The circus came to town last week and I decided we needed to check it out. The last time I remember going to a circus was when my grandparents took me. I was about 10 years old and I got to ride an elephant which was the highlight of my week. I also got a blow-up elephant to take home that I loved until the day my cousin sat on it and it popped. I was so pissed off sad. But I digress.
This circus wasn’t too shabby. Not that I have much to compare it to. The tickets were reasonable and the show was longer than I expected – nearly 2 hours (longer if you count the intermission). The first round of gymnasts, I guess you would call them, was a group of Asian guys. They reminded me of that guy in Ocean’s 11. If you’ve seen the movie you know what I’m talking about. They are very flexible and were jumping all over the place, through hoops, etc. There were also some acrobats that climbed a pole another acrobat was balancing on his shoulders or forehead. No nets either! There were horses, dogs, camels and elephants that performed too. And only one clown, whew! Not a big fan of clowns. I liked the juggler, however. He was near the end of the show.
Now the not so great stuff. It felt a little claustrophobic inside the tent and it was hard to breathe. They took every opportunity to try and make more money by selling tons of concessions, toys, coloring books, elephant rides, etc. I felt bad for the people sitting behind the kids who won these monster balloons. It was a gimmick to sell bags of peanuts – some bags had a tag inside saying you won a balloon. Like they couldn’t wait until the end of the show to do that? It was packed in there as it was.
But in all, I enjoyed the show and I managed to get a few decent photos too. I had my camera on the fastest shutter speed and ISO I could get away with. Of course I ran out of memory just as the elephants came out and had to switch to my Powershot which sucks in low-light situations but what can you do? It was still an interesting experience.