The Flyer Guy

Flyer guy-

I have sympathy for anybody trying to hand out a flyer, of any kind really. I never ignore the person and even if completely disinterested I, at least, take the flyer from them and throw it away later. I’ve been there. Today I see what looks like a stereotypical nightclub promoter. Tight jeans, loud shirt and offensively enormous sun glasses. I’m in a Tibetan refugee village in northern India. Its full of monks, hippies and beggars. This flyer guy blended in like a meth’d out stripper in church. He wasn’t promoting a club though, the flyer he handed me said “Snow Lion Dance, Live Show” it was a traditional dance performance put on at an elementary school inside a Tibetan refugee orphanage. (Awesome!) I arrive at the school and an older couple from France were the only 2 other people there. The flyer guy greeted us and sat us down (on the ground) in an empty room. Come to find out that this is a 1 man show and the flyer guy is also the headline act. By this time he lost his massive sunglasses and was changing into a traditional robe type thing.

His first dance lasted 20 seconds and I don’t even remember what happened really. Dance two starts out as a meditation and slowly progressed into ballerina esque leaping around with arms out. Shit starts heating up from here and me and the French couple are exchanging glances in disbelief of how weird its getting… they hate it, I love it. Dance three is interpretive breakdancing with a dash of tight figure skater spins mixed in. Dance four he takes the French lady from the “audience”, picks her up, drapes her over his shoulder and carries her around the room, she was mortified (She’s like 60). He puts her down and pulls up both her husband and I. After dancing around a bit he picks up the French guy and places him over his shoulder. Then he picks me up and throws me over the opposite shoulder and ON TOP of the French guy. He runs in circles around the room and jumps up and down carrying both of us. By this point the older French couple are fed up and start talking about leaving. Before they could though he is already into his next dance, which isn’t dancing at all. He runs over to us, and dripping with sweat, goes down the line placing his face licking distance away from ours in some kind of intense staring contest. He would stand there leaning over, in complete blank stare, eye ball to eye ball for about 15 seconds before going to the next person. Its so bizarre that its funny as hell to me.

The French couple see it differently and stand up to leave, but he convinces them to stay with the promise of not touching or involving them in the next dance. For his grand finale he mimics a possessed witchdoctor or some type of oracle summoning lost spirits. He sprints from one side of the room to the other, jumping up and throwing his body flat against the wall. He’s whipping his head around, flailing his arms and speaking in tongues. For about a minute he has his shirt pulled over his head and the French take that opportunity to sneak out. Not me though, to he’ll with that! This is the weirdest and most awesome thing I’ve seen all year and I’d be damned if I’m leaving early! When he pulls his shirt from his head and finishes the performance theres just me there, sitting cross legged on the ground clapping and whistling like I just saw the ghost of Michael Jackson. He thanked me for staying to the end, but didn’t seem all that surprised that the others left. “Some people just can’t handle it” he says.

Bob