Age: 27

Born: June 4, 1981

Made in: Victoria

African-born Bakary, or Kai as he likes to be known, represented his homeland as a swimmer at the Sydney Olympic Games in 2000.

Now, after eight years in Australia, living in Sydney for four years and his current home Melbourne, Bakary has found his passion in fashion.

"I stayed here to pursue my swimming, as the facilities in Mali weren't very good," he says. "And there are so many other opportunities here."

Bakary says he enjoyed a comfortable upbringing in French-colonised Mali until an uprising in the late 1980s plunged the nation into unrest.

He recalls bullets flying past his bedroom window and refers to violent protests that interrupted his school days as commonplace.

In Australia, Bakary has worked in various jobs and says making ends meet while trying to improve his English has been a great challenge.

Bakary is now working as a storeman but last year he also started his own clothing import business.

He says he makes the most of his family connections throughout Asia to build his business and cites his break into modelling through Make Me a Supermodel as a happy coincidence.

"I love fashion, and I'm now involved in two of the biggest parts of that, importing and modelling," he says.

The oldest contestant of the MMAS finalists, Bakary says he will keep to himself and focus on the job at hand.

"I thought modelling would be an easy thing to do but it's definitely not," he says. "I'll do whatever it takes to win. My goal is to make the top 5, anything can happen from there."

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