Balloons and Smiles

I am truly grateful that I am a clown! I love being able to bring laughter and joy to children and adults. I am very content and blessed to be living in Tunisia and clowning here. I am not always in costume though. In fact, I don’t clown a lot, and that is okay.  It is certainly easier to sit and chat and build relationships when I do not look like a clown!

I have said before that I often visit day care centers in my local community. Most of the time I am just me, no false eyelashes or bright yellow wig. We still have fun!! Balloon animals are a novelty here. The kids enjoy watching how the animals are made and they love seeing the animal come alive when I draw the face.

They have pencil balloons here, but they are filled with air. That is all! No dogs, giraffes, snails, or even swords. They just have the straight balloon. (Sadly, the quality of the balloons here is not like in the Unites States. I get my balloons when I am in the states and bring them back to Tunisia with me.)

These pictures are from a day care center that I visited occasionally over the past couple of years. This year it is not there. Well, the building is, but the day care is not! The identifying paintings on the outside walls were painted over with white paint.

I am happy that the kids (and teachers) recognize and greet me out in the streets. If I only showed up in clown costume, they wouldn’t recognize me quite as easily. I appreciate being able to build relationships here, but I can’t do that as Mimi.

I was making balloon animals a few years before I started clowning. If you are just beginning to consider the possibility of becoming a clown, this might be a way for you to ‘get your feet wet’. If you have been hesitant about clowning, try getting up in front of a group of kids and do something simple and fun like creating balloon animals. Feel the joy start to flow! Clowns grow and evolve. Sometimes we need to start out with baby steps.

Maybe, just maybe, you will discover a clown inside that you didn’t even know was there! What a wonderful treasure to uncover!