by malina. toronto, ontario.

On August 16 and 17, 2000, hundreds of girls lined up at TorontoÕs Paramount Theatre entrance with dreams of fame and POPularity; some as early as 4am! Tiny Giant staff decided that the best way to cover this story, was to audition. Sarah (the editor) and I, felt so confident about our success that we arrived at around 10am, steaming teas in hand. WeÕll show them how it's really done, we thought.

Moving closer to our destination, we began to see how large the flock of wannabes really was. Hovering a little closer, we scanned the crowd. The truth became clear when we sized up our competition. We weren't going to make it, we couldn't sing that well and as sure as anything we weren't going to stand in that line!

The group of five 18- and 19-year-old girls we talked to were in high spirits. They Òcame there for the experienceÓ but didnÕt really think they were going to make it. We then spoke to one of the few guys in the line, who said he was just there to support his girlfriend. Just when we were going to move on and ask some other girls similar questions it dawned on us. We were trying to get insights and different stories from girls who like pop music and wanted to be pop stars. What could we expect?

Knowing weÕd got all we could hope for, we pushed through the crowd that looked as if it was raided by a giant POP cookie cutter and went back to our work headquarters. This was a highlight of yet another eventful day.