Toronto Miss Chinese Pageant 2005

The whole pageant is in the Chinese language and follows a curious theme. Luckily a translator was by my side or I would have been very bewildered indeed. When the pageant opened with its first of many musical numbers, I thought I was looking at the Sherwood Forest of so many tales. I was informed by my cultural guides, that Chinese shows often follow a fantastical theme and often borrow themes and songs from popular stories, Hong Kong TV dramas and pop music. The basic and bemusing theme for this Miss Chinese pageant was a story about a boy, a prince and his ten flower fairies that go a wandering. The prince, played by famed Chinese actor/singer Joe Ma, is in his castle trying to commune with his departed wife, last years page! ant winner Lena Ma, in an annual ceremony where she comes to him in the form of an apparition. Naturally, they performed a duet while ten flower fairies, our ten contestants, danced about in medieval style dresses. It was an exceedingly romantic theme played out in song, after song, after song. Mayhem needed to ensue, at this point, to ensure everyone viewing at home got hooked during the live telecast. Into the prince's castle stumbles an interloper dressed like Harry Potter and a high school student, played by Thomas Chong. The magical ceremony is disrupted and the ten fairies disappear cosmically to Montreal of all places. The prince gets very cross at the student interloper and the boy must now try and find the fairies and bring them back to the prince in his castle to complete the ceremony or he's in really big trouble! On stage our 10 contestants and performers took a break and costume change backstage. Whilst this was going on, the audience was shown pre-recorded video clips of the ten pretty contestants showing each girl smiling, walking, dancing, and running. When the video footage ended, the pageant resumed onto the Talent segment.

Each young lady contestant must perform a talent. I was informed by my valuable translator that each year the production team tries to find obscure talents for these girls to perform. Here is a list of the talents performed: Chinese ethnic dance, Broadway style singing and dancing, Chinese acrobatics, mime, flute playing, Gymnastics and Kung-fu style jazz. My favorite talent was performed by contestant number three, Ya Lan Chen. She played the Gu-zheng, a traditional and old Chinese musical instrument which requires much talent. Wonderfully unique and refreshing. She certainly got my vote after karate kicking, baton twirling and miming. After Talent comes Vitality. Vitality was the pretty way, of referring as to how fit these girls were. This section of the pageant was demonstrated by additional video footage of the 10 young women demonstrating vitality by riding bikes, playing volleyball, boxing, etc. all whilst smiling, posturing and looking non-sweaty and photogenic. They also demonstrated their vitality on stage in fitness dance numbers.

I believe this was all an attempt at the flower fairies, our ten contestants, finding their way back home to their castle but it was a bit cloudy even with some good translation. Not to worry because at this junction, we have arrived at the swimsuit and poise segment of the pageant, also known as the ‘who has the best body' segment. The contestants were all in the same white one-piece bathing suit and came one at a time to the front of the stage to demonstrate their ability to walk and pose like models. Once at front of stage they were asked situational questions by the MC, which determine their personalities. Nail biting stuff! The contestants were asked bizarre questions like: You are stranded on a deserted island with only your boyfriend, and a raft for one appears: What do you do? Even more strange was that these questions were asked by some computer generated like apparition from a mirror on a false wall. But it was all part of the fantastical and bemusing theme of the show and everyone appeared to just love it.

For this year's Toronto Miss Chinese Pageant, the winner was favorite to win, Miss number six or as better known to family and friends, Elva Ni. The 1st runner up was Ya Lan Chen and the 2nd runner up was Elli Paraskakis. Once the winners were announced, given their flowers and banners, pandemonium broke out in the convention centre auditorium. There was a mad rush to the stage by press and supporters with such a huge outpouring of excitement. It really was something unique to see in Toronto!

Best wishes to all the girls in the pageant from Toronto Arts and Events and our congratulations to all the winners of this year's event!