Not to be confused with the famous Queen album of 1975. This was a daytime trip to see a Chinese puppet style production in the Opera house in Madrid.

No Rugby here…

While many people were watching the rugby semi-final between England and New Zealand I had to travel into the centre of Madrid to watch a performance called “Mi Amigo Frankenstein” (My Friend Frankenstein) in the grand and well-known Opera building. It was for kids.

While the rugby played out in Japan, I was watching a bloody Chinese puppet show. Mixed with some pantomime-like, slap-stick comedy thrown in.

It was immediately after Dani’s swimming class. There were four of us. Myself, Dani, his cousin Susana and her mum. A Metro journey took us right into the beating heart of Madrid. Arriving just in time for the lad to run to the toilet. I swear he would have pissed himself if he had started watching the show without going.

The Show…

Naturally I thought it was crap. But Dani loved it. Far more than I thought he would. Meanwhile Susana had to leave about half-way through the performance. Crying. It as all too much for her. At first, I thought it was because something had frightened her. There was a little scary music at one point and then the image of a skeleton coming to life. Well, maybe…

But no. she was in tears because it made her sad. Sad to see how others were treating the ‘monster’. Funny in a way. She is a lovely and very sensitive girl. I remember she also cried when we went to watch the Dumbo movie when the baby elephant was teased.

More brainwashing for the kids…

Ironically that was supposed to be the whole point of the play. A message about “exclusion”. How we should not exclude anyone just because they are “different”. Typical nonsense these days. Keep enforcing the PC messages to young kids. Never mind the format or story used to do so…

This was a story about a doctor digging up corpses to acquire body parts to make a ‘monster’ right?

Please!! Help me out here!

All that aside, the puppetry was quite good. After the show they even invited the children to see all the puppet parts and how it was done. Dani joined in the crowd of kids but Susana had already left the building.

City Centre Photo

As this was the centre of Madrid there were the usual street entertainers plying their trade. Or in many cases just photo opportunities.

This is the one the kids chose… A giant panda. Nice photo though don’t you think?

Susana now back to normal and unstressed. No pandas were hurt in the making of this photo.