I'm Sorry..Have A Circus Story

Wow, I am certain you are all loving me right now. It has been a nearly a month since I posted last. I was going to make a post about going to the circus with my host-mama and little brother but issues occured and things happened and it was all a big to-do. So to update you all on that end, I am no longer living with Irina and Ivan. I am now living with Katya and Serge. There were personal issues with my last family, with poor health and development of my younger brother and my host mother’s pregnancy. But now I am living with a girl in one of my classes and her family and they are great. My Russian is improving and it is wonderful. I have a 15 year old sister Lera and a 4 year old sister named Sasha. I will write about them soon(I hope)

But It is now time to write about my trip to the circus. I wrote a little in the moment before deciding to focus on the show so that little bit will be in italics.

I don't know what to say. I've never been to the circus before, and I've only ever really seen them in Big Fish and Madagascar 3. There is an upbeat piano tune somewhere in the back right, and right in the center of this little rotunda is, you guessed it, the big red ring. There are ramps and what looks like a trapeze wire. My mama bought popcorn that is stale and doesn't have nearly enough Carmel to hide the burnt taste, but it's somehow just as I imagined it. It's starting to fill with people :)

A drumming began behind the big red curtain, teasing us into curiosity, what could be back there? Then it stopped as suddenly as it began, replaced with a jazzy mix tune originating from the same place as the piano.

The show began with a roller skating show and it was amazing. Three boys and a girl did amazing tricks off of ramps and I could hardly believe my eyes. I have only been rollerskating once in recent memory, and I was terrible(as everyone there could attest.) And I remember back in the day, when Salem or Corvallis had a rink, I would cling to the bar and slowly inch around the ring. So seeing people who were so amazing was awesome.

Then came the monkeys. Now, I am a huge animal lover and part of me hated this because I knew that the animals in this show were not being treated well and I would often see them yanking them and I was about 5 seconds from leaving, but I do have to admit that the monkeys were incredible smart creatures. They wore stupid sequined little outfits and hats. One wore a gas mask and that was terrifying. No, I’m not your mummy.

A dog came in carrying a charriot with monkeys dressed up as Romans with stick swords and they chased monkeys on scooters. And then monkeys riding dogs were chased by monkeys on mini horses and just wow. Monkeys.

Then came the clowns. So I am used to my mental image of clowns being the scary painted face ones. But these clowns just had lots of blush and they were very cool. I was really happy that they weren’t scary they were just shirtless dorks. One was really short and fat and the other was tall and skinny. Skinny did a bridge and Chubby played his ribs like a xylophone and then the ring-master-lady pulled them out of the ring so a warrior princess and her guard could do cool tricks on a teeter totter.

The clowns came back and played some music, Skinny played the banjo and sang really fast Russian and Chubby stole Skinny’s hat and began playing violin(really, really badly.) So of course in retaliation he broke Chubby’s violin. Chubby suddenly played a really awesome saxaphone song. I also remember a great drum solo.

So sadly my bullet points end there so I don’t have any more specific details but I do remember some awesome horse riding and a trapize show that I will never be able to forget or explain. It was amazing and beautiful and scary and just wow.

My mom just said I have cake and coffee so I’m going to go now. Sorry this took so long but I will try writing again soon. Pictures are on their way.