playboy bunny

Emceed at J. Kindergarden/Childcare Centre's National Day Party yesterday, dressed in blue bunny ears and a clown costume. Was at the act3 office at 7-ish in the morning cos bunny makeup takes almost an hour to paint on - from the white oil paints (that refused to stay on and had to be retouched up every 15 mins) to the bunny eyeliner to the bunny whiskers to the bunny red nose and red lips and bunny floppy fringe. And the bunny headpiece was totally throat constricting and suffocating. Only when the ears got lopsided did I actually have a chance to breathe.

It was all done in the name of fun (and money and not so much patriotism) and cos I haven't emceed since primary school I figured, why not? It was quite a last minute thing so there wasn't a script, just a programme list (that kept changing throughout the whole concert) Which kept the Fun the clown and Hiphop the bunny constantly on their toes. And when the mic was ungraciously snatched from us to be meddled with by the technician, they were stuck on stage micless in front of a whole lot of hyperactive and noisy malay kids all dressed in red with the moon and stars. So they had to resort to clown shouts and bunny squeaks to continue the show.

"And the next item is an action song called 'Under the Sea" by the J Playgroup"
*applause*
(no visible movement from the backstage.
Then we see a whole group of kids dressed as sea creatures staring mournfully from the stage wings refusing to budge. The teacher gestures to give them 5 minutes. The bunny and the clown look at the programme sheet in our hands which says '940-945 "Under the Sea" ' An ambitious programme, it is. In desperation the bunny and clown lead the crowd in another cheer for Singapore and talk nonsense on stage.)

When the little sea creatures finally decide to come up on stage, they stand stationary while the lively sea music plays. The seashell kid looks at the bunny and clown dancing along (desperately trying to get the rest to move to the ocean song), and bursts into tears. In the end they manage a little wiggle or two before meandering off stage.

When narrating the day's events to a friend last night, she asked "So how long did it last?"
"Forever"

When we finally got to the grand finale (the sing along session), we thought nothing could go wrong. But somehow they managed to play 'One People One Nation" twice, instead of "Stand Up for Singapore". So the bunny and clown were the only ones onstage trying to remember the words to the songs (and thinking they should have made more use of the community singing sessions in school, but it's too late anyway) so the parts where they couldn't remember the words to, they swayed and jumped and waved the plastic flag vigourously. It was a full body cardio workout.

The white bunny eyes took in the sea of red little ones and the vast amount of stars and moons and swore that if it had to see another red thing, it would give up the ghost. But the bunny agrees that the malay kids sing and dance very well. They just have the ... groove.

It was difficult not to get high cos the kids just had so much energy! In the end a whole lot of them trooped to the backstage (which was the fire exit cos we didn't have a proper backstage to hide in) to give us high-fives. It was really cute. The bunny recognises it's the only time it has sung the national day songs without any sense of irony.

I write of the bunny in the third person because I'll never admit to doing these things on my own accord. The bunny shall be my new alter ego. It's like the second skin that's growing on me.And it's blue.