By David Aspinall
This super-confident teen organised an elaborate promposal complete with signs and confetti to ask herself to the dance.
Wearing an ‘Aloha Strong’ shirt, self-confident Rika Sarkar stepped out into the yard at her school in Honolulu, Hawaii, USA, on March 29 and picked up a feather boa and tiara.
Striding over to a huge group of people, the 17-year-old grabs one sign reading ‘mirror, mirror on the wall, who is the baddest chick of all?’ before turning around to one friend holding up a mirror for her.
Grabbing another sign asking ‘prom?’, Rika then takes a selfie before her surrounding friends and pupils begin cheering ecstatically and set off into the air.

PIC BY RIKA SARAKAR / CATERS NEWS
Rika said: “The promposal turned out better than I could have expected.
“I’d told my friends what I was planning so thought around 20 people would be there.
“When I went outside there must have been around 150 people watching and they were all excited.
“There were a lot of components to the ask so lots of people could join in.”
Rika came up with the idea as knew she wanted to take herself but – having watched her friends being asked by other people – wanted to be asked by someone.
She said: “Everyone was super hyped up about because no one had ever heard about anyone asking themselves.
“They were kind of sceptical about it, but I just told them to wait and see because I had everything extravagantly planned.”
Rika turned up to her prom on April 1 dressed in traditional Indian clothing, brimming with confidence and having reached ‘maximum slay’.

PIC BY RIKA SARAKAR / CATERS NEWS
Rika said: “My date looked and felt amazing.
“I wanted to make a statement and ensure I stood out.
“Throughout all of this, I wanted to show everyone that it is okay to love yourself and be okay with who you are.
“When people asked me who I was going with and I said, ‘by myself’, they would tell me ‘it’s okay, Rika’ or ‘you’ll find someone’.
“I told them ‘no, I want to go by myself and am completely okay with it’.

PIC BY RIKA SARAKAR / CATERS NEWS
“Most people are so insecure and it hurts my heart to see it because we shouldn’t be confined to a certain beauty standard because everyone is different.
“Everyone should make the most with what they have instead of worrying about what they lack.”