OddThinking

The year was 1997.

The location was North Stradbroke Island, an island near Brisbane in Queensland.

The event was my first ever National Circus Festival, and it was an exciting time for me.

It was a weekend of friendship: I caught up with people I hadn’t seen for over a year (from when I lived in Queensland) and I met many new circus performers.

It was a weekend of performances: I saw many performances. Many, many performances. As a newbie, I saw acts unlike any I had seen before.

It was a weekend of being an audience participant. I was called up on stage by performers four times in as many days. The reason was because I was a newbie. The first time it happened, the performer looked through the audience for a candidate saying “No, I know you. I know you. I know you… ah, you! What’s your name?”

It was a weekend of over-exposure.

One hula-hoopist learnt the importance of dress rehearsals, as she struggled with a bikini top that kept threatening to slide-up and undo as she hooped on stage. Eventually, in frustration, and to great audience appreciation, she ripped it off and continued topless.

Apparently some audience members weren’t so appreciative of the predicament that Maike Aerden found herself in. I saw her perform several times, as her Venus character. She was a tall, stunning, blonde, and when she would pull a man out from the audience (not me, luckily), they were eager to do what she asked.
She would give a rousing shout, “Are you feeling hot?”
“Yeah!” the man would cry.
“Oh, well, in that case, you’d better remove an item of clothing.”
She’d repeat this a couple of times, until he had his chest bare, and his was starting to feel self-conscious.
“Are you feeling hot?”
“Uh, no.”
“Okay, let’s get on with the show then.”

In her last show, the volunteer wasn’t feeling self-conscious at all, and kept repeating “Yeah!”. Venus relieved him of his shirt, shoes, his sunglasses, his necklace, and kept waiting for him to stop, but inevitably he was soon stripped down to his underwear.
“Okay,” she said, “Now, I want you to think about this very, very carefully. Are you feeling hot?”
“Yeah!” shouted the man, and dropped his underwear.
Venus, once she finished laughing, managed to persuade the exhibitionist to put his trousers back on and continued with the show.

The next day, the police came to interview her. Apparently, there were several complaints from people in the crowd. I still have trouble fathoming this. Yes, there was nudity. However, there was no suggestion of lewdness, sexuality or eroticism. It was merely the sight of a penis – yes, within the view of children – that caused people to complain.

Furthermore, how much blame can possibly be assigned to the performer in this situation. This still rankles with me slightly.

But, today’s story isn’t about audience participation or nudity. It is about the rigger and the t-shirt.

There was a commemorative t-shirt made for the event, and clearly too many had been produced because, in the last few hours of the convention, the prices had been dropping.

Some of the kids had been taking their t-shirts around to the performers and their friends and getting them to sign it. So, one of the organisers had the idea of getting all of the performers from the convention to sign one official t-shirt, and then auction it off. Unfortunately, it wasn’t planned very well. The auction was held after the big show on the last night, once the audience had all been dismissed by the MC.

The show was held outside, with people sitting on the grass around a circle which included a circus rig (for the aerial acts.)

Some poor guy – I was told he was a circus rigger, although I suspect he also had experience as an acrobat – was left shouting out to the quickly dwindling crowd, trying to garner some interest in the auction.

I think it was the stage manager who, seeing the rigger’s predicament, came out with a spare milk-crate for him to stand on. That way he was more visible to the interested audience, scattered amongst all the people milling around, and he could see their bids. He was grateful, and clambered upon it.

Another milk-crate was procured, and he balanced one carefully on top of the other, stood on them both, and spruiked for more bids.

Suddenly, he felt something, and looked down. A safety harness was being threaded between his legs by another of his friends, as he stood on the crates.

This was the bit that makes this story so interesting to me. He knew what was coming next. He let out a bit of a sigh at the direction the events were turning, but he didn’t say “no”. He let it happen. As he continued to spruik the t-shirt, the safety harness was fastened around his waist and tightened. The attached rope was attended by another rigger, to ensure there was no risk of danger, and a small spontaneous posse of milk-crate foragers came forward with a steady supply.

He continued to try to collect the bids, completely entrusting his team members with his safety, as one by one, milk crates were handed to him and he precariously added them to the stack, one-by-one, until he was about three metres off the ground.

I was entranced by the whole situation – the riggers total acceptance of where things were leading; that these guys could just lark around with death-defying stunts; that they could do so safely; that the rigger completely trusted his mates. I wanted to be part of this; I wanted these to be my people!

When the auction started, I had no desire for another festival t-shirt; I had already purchased one. Collecting autographs have never been my thing.

However, I found myself as the winning bidder, on a t-shirt that, to this day, I have never worn.

My plan was to give it pride of place of my T-Shirt Quilt Project.

I started this article when I put the t-shirt in the washing machine for the first time, ever. It had rust-coloured marks on it, and it needed to be washed before being made into a (washable!) quilt, but I had always been petrified that the autographs would wash away.

I coated it in a sealant product to protect them, put it in the washing machine, and then came to the computer to document its history, just in case it was all lost.

Now, as the article nears its end, I can report that I have removed it from the machine. After its first wash, the autographs, though slightly smudged by the sealant’s solvent, are all in good condition. Phew!

Coda: Joel Salom used to perform on the streets of Brisbane, juggling on top of a stack of milk-crates. When he saw what happened at the auction, he realised he had an opportunity to break the world-record height of milk-crate stack.

I saw him later in the night, just a couple of milk-crates of short of the rumoured record, having trouble because he was obstructed by the top of the circus rig. Think about how high trapeze artists perform. Now think about the height of the large horizontal strut that their trapezes hang from. Joel was in trouble because that strut was about chest-height for him, and in the way, as he stood on top of a teetering tower of milk-crates.

Now do you understand why I have been to seven more of these circus festivals in the intervening years?