Even though Matt encouraged me to go on the show for fun, and I was drawn to all the glitterati that come with being on television, what I really wanted was to share my story with an audience. I imagined out of the millions of people watching, someone among them might be interested in publishing my book. With this idea in mind, the show ceased being a frothy little vacation, it became (quite possibly) a step in the right direction. And with that in mind, I felt as though a big rock had been strapped to my chest.
After a few days of mulling it over, I finally went online and filled out the Fei Cheng Wu Rao application. A simple one-pager requesting basic information such as age, height, weight, profession, hobbies, and a few photographs. The whole thing took no more than ten minutes. It was all strangely easy.
Too easy – it made me uneasy. I wished they had IQ tests or essay questions like: please estimate the number of manholes in the City of New York, then diagram your logic, double spaced with 4 inch margins to be turned in first thing Monday morning. Just so I could agonize over it for days and then formulate an answer so brilliant it will dazzle the judges until they go blind. But with this teensy form of age, height and photos, how are they going to know I'm special?
Reluctantly, I took one last look at my very unspecial form and pressed "Send".
On the FCWR Canadian Edition poster, "hai xuan" was printed in bold white letters just below Meng Fei – the MC's bald head. "Hai xuan" literally means "selection from the sea", implying the vastness of the applicant pool. But mom was convinced that I would get picked. Then again, mom also thought dad would win the Nobel Prize.
Every day I checked my email 16 times. A week passed without any word from Fei Cheng Wu Rao. I began to worry. Did they perhaps lose my application? Or am I simply... not good enough?
I hopped online to check their website again. Nothing has changed. Did I apply through an illegitimate source? The wrong website? There are dozens of microsites for FCWR. Toronto, Calgary, Edmonton, Vancouver, London, Nanjing, it appears, each had its own page. I decided the wisest and safest thing to do was to spam the system by setting up my profile on 10 different sites. I put a Michelle in every city. Just to make sure NOBODY missed me. (Dating show tip: When in doubt, SPAM.)
Then I noticed something rather odd. All the girls on the front page of these dating sites have thousands, sometimes even TENS of thousands of votes. How did they amass such a staggering amount? Do I have to get all my friends rallied up to vote for my dating ad? That would be so embarrassing. No, it would be humiliating. I was hoping to carry out this show business like a covert operation. 007 Style. Still, even if I begged everyone to vote, my Facebook contacts featured a miniscule count of five hundred and forty one – I don't have that many friends!
I let out a heavy sigh and commenced to clean my room. Cinderella is not going to the ball.
A few days later, the phone rang.
A friendly voice informed me that Fei Cheng Wu Rao Vancouver edition is taking place at the Fairmont Hotel on Saturday.
"There will be professional make-up artists on-site. But the girls must wear their own outfits," he said, "Would you care to come?"
At last. The group audition.
"Of course I'll come!"