php - identical strings don't show up as a match

I'm trying to determine whether or not two strings match, and even though when I print them out, they're identical, it still says they don't match.  I tried to cast them both as strings, and I tried using '===' instead of '==', but neither solved the problem...

       if(preg_match("#^Availability:#", $test)) {
        //just to note: $test = "Availability: Lorem Ipsum";
        
        $nid = 1;
        $prep = explode("Availability:", $test);
        
        $orig = node_load($nid);
        
        print $prep[1];  //Prints Lorem Ipsum
        print($orig->title); //Prints Lorem Ipsum
        
        if((string)$orig->title	== (string)$prep[1]) { 
          print 'ok'; 
        } else { 
          print 'nope'; //Always prints nope
        }
        ...

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