Just as this year's Toronto Pride celebrations were fading from local headlines, the city made a splash in the United Kingdom during London's Pride festival.
Last Saturday, London hosted the third-ever WorldPride, an event that happens every few years, aiming to deliver a lesbian, gay, bisexual and trans parade and festival of international scope and appeal. Though the streets of central London were packed with excited attendees, colourful characters and intrigued onlookers, a series of organizational snafus led to the entertainment program being dramatically reduced—and the parade turned into a march without motorized vehicles—just days before the event.
Meanwhile, delegates from Pride Toronto, Ontario Tourism and Tourism Toronto, promoting Toronto's own upcoming WorldPride celebrations in 2014, swept in to fill some of the gaps. When the official media area in Trafalgar Square didn't happen, London Pride organizers directed international reporters to Toronto's media lounge in a hotel just outside the square. In fact, that's where some London organizers went themselves for a break.
More dramatically, Canadians dominated the entire final hour of London's Pride programming, with Proud FM host Mike Chalut taking over as MC to welcome '80s star Corey Hart and Toronto booster and high-energy headliner Deborah Cox to the stage. By day's end, there was a buzz that Toronto's WorldPride organizational abilities would decidedly exceed London's.
"According to [Toronto] organizers, they have been planning it for the past four years," reported
Gay Star News.
Caryl Dolinko of InterPride, the international association of Pride organizers that sanctions WorldPride, told the
Toronto Star that Toronto's is "going to be the biggest and probably one of the best WorldPrides we'll ever have… Toronto will do it right."
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Original sources: Gay Star News & Toronto Star