20-year-old ballet dancer Mori Riyo is the first Japanese to be named as Miss Universe in 48 years. She was selected from 77 contestants at the annual competition in Mexico on Monday. The runners up were from Brazil and Venezuela. Mori is from Shizuoka Prefecture, where she currently works as a jazz instructor at a dance school run by her mother. She has studied dance since she was four, including time studying ballet in Canada. In an indication that the world has fallen for Asian Beauty – a common theme in Japanese advertising these days – Miss Korea Honey Lee was also chosen among the final five contestants. The win by a Japanese entrant is all the more notable since the runner-up in last year’s contest was Naha City native Chibana Kurara (25), who has capitalized on her instant fame and now works as a TV news reporter among other things.