BIT BY THE BUG

SINCE THE band launches began, I had been seriously contemplating whether I really, truly, honestly wanted to play Carnival 2K5, or whether I should take my hard earned cash and have a nice, quiet vacation in some far away destination instead. But lo and behold, after much cajoling and prodding by some very persuasive friends, and after tempting myself by peeking at the costumes online, I found myself in Tribe’s mas’ camp two nights ago, with pen in hand, signing up.

We stood up in that mas’ camp until well after they had planned to close at 8 pm, poring over each and every costume, weighing the pros and cons. Believe me when I say Carnival is very serious business for women! Choosing a costume is relatively easy for men who are quite happy in their comfy baggies with a thingy on their head and a thingy on their chest — which they immediately shed anyway after crossing the stage — but let me tell you, choosing a costume as a woman takes a heck of a lot of time and careful consideration. First, you must figure out which colours suit your skin tone, complexion and hair colour. For example, the combination of light pink with hot green does not tickle my fancy nor would it suit my complexion. Then you have to consider what colour you played in last year because you wouldn’t want to have pictures from 2K4 matching the ones from 2K5. So that cuts down the options considerably.

After eliminating sections from the first round, then comes the task of inspecting each costume very carefully. What kind of style is the bust piece? Will it be comfortable? Will it give proper support for two days of jumping and waving? What about the waist piece? Will it cover a particularly full derriere or leave too little to the imagination? How much coverage do you want? Does the waist piece fall low on the waist or high by the belly button? And what size bottom piece should you choose – the L or the XL? How small is the small, and how big is the large? Once that is out of the way, then comes the crucial trying-on-of-the-headpiece. See, the headpiece can make or break a woman’s Carnival experience. You have to carefully choose one which will be both attractive and comfortable. Headpieces that have large feathers and the majority of the work standing at the back of your head can be a problem when a strong wing blows, which is why you often see women holding on to their headpieces as they walk into the wind so they don’t bend or break. 

Big headpieces are certainly beautiful but often impractical. I came dangerously close to signing up in a stunning yellow and orange section with a massive feathered headpiece that cascaded down my back. But after trying it on and taking a few tentative steps, I pictured trying to jump and wave across the stage on Carnival Tuesday with such a large thing perched on my head, and decided it was indeed lovely, but not practical. And the last thing you want on Tuesday is to be walking down the road holding your big headpiece, or worse, abandoning it on the street or in your car because it is too much trouble to wear. A friend then pointed out something else to me – if you play in a massive headpiece that requires two feet of space in order to turn your head, how will anyone come and take a wine with you? On top of that, big feathers tend to smack the people around you in the face, which will get you a number of dirty looks. So you see, choosing the right headpiece is of vital importance to a woman.

Now the choice was down to five, so we then closely examined the adornment of each costume. For example, on the bra piece, are the beads at the top edge or lining the bottom edge of the cup? If the beads line the top they can become very annoying by wedging themselves into your cup piece every time you jump, which you have to keep pulling out and flattening. Some of the costumes also had “too much going on” as my friend kept saying – too many flowers, too many big jewels, just too much. And yes, there is such a thing as “too much” in Carnival – but some of them were also too plain or were lacking in arm/leg/neck trimmings. The trick therefore is to find the happy medium between too much and not enough. Then, we all stood back and had to decide that out of three costumes that made it to the final round, which one we would all be happy to play in together. This can be a difficult choice because not everybody will like the same section. But finally, after weighing the pros and cons of all the Carnival costume factors, we all decided on a beautiful gold and pearl number with a white-feathered headpiece, excitedly made our first down payment, and became official members of Tribe 2K5.

The funny thing is that if anyone asked me three months ago if I was playing mas next year I would have immediately have told them no. This year I had made up my mind that I was taking a break from playing mas for a while, or maybe i’d just play J’ouvert instead. But then the Carnival bug bit me – and it bit me hard! What can I say? I’m a sucker for a pretty costume. After all that debating and deliberating in the mas camp, I know that at the end of the day it doesn’t really matter what section you are in, once you are with your friends and go in with a good attitude, you will have a good time, guaranteed. While I know that I have the rest of my life to play, I feel as though the time to free up for Carnival is now, while I’m young, free, single and disengaged. Will it be worth it? I don’t know just yet... but I’ll let you know come Ash Wednesday!