More than a week after being mistakenly crowned the winner at the 2015 Miss Universe pageant, Miss Colombia Ariadna Gutiérrez has opened up about the “humiliating” ordeal.
“I was disconnected. I haven't received phone calls from almost anyone. Very few people have communicated with me,” the 22-year-old told Colombia's W Radio on Wednesday, explaining why she’s been mostly silent about the incident. “That's because I had to grieve for what happened.”
Gutiérrez had already started celebrating what she believed to be her victory at the Dec. 20 Miss Universe pageant when host Steve Harvey interrupted her revelry to announce that he'd read out the wrong name for the winner. In a mortifying on-air moment, the crown was then taken from a visibly stunned Gutiérrez -- and given to an equally flabbergasted Miss Philippines, Pia Alonzo Wurtzbach.
Photos of the aftermath show an emotional Gutiérrez being comforted by her fellow contestants.
After the on-air flub, Gutiérrez, who was named the first runner-up, was widely praised for responding to Harvey’s mistake with grace. “Everything happens for a reason,” she said backstage immediately after the mortifying incident.
She later took to Instagram to congratulate Miss Philippines for her win. “Life continues and in the future we will find out why things happen the way they happen,” she wrote in her post.
In her interview with W Radio this week, however, Gutiérrez had a few stronger words for what happened, calling the incident a “great shock” and a “great injustice.”
“They did not do things the right way,” Gutiérrez said of the way the error was handled.
“They could have done it, I don't know, the next day in a press conference or a press release,” she said, referring to the stripping of the crown.
Still, Gutiérrez stressed that she was looking on the bright side.
“I managed to make history, which I think is more important than winning the Miss Universe title,” she told W Radio.