On the 31st of October, the year 13s organised a Halloween disco after school for the student, and staff, population. They did not deign to include us in any of their planning, but we elbowed our way in anyway and, hopefully, helped.
I asked some year 13 students what I could do, and they told me to carve a pumpkin. Now, I had never actually carved a proper, intricate pumpkin before, and I do not count the simple triangles and smiles I have hewn into the orange, thick skinned monstrosities of my childhood, so I approached the task eagerly, but altogether rather wearily. Having conducted extensive re`search into pumpkin design and carving, I learned of the three layered technique, which I then attempted on my pumpkin, albeit with limited success. The technique is essentially that the deeper you scrape into the pumpkin, the lighter it will be, but if you just scratch away at the skin, a golden orange glow will come through in those areas as opposed to the bright yellow that happens when you burrow all the way through the pumpkin flesh. On my pumpkin, this did not really work that well, but I'm still very happy with how it turned out. Next time I could perhaps do a trial run of this new technique, which I tried so unsuccessfully to implement this time.What I am very happy I did however, was that i did indeed research beforehand, as it changed the tools I used in the carving of the pumpkin. I had planned on using kitchen knives, but I read online that they are far too big and rough for small details. Most places recommended an X-acto knife, but since I cannot purchase one anywhere I know of, I decided that a craft knife would work just as well. I chose a well-known face to be on my pumpkin: that of Jack from a Nightmare before Christmas, because not only is he instantly recognisable, but he is also one of my favourite movie characters. Having finished my pumpkin, I made my brother one too, although his was significantly smaller, due to the small time frame.
I attended the disco itself as well. I had been hoping to be useful as just another pair of hands if nothing more, when it comes to clean-up or serving food, but I brought my camera as well, to take pictures for the yearbook and for the bulletin we were commissioned to make too. I hadn't planned on dancing at all, as it is one of the things that I am certainly very, very, very inept at. I was made to though, because if we the organisers were on the sidelines looking bored and uncomfortable, then how could we expect little year sevens to get pumped enough about dancing, especially when they feel awkward enough in the first place. So I took breaks from taking photos to sway from side to side or bob up and down a little bit, since that is, sadly, the full extent of my dancing abilities. This peer pressure from us to make the others dance was reflected in most people's clothes too. Almost all of year 13 was wearing costumes of some sort, and most of them were very frightening too, so I felt rather harmless and inadequate in my cardboard R2D2 costume.
Clean-up was relatively painless due to the fact that we had a lot of people helping out. Everything was done in half an hour, except the bloody poster paint prints on the windows, which we left for the cleaning ladies (I suspect they will hate us till the end of time).
Overall, I think it was very well organised indeed, especially when you consider that everything was done for more or less three days. Seventeen thousand rubles were raised for a worthy cause, and all participants had fun. What I personally found very impressive was the effort people actually put into their costumes. The winner of the costume competition was a year eight zombie bride, who had used actual pig intestines to enhance her zombiness.
The only real issues was the difficulty in getting people up and dancing. There was a whole congregation of students in the corridor, unable to leave yet unwilling to dance. Whether that is the result of a difficult age or a lack of generated excitement, I cannot tell, but the year sevens certainly enjoyed themselves. Attendance too could be improved, with more active marketing campaigns before the dance and some excitement drummed up maybe with posters or, most preferably, sensational word of mouth. All of these issues might have been solved had their been more time to plan, although taking everything into account, I consider the disco to be a success.
As a result of this evaluation however, year twelve have decided that the next event we coordinate, the Winter Holiday Party (originally X-mas party, but altered to reflect the multicultural and varied nature of our school after our talk with the head-master) should be planned well ahead. We therefore decided to talk to the headteacher straight away, to ask about whether it would be possible to do something of the sort, and he gave us his approval, encouraging us to draw up a plan and approach him again.
Keeping on track with the Halloween disco however, I created a bulletin about it. It's in black and white, as requested by our IB coordinator out of photo-copying considerations, but I did the best I could with the colour scheme, and it wasn't that big of an issue since Halloween is supposed to be a creepy festival.
 |
| left: my brother's pumpkin, right: my Jack pumpkin |
I attended the disco itself as well. I had been hoping to be useful as just another pair of hands if nothing more, when it comes to clean-up or serving food, but I brought my camera as well, to take pictures for the yearbook and for the bulletin we were commissioned to make too. I hadn't planned on dancing at all, as it is one of the things that I am certainly very, very, very inept at. I was made to though, because if we the organisers were on the sidelines looking bored and uncomfortable, then how could we expect little year sevens to get pumped enough about dancing, especially when they feel awkward enough in the first place. So I took breaks from taking photos to sway from side to side or bob up and down a little bit, since that is, sadly, the full extent of my dancing abilities. This peer pressure from us to make the others dance was reflected in most people's clothes too. Almost all of year 13 was wearing costumes of some sort, and most of them were very frightening too, so I felt rather harmless and inadequate in my cardboard R2D2 costume.
 |
| R2D2 (me) and a zombie picture courtesy of Mr. Browning |
Overall, I think it was very well organised indeed, especially when you consider that everything was done for more or less three days. Seventeen thousand rubles were raised for a worthy cause, and all participants had fun. What I personally found very impressive was the effort people actually put into their costumes. The winner of the costume competition was a year eight zombie bride, who had used actual pig intestines to enhance her zombiness.
The only real issues was the difficulty in getting people up and dancing. There was a whole congregation of students in the corridor, unable to leave yet unwilling to dance. Whether that is the result of a difficult age or a lack of generated excitement, I cannot tell, but the year sevens certainly enjoyed themselves. Attendance too could be improved, with more active marketing campaigns before the dance and some excitement drummed up maybe with posters or, most preferably, sensational word of mouth. All of these issues might have been solved had their been more time to plan, although taking everything into account, I consider the disco to be a success.
As a result of this evaluation however, year twelve have decided that the next event we coordinate, the Winter Holiday Party (originally X-mas party, but altered to reflect the multicultural and varied nature of our school after our talk with the head-master) should be planned well ahead. We therefore decided to talk to the headteacher straight away, to ask about whether it would be possible to do something of the sort, and he gave us his approval, encouraging us to draw up a plan and approach him again.
Keeping on track with the Halloween disco however, I created a bulletin about it. It's in black and white, as requested by our IB coordinator out of photo-copying considerations, but I did the best I could with the colour scheme, and it wasn't that big of an issue since Halloween is supposed to be a creepy festival.
 |
| The bulletin hasn't been sent out yet, but this is the final version |
No comments:
Post a Comment