A student left permanently scarred after being glassed in the face is on her way to the grand finals of a beauty pageant.
Alexandra Homayoonpoor, 24, is the current Miss West Yorkshire 2013 and is now set to represent Miss Yorkshire Dales in the Miss Galaxy England contest.
She needed surgery on her nose following the violent attack at a pub in Leeds, West Yorkshire, that split her nostril in half on New Year 2010.
A group of men attacked her and her boyfriend in a bar on New Year's Eve.
She was rushed to hospital by ambulance before having 12 stitches to repair the damage.
The
then 21-year-old was left with a 4cm laceration to her nose and a nose
stud she had been wearing was left embedded in the wound along with a
piece of glass - which was stuck so deep it could only be detected by
X-ray.
Surgeons reattached her nostril and removed the glass that had become deeply embedded in her face.
Alexandra,
a journalism student from Otley, Leeds, had been out for a celebratory
drink with friends in nearby Headingley when one of a group of drunken
yobs swept a table filled with glasses directly at her face.
She
said: 'It felt like I had been punched in the face. My arm was covered
in cuts from the glass and the next thing I knew my face was streaming
with blood.
'It was everywhere, and I was hysterical, screaming "He's broken my nose, he's broken my nose!"
'I couldn't understand why there was
so much blood. I knew I hadn't been punched but there was so much blood,
it was just gushing from my face. I was covered in it.
'It was
only after the paramedics took me to A&E that my dad came and told
me that my nose had been sliced open on one side, from the front right
the way to the back.
'They couldn't operate on me that night and I had to go back the next day to have an operation under general anaesthetic.
The former Leeds University student, who now works as an account executive, said her self-confidence had suffered after she was injured in the attack
and she started to enter pageants to rebuild her self-esteem. Alexandra
reached the finals of Miss Leeds in 2010, shortly after the attack.
Alexandra will compete in the grand final in March with girls from all over the country. If she wins, the international final will be held in the USA this summer, representing England.
She said: 'It's a kind of hobby for me. I'm proud of winning another title. Pageants are not only a fun and glamorous experience in which you get to represent your region, it's also a brilliant chance to inspire others and do charity work.'
'If I do happen to win my mother won't be too pleased if I have to go to the US as we have booked a big family holiday at the same time.'
