Post a Comment On: Occasional Ramblings

The committee for the employees club decided to go all out this year. Instead of having a one night club party where we have free food and live entertainment, this year they opted for a 3 day bash with various activities lined up. The first day will include the kid's art exhibit, a kiddie bingo, movie marathon and a mini fair. The second will be a singing contest and the third night will be a poolside dinner party. I was informed last week that I will have a booth during the mini fair. It seems that the kids liked my balloon animals so much (I have made them in previous parties) that they were requesting me to do a repeat performance.

I bought a bunch of balloons and a new double action hand pump. I couldn't find the balloon twisting book I got from my niece so I just tried to recall how to make the figures from pictures.

Yesterday was the first day of the fair. I started setting up the booth at around 1730H. Beside me was a booth selling compost fertilizer, a booth selling home made ginger extract and a snack bar grilling hotdogs. It was an outdoor event and they installed a tarp on the playground in case it rains. They installed a huge canvass by tying it to two trees which would serve as the movie screen using a digital projector. It was still very bright so they decided to do the kiddie bingo first. I have started out making some animal shapes and some of the kids started to approach my booth. Somebody announced on the PA system that the balloon booth is now open and soon there was a very long queue of impatient kids coming from my booth. I suppose the compost fertilizer booth or the ginger extract booth did not interest them a bit. I was alone in the booth and soon I was frantically trying to meet up with the demand. I was churning up pigs, dogs and bears as fast as I could. The line thinned out when they started playing bingo but there were still a handful of small kids who were more interested in the balloon figures than playing bingo so I still have a lot of backorder to fill up. It also rained so at that point we were huddling inside the tarp so we would not get all wet. I noticed that some of the older kids were not too interested in having balloon animals though. I think they were undecided if they should get one since their peers might think it's uncool. The movie marathon started shortly after. It was Star Wars episodes 4 through 6. Revenge of the Sith just played in the local theaters a few weeks back so they thought it might be a good idea to introduce the old series to the newer generation.

I got a few unusual requests like doing a balloon giraffe but unfortunately I didn't know how to do that much to the disappointment of the little boy who requested it (I suspect he just watched Madagascar). Some of the requests I could improvise like requests for flowers, dragonflies and balloon hats. One little girl requested a balloon sword which was very easy to improvise. When some of the kids saw what she was holding though, everybody wanted a balloon "light saber" even the older kids. Soon the line began growing again because of the demand for this new figure (which was thankfully easy to make) until I finally ran out of balloons to inflate. I though my work was done so I started packing up but then other kids approached me and asked if I could "change their pig into a sword please?". So I spent another half hour or so untwisting pigs, bears and dogs into disfigured balloon light sabers. Soon most of the kids were not even paying much attention to the movie. They were too busy playing mock light saber duels with their ex-balloon animals. Feeling tired I went back home early and grabbed something to eat. 2 more days to go... *groan*