I am scared of many things. As most people know, these are by and large completely unreasonable fears, just shy of being full on phobias. For some reason, many of these things fall into the category of "things children are supposed to enjoy". As I work with children now, and have in the past, I have come into contact with many of these things more regularly than I might like.
The list is as follows (in ascending order of creepiness):
1) The Hobbit cartoon
2) Clowns (only with fully painted faces)
3) People in Character Suits (Mickey Mouse & the Jack in the Box man, in particular)
4) Character suits without people in them, laying on the side of the road
5) Mimes
6) People wearing just the head of a character suit, with regular clothes
You will find (something many people find odd) that puppets do not appear on the list. Why? Mostly because of Jim Henson, but more so because puppets are rarely people-sized, and therefore, if they were to become posessed by some sort of urge to kill or maim me I could most likely defend myself.
Of course, then there's La Pequeña Gigante, the giant marionette import from France who terrorized the streets of Santiago this past weekend.
She was supposed to be performance art, as the little troupe of traditionally clad Frenchman flew and danced and pulled her strings, taking her a on trip through downtown Santiago. On television, it was highly enjoyable to watch, if more for the spectacle of families lining the streets than for the ingenuity of the event. The idea that an old-fashioned puppet who spent most of her time sleeping and walking around brought families together to do something other than eat and watch television was very cool. However, there is a limit to how much I can take.
I reached that limit on Sunday afternoon, when La Pequeña Gigante finally captured her puppet rhino (as was her quest) and decided to enter my domain: Plaza Italia, just outside my apartment. Thousands of people gathered, waiting for her to wake up and reveal the rhino that she had captured. They waited and waited and waited, watching her sleep and sleep and sleep. Children screamed "Wake up lazy puppet!" as she slept past her announced wake-up time. They got anxious. Finally, the frenchmen appeared, she stood up, the clowd roared...blah blah blah. The rhino was revealed, and looked like a puppet rhino should.
It was clear that there was something to come, as we had waited so long and it was her final day in Santiago. So there was a confetti canon, and a live band, and a giant cymbal. But before that, before the merriment, there was the urine.
La Pequeña Gigante, having taken such a long nap and having (presumably) consumed three tons of water, decided that she would do what no proper lady-doll ever should: she hiked up her skirt, squatted, and peed in the street.
Call me American. Call me pretentious. This just didn't seem ok. There's something creepy about watching what is supposed to be a child, albeit a giant fake one, doing something so....intimate? dirty? bizarre?
La Pequeña Gigante scarred me. I'm going to update my list.
I'm going to link to someone's flickr set, because I believe that photog captures PGs creepiness better than I ever could.
The list is as follows (in ascending order of creepiness):
1) The Hobbit cartoon
2) Clowns (only with fully painted faces)
3) People in Character Suits (Mickey Mouse & the Jack in the Box man, in particular)
4) Character suits without people in them, laying on the side of the road
5) Mimes
6) People wearing just the head of a character suit, with regular clothes
You will find (something many people find odd) that puppets do not appear on the list. Why? Mostly because of Jim Henson, but more so because puppets are rarely people-sized, and therefore, if they were to become posessed by some sort of urge to kill or maim me I could most likely defend myself.
Of course, then there's La Pequeña Gigante, the giant marionette import from France who terrorized the streets of Santiago this past weekend.
She was supposed to be performance art, as the little troupe of traditionally clad Frenchman flew and danced and pulled her strings, taking her a on trip through downtown Santiago. On television, it was highly enjoyable to watch, if more for the spectacle of families lining the streets than for the ingenuity of the event. The idea that an old-fashioned puppet who spent most of her time sleeping and walking around brought families together to do something other than eat and watch television was very cool. However, there is a limit to how much I can take.
I reached that limit on Sunday afternoon, when La Pequeña Gigante finally captured her puppet rhino (as was her quest) and decided to enter my domain: Plaza Italia, just outside my apartment. Thousands of people gathered, waiting for her to wake up and reveal the rhino that she had captured. They waited and waited and waited, watching her sleep and sleep and sleep. Children screamed "Wake up lazy puppet!" as she slept past her announced wake-up time. They got anxious. Finally, the frenchmen appeared, she stood up, the clowd roared...blah blah blah. The rhino was revealed, and looked like a puppet rhino should.
It was clear that there was something to come, as we had waited so long and it was her final day in Santiago. So there was a confetti canon, and a live band, and a giant cymbal. But before that, before the merriment, there was the urine.
La Pequeña Gigante, having taken such a long nap and having (presumably) consumed three tons of water, decided that she would do what no proper lady-doll ever should: she hiked up her skirt, squatted, and peed in the street.
Call me American. Call me pretentious. This just didn't seem ok. There's something creepy about watching what is supposed to be a child, albeit a giant fake one, doing something so....intimate? dirty? bizarre?
La Pequeña Gigante scarred me. I'm going to update my list.
I'm going to link to someone's flickr set, because I believe that photog captures PGs creepiness better than I ever could.
