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Published: November 2nd 2008
"Wasted Away in Margaritaville"
No really, the beer is a prop!
Dont' worry, the "sunburn" is all blush. I think I still have some ground in to my skin.After a week of showing "It's the Great Pumpkin, Charlie Brown!" to my students, it was finally time for my party.
In years past, I have gone to Minerva's in Wisconsin. She and her hubby have a house outside of town so we can have bonfires, deep fried turkey, too much sugar, odd mixed drinks that shouldn't be made, and lots of beer, and then crash out, all while bothering no one. We ususally spend most of the next day of the sofa watching movies, eating leftovers, recovering... This is the first year I missed her party since 2003. Part of me is sad to miss it, because it is such a looked-forwarded-to tradition, but, hey, I'm in China!
Now in Wisconsin, as in Minnesota, costume planning requires extra considerations. Like can I wear it over a winter parka? (In 1991 we got over a foot of snow on Halloween night.) Will it keep me warm as the temps might possibly fall to near freezing? Can I pile layers of sweatshirts and extra pants over it (for the bonfires)? Can I layer extra clothes under it so I don't look stupid while I don't freeze? Is it tight fitting
Full view
Yep, flip flops. I can finally wear flip flops in public. enough to not get too friendly with the bonfire? Can I still move after I do all of this?
Careful planning had gone into my costume. It's hot here. And humid. And it will be crowded.
This is not a country that celebrates Halloween, so I couldn't just go to Walmart or a Halloween store and pick something up. All I had seen were a few random things (for the foreigners, of course, not the locals), and I had no desire to dress as a witch, sexy nun, or don a curly green wig and cape. I like original costumes. Clever ones. Punny ones. Heh heh.
So, as luck would have it, a week before Halloween I was chatting with the lovely Jo back in Mpls and she made some comment about wishing she had a margarita. Which, of course, led to the lyrics of Margaritaville. If you have no idea what I am talking about, shame on you, go find some Jimmy Buffet. I am not a huge fan, but the song's a classic!
So suddenly, in the middle of, "Salt? Salt. Salt! SALT!" it came to me. I would go as "Wasted Away in Margaritaville." I
took some liberty with the lyrics.
All I had to do was track down some cheap jewelry (hello, 2 kuai store!), sunglasses (mine actually have anchors on them), a "Hawaiian" shirt, flip flops, and make-up. This is do-able. Dongmen, a shopping area in Shenzhen, has never left the 1980s in some respects. It's scary.
So with the help of James, who decided to go as the Nurse Joker from The Dark Knight, I managed to put together my costume. (He was one of the few people I had told about it, as I prefer to not have to explain such things without visual aids. Yes, he blackmailed it out of me since he had my thumb drive at the time.) James, lucky for me, had seen a "Hawaiian" shirt the week before when he had been costumer shopping for himself.
I made the salt shaker with cardboard from something I bought a while ago (no clue what) and dental floss I borrowed from Roy. I'm a minty-fresh, sunburned, happy, drunk vacationer.
I was very pleased that throughout the night I only had to explain my costume twice. I got a lot of, "Vacationer??" followed by me
turning around to show the salt, followed by, "OH! Margaritaville! I get it! That's really good." I'd be lying if I said my ego didn't love it.
So a group of us got together at Julie's and dressed for the big night. (Julie's the one who loaned me flip-flops back in Zhuhai.) Then we all headed out to NYPD. NYPD is a New York style pizza place that serves the best pizza in the city. It's not Chinese pizza, it's real pizza. Meaning properly seasoned sauce, properly textured crust (one of those things you think can't be done wrong until you realize it can), and ample amounts of gooey, stringy, real cheese. And for Y100 I can eat to my heart's content and drink as much Kingway beer as I can handle. That's $15 well spent!
The party was held in a mall, in almost a rotunda area, which provided ample gawking space for the locals. It was like we were a zoo exhibit. There were three floors of people watching us in our costumes as we ate, drank, made merry, and some performed on stage. They even took pictures. We should have made them foot our bill.
After paying homage to my Wisconsin training of eating and drinking myself fuller than full, we headed out to the real party a 10mn cab ride away. That's right, NYPD was just dinner and warm-up.
We raced another cab enroute to Michelle's AKA The Cue Club, which is by the stadium. It was amusing to see all of our cabs pulling up to Michelle's. It reminded me of a fancy NYC gala event except with red VW taxis instead of limos, and crazy costumes instead of formalwear. We were still the celebrities.
There were probably a couple hundred Ex-Pats, a few Chinese, some outside, some inside. They had DJs playing (not spinning, sadly) music that would qualify as Rap when I was 12. Yep, MC Hammer, C & C Music Factory, Tag Team, Coolio... I didn't drink any more that night, except for the one beer Bart gave me. I guess Lydia didn't want it and we just couldn't let it go to waste.
Around 1:30am (Maybe, I didn't wear a watch--it just didn't go with my costume!) my friend, Julie the Panda, and I headed out. I crashed at her place since she lives in Futian.
"And here's my card..."
Yes, he had props, too. A cab ride back home would have cost a fortune and taken next to forever.
All in all, a good and crazy night. Lots of little crazy mischief and silliness. Halloween is definitely my favorite holiday. No matter which side of the globe I'm on.
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thompson
non-member comment
thank you
thank you for coming to the event. glad u had a great time