If Friday didn’t get that many people to don on their costumes, then Saturday would be the night to get freaky.
I became the priestess again, while Sean became another variation zombie, this time German soldier zombie. The look was purr-fect and had he a Hogan’s Heroes’ steel helmet, then he could be a zombie from that movie, Dead Snow.
We checked out the Parade of Lost Souls over by the drive. I had never been before and neither had Peggy. Although it is an all-ages outdoor event, I had it in my mind that it was going to be scary. Not Potters House of Horrors scary but maybe a little creepy? I mean, after all, it IS halloween.
The starting point of the walk was at garden park, where there were silk rope artists swinging from trees and a sound booth area, where one could bang gongs or make weird experimental kazoo sounds.
The line-up to start the walk wrapped around the entire park block. But we weren’t going to do that, it seems. In the cloak of darkness, Peggy, Sean and I cut to the front and blended in with all the other people in line. I know, we’re bad but there’s no way we’re going to wait for an hour just to walk down some public alleys. And there’s no way that the volunteers can never police where you’re coming from or where you’re going.
So we snaked along the back alleys with hundreds of other people to look at “scary” installations including carved pumpkins, giant spider web (along with Miss Moffat), mannequins and shadow puppets.
I don’t know what these two were whispering about but the fact that they were crouched in front of a sign that read “Feed us children” was kinda cuh-reepy.
But what was great was the opportunity to see other people’s costumes. The creepiest one, hands down that night, would have to go to the guy who dressed up as pyramid head, the metal head butcher from Silent Hill. Holy crap, you don’t want him following behind you down the dark alleys of Vancouver. Even his killing instrument was made from metal and he scraped it along the ground as he walked, 7 feet tall in those platform shoes.
Holy poop in my pants. (Photo: Silent Hill Wiki)
Walking along the final alley brought us to a vintage tea party which appealed to my love of Alice in Wonderland and Victoriana/Edwardian times. These performance artists were mad as a hatter and chirping at the crowd, while sipping tea out of their shoes in their make-shift parlour.
I was enthralled at their performance, wacky as it was. I was ever more intrigued because I snapped a shot of one of the ladies in movement. I love the way this picture turned out. Creepy, non?
Ghostly apparition.
The parade was not what I expected. I imagined there would be costumed horrors, jumping out at us from the bushes and running after everyone down the alley, creating pandemonium. But that wouldn’t be very family-friendly now, would it? I would go again, but more to see the revellers who came in costume, rather than the event itself.
What was really scary though was that after you finish going down the last alley, the event organizers would try to funnel people down a particular street they blocked off, so that the revellers would be forced to “donate” to the event they just experienced. Not only tacky, but scary too!
View more photos of Halloween night on my Flickr album.
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