Santa, send me bandages

Christmas is a dangerous time of the year for children and adults

THE CHRISTMAS PARTY is in full swing. I glance at my list. “The first lucky child to meet Santa will be Min-Min, aged three,” I announce.

A woman steps out of the crowd, hands her screaming toddler to me, and then retreats to take a photo.

I attempt to hand the shrieking, kicking, wriggling child to the huge, scary, bearded, red-suited man seated nearby.

Min-Min, crazed with fear, turns into a 12-kg Mike Tyson.

“Ha ha ha!” Santa and I chuckle good-naturedly as she lets out a 4,000-decibel scream which bursts our eardrums.

“How charming!” I say as she bites through the antibrachial vein in my wrist.

“How adorable,” we chant as she rips off Santa’s beard and lands a roundhouse kick on my genitalia, causing me to temporarily black out.

Regaining consciousness and fashioning a quick tourniquet from tinsel to stem the blood loss, I look down at my list of children. One down, 42 to go.

Yes, it’s Christmas.  People misunderstand this season. It’s really a very challenging growing-up experience for all concerned, children and adults.

Two days later, your bandaged narrator is playing the role of The Storyteller in a theatre production of The Snowman, starring the City Chamber Orchestra of Hong Kong. At this event, I am on stage, a safe distance from a sea of two-legged piranhas, ie, the children.

*
At the end of the show, Santa Claus bursts through the door at the back of the auditorium.

The plan was for the orchestra to strike up a verse of Sleigh Ride as Santa strides down the aisle to join us on stage, making a short but witty speech (“Ho ho ho”).

But as soon as Santa appears, a scream of excitement rises from the children.

These kids are older and smarter than the earlier crowd and know they have an advantage in terms of mass. They climb out of their seats and mob him. Dozens, then scores of children besiege him, demanding gifts with menaces.

Santa disappears entirely underneath hundreds of tiny legs.

The orchestra manfully continues to play extra verses of Sleigh Ride. Minutes pass. Has Santa been crushed to death by several tons of sticky-fingered, snot-encrusted young flesh? I removed my Christmas hat as a mark of respect. What a way to go.
*
As the orchestra played the 95^th repeat of Sleigh Ride, I was gripped by a kind of madness, or perhaps it was the Christmas spirit (a pint of eggnog consumed earlier).

Leaping off the stage, I ran up the aisle and waded into the shoulder-deep pile of squirming children. Somehow I managed to clear a space for Santa to make it to the front without killing anybody.

A musician whispers to me as I get back onto the stage: “Well done. I thought Santa was dead.”

I shake my head: “Now you know why he wears all that padding.”
*
In the foyer afterwards, I autographed a few programmes.

But then I saw Min-Min and her entire kindergarten class approaching. They were no longer scared, which made them more dangerous than ever. I flee. My medical insurance has suffered enough this season. Happy Christmas.
*

Technorati Tags: the snowman,scared of santa,city chamber orchestra of hong kong

[Illustrations from Chicago Tribune and other sources; City Chamber Orchestra picture shows earlier production of The Snowman)

Comments

[Lift Lurker]

The Shop Santa Claus Song
As singed in Liftuania

You better watch out
You better had smile
Better not pout
I'm telling you why

The children are coming to town

They're making a list
And checking it twice,
Gonna be inspectin' color of your eyes
The children are coming to town.

They see you when you're smoking
They know if you are fake
They know if you smell bad or good

So please bathe for goodness sake

Oy!

You better watch out
You better not cry
Better not pout
I'm telling you why

The children are coming to town

[Dancer Arroyo]

I agree, children are extra dangerous when they have overcomed their fear. I once participated in a Japanese tea ceremony performance in a primary school. My job was simple, to serve tea to the designated children in the right seats. I had a tray of 6 tea bowls with me and as soon as I walked down from the stage, I was surrounded in 3 seconds. Little hands rise up from the side of my tray to grab the tea bowls from me so I had to use the only advantage I had - my height, and held the tray practically over my head in order to save the consulate-owned tea bowls. Not a pretty sight.

[grandpa]

In Aviation , it is called flares, those "fireworks" used to distract missiles from their target.

Santa calls it candy.
He got his bag full so that he can fling them out before attempting an approach .
after the monsters have torn at each other an dare tired, he can make a safe entrance..

Hey Lift lurker
Are you sure that you are from Liftuania?

When I read your funny comments, i would say that you come from Laughtuania, instead

[rafanjr]

...a tall, blue wrapped gift was sitting on my desk when i came in for work this morning, when i opened it, it a bottle filled with red maraschino cherries.... i just could not make anything out of it.

"It’s really a very challenging growing-up experience for all concerned, children and adults."

[Lift Lurker]

Grandpa,

Laughtuania is a district in Liftuania. It is where all our hospitals are because we believe that laughter is the cheapest medicine. And it sometimes work.

(However, many of the jokes and humour now also made in China, so we have to double-check quality)

It is north of Loftuania, the high plateau. (You can reach the top by Lift).

And east of Leftuania (birthplace of pure socialism in Liftuania. There is statue of angry Karl Marx twisting Stalin's ear)

And west of Listuania (the inclined village slowly dirfting to sea)

And south of Luftuania (where German aviators retire)

Redlight district is Leertuania.

We do not have a Lostuania because no one get lost here.

And last and also least, is Leastuania.

I will invite you but there is no airport, and we have heat-seeking SAM batteries everywhere.