — I wish that I could take this pain away from him, I wish that he could be able to articulate to us why he’s feeling this way,” she said. “I just have to trust (God) has Luke’s best interest in mind, even if we can’t see it right now.”
She’s taking that trust into the Miss America pageant in a few months, too.
“I can be the best version of me that I can be, I can give my best performance, and I still don’t know what’s going to happen, but I have to trust that everything happens according to his plan and that I will be where I’m meant to be.”
Maraist can be reached at [email protected] or Twitter @zoeymaraistACH.