Back to Halloween... the infectious excitement of Halloween actually started the night before. I was stunned to see my students running around our sea at 3am, giggling, dressed in their costumes or actively scavenging for scraps to make into costumes. The next day, students began appearing dressed up for the holiday immediately. Some attended class and meals in costume, others waited until dinner or just after to get changed. If I was asked one time about what I wanted to be for Halloween, I was asked a million times. I was a saloon girl, by the way. I re-used a costume that I had purchased online in 2007 and have only worn twice (although in 2008 I didn't dress up). It is quite sexy, consisting of a short fuschia and black dress with a multi-colored can-can underneath, black stocking (or fishnets, which I didn't have), heels, a fushia garter, headband, and black fan made of died ostrich feathers (I actually got that in the UK -- didn't come with the costume). I made my face up competely, added some bindi designs and falsies to my eyes, and was ready to rock.
When I got to the party, I went picture crazy! Everyone had dressed up, and so many of the costumes were amazing, not only for their design but also for their cleverness. So many of the students did not come onto the ship with a costume, but made something amazing while on board. Fortunately, there was a costume parade and a costume contest. I didn't envy the judges! There were quite a few amazing entries. Faculty and staff didn't compete:(
The contest winners were:
1) in the kids division, "the transformer" (one of the older kids cut up, painted, and taped cardboard to himself in all the right places to look like Optimus Prime)
2) in the male division "SAS Picture" (a guy dressed up as one of the cheesy art prints in the cabins, complete with the backside graffiti -- people were leaving messages on his back all night)
3) the female division "the creeper" (girl who dressed up as Japanese horror girl in the Ring and the Grudge)
4) the group division "the rickshaw" (2 guys that tranformed a tricycle into a bicycle rickshaw complete with paper-stuffed legs hanging out...amazing)
5) and finally the overall creative divion "speed racer barbie" (girl who dressed up like a biker chic and made a life-size barbie box complete with celophane window!!! It was decorated with logos and sales language... amazing)
And now for the best part.... THRILLER! I have been assisting one of the students, Paulo, as a hip hop instructor since early on in the voyage. In the spirit of Fall 2000, I put a bug in his ear about doing a surprise performance of Thriller during the Halloween party. It was gleefully accepted, and for the past month, the class has been learning the choreography and practicing. One of the students clipped the music for us to include some sound effects. It was so great the way we executed it: Maria cleared the dance floor about halfway through the party and was pretending to do the costume party when she was "interrupted" by this massive growling noise. Pretending confusion, she backed out of the way. The lights went out. Enter Thriller ghouls and goblins. When the lights came back on, we were rocking and rolling. The performance went by in a flash. We held our pose at the end to the sound of thunderous applause. Everyone was really excited and congratulatory. I was so proud of the students who performed, because they worked really hard and it took a lot of guts for some of them to be in a dance performance. Many of them exclaimed at the rush performing gives you. I wasn't surprised at the feeling of course, but I had no idea how much I'd missed it until that night.
Happy Halloween!
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