Just when viewers thought they met all the eligible bachelors in the running to sweep Qiniso Van Damme off her feet in M-Net’s “The Bachelorette SA”, the testosterone in the house surged with several more contestants added to the mix.
With the shoe on the other feet for Van Damme, who was a contestant on season two of “The Bachelor SA”, she is privy to the cutthroat environment that the guys find themselves in.
However, this time she gets to call the shots and, in so doing, chose her destiny.
While a bevy of men hover on the fringes sizing up the competition before going in for the prized possession, let’s look at why she is a catch.
1. Beauty With Brains
The 20-something model and actress has two degrees under her belt and is currently completing her Masters in Social Anthropology at the University of Cape Town. As she boldly stated on the show, she will not dumb-down for any man.
2. She Can Wrap Her Tongue Around Several Languages
Van Damme is multilingual. As we witnessed from her brief red-carpet interaction with 36-year-old Ten as well as 30-year-old Lunga, she’s fluent in Spanish and isiXhosa.
And she can also converse in isiZulu and isiSwati.
3. Life Is An Adventure With Her
She’s bubbly, outgoing and has an unmistakable sense of adventure.
She enjoys hot yoga, she can spontaneously beatbox, she loves to travel and she’s into astrology so she’s ready to have someone give her the moon and the stars.
4. She Wears Her Heart On Her Sleeve
“I’m also just a girl looking for her partner,” Van Damme said in episode one of “The Bachelorette SA”.
She doesn’t believe in giving up. Having dusted off the disappointment of not being selected by Marc Buckner, she’s braving the journey once again.
This time, she knows what she wants. And she wants a guy who isn’t afraid to show his emotions. She wants romance. She wants thoughtfulness.
She wants adventure. And she wants a bit of quirky thrown into the mix to appease the nerdish side of her.
5. Love Has No Colour For Her
Born to a Belgian father and a mother, who is half Swazi and half Zulu, Van Damme is proud of her roots.
In an earlier interview, she said: “My name is Qiniso, which means truth. My mom named me the truth because she felt I was a true representation of what love between cultural lines can look like.
“Being mixed race, my whole life I’ve been exposed to how love can happen in different ways. I’m just looking for my person.
“Be they Korean, Ghanian or Afrikaans South African… if I fall in love with the person, I fall in love with that person.”
“The Bachelorette SA” airs M-Net (DStv channel 101) on Thursday at 7.30pm.
Read this story and more in issue 6 of IOL Television here