OVO!!
So I have been working, working, and more working!
Here was my day today! This is part of my staff, mostly just the people who worked today. They are making the OVO sign! You can see the Grande Chapteau in the background, though it does it no justice!
On Wednesday, the 29th, we had Dress Rehearsal. Then on Thursday, we had Premier. It went great! I worked on both days but I saw the show with my boss on rehearsal. It was amazing. Completely different than Kooza but just as great. The life of insects, or bugs, whichever, with a love story in between. It is too hard to explain so watch the link below. If a picture says a 1000 words, this video explains 50 million words! The minute and a half does not do Cirque justice but it gives you a taste of what they do!
OVO!
Well, other than that, the purpose of this post is to explain why Gypsies exist. So let me begin!
When I first started working, I was driving, then I paid for parking one day, and then I decided to start taking the bus. The Cirque is set-up on the Port of Quebec. I literally look at the river all day. It's gorgeous, but usually its cold and raining. Today I took the Ecolobus which is free and basically a way to chauffeur tourists around the hills that divide uptown and downtown. They are super cute (not the tourists, the bus). They are half the size of a real bus so they can maneuver alleys and side streets. They run on batteries and it is free so my complaints about the nagging tourists will just have to subside! They ask me questions like I am local... hilarious, especially when I fake the ability to speak french!
Anyways, I decided to walk through the Marché du Vieux-Port de Québec on my way home before I got back on the tourist trap (aka Ecolobus), which is a local market by the Port and take a look around. It's basically a farmers market but inside (the rain is really overdone here).
After realizing the market was almost all but closed by 7pm, I decided to go find the Ecolobus. When I found it, the sweating, tired, tourists made me all but run for my life. The capacity of the Ecolobus is 21 and there was at least that many. So I decided that today I would walk home. It is only about a 2 miles and there are stores everywhere on my way back.
This is when I found the gypsies. Yes that is right, GYPSIES. I had looked in a couple of stores, bought a couple of postcards and found a pod of tourists circled around a large monument with a clearing. I thought it was just tourists looking at another tribute structure. Boy was I wrong!
There was a loud snap of a whip and there they were. His and Her Gypsies. I knew I wouldn't be that impressed since I have seen Cirque but there was a difference...
The difference= knives and fire. She had on a belly shirt with rusty gems and long ripped, thick-striped pants that had been worn too many times for wear. He had on dirty jeans with a frilly white button up that looked like more kerosene had been on it than detergent.
Their show was very planned out with everything from dancing while setting up, to props that were made from duck tape and aluminum scraps. They both looked like they hadn't had a bath in weeks, but I think that was part of the act (or I at least, I hope so).
You can see the back of the 'her Gypsy' here (she was waving flags at this point). Other parts of the show included syncronized tap dancing, juggling of fire & knives (together and alone), walking on homemade stilts and ladders (then of course, juggling again).
The finale was the woman on all fours with her stomach in the air with the aluminum circle (homemade, of course) balancing on her stomach. You can see the aluminum circle, in the picture above, in front of the tourists sitting on the bench. The circle had 6 knives pointing towards the center, and then of course, it was on fire. Then, the 'his Gypsy' jumped through the fire/knife circle. All together, the show probably lasted 25 minutes. I was a little bit nervous for them towards the end so I was more impressed with their act than expected. Bravo Gypsies!
I never thought I would actually get to see a real gypsy in my life. Mark that one off my bucket list.
(Oh and the best part... while I was walking away I heard another Gypsy group taking over to entertain the tourists...)
Au Revoir!
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