Water Kingdom a hit at Uncle Skinny’s Kids Carnival

For yet another year, the Scotia Bank, Stickman Entertainment, Uncle Skinny’s Kids Carnival has been hailed a success.{{more}}

The show, which was held at the Victoria Park last Saturday, this year started at 10:00 a.m., rather than after lunch, as was the case last year.

As favourite cartoon characters like Ben 10, Alice in Wonderland, Bumble Bee, Alvin and the Chipmunks, Minnie Mouse, Pink Panther, Chicken Man, and crowd favourites, Sponge Bob Square Pants and Elmo from Sesame Street made their appearances, the excitement on the children’s faces was evident.

Some of the children had tea and took photographs with Alice in Wonderland at the Mad Hatter’s tea party, or were preoccupied getting their faces painted, riding the horses or bumper cars, grabbing sweet tasting cotton candy, jumping on the trampoline or bouncing castles, watching a movie or being entertained by the Magician who came in for the show from Miami, Florida.

Not surprisingly, the Water Kingdom proved to be a hit with the children, some of whom came well eqiupped with swimsuits and towels. The children eagerly lined up for their turn to slide down the giant inflated water slide, following which, many jumped into the large, inflated wading pool which was positioned nearby.

After the children dried their skins and changed to dry clothing, it was time for a concert which included some of this country’s top Soca artistes, including Fire Empress, Problem Child and of course, the man behind the Uncle Skinny’s Kids Carnival, Gamal ‘Skinny Fabulous’ Doyle.{{more}}

With a crowd in the park resembling that of Soca Monarch, Skinny belted out some of his hit songs, much to the delight of the children, who could be heard singing word for word. During her turn on stage, Fire Empress, performed her hit “Rum Please”, but modified her lyrics to “Pass me a drink of your juice”, instead of rum.

Not to be outdone, the animated characters, also showed their dance moves on stage. The children seemed to know every word of the Dora the Explorer and Sponge Bob theme songs, as some of them took a more comfortable seat on their parents’ necks to get a clear view of what was happening on stage.

Remarks were also made by Frederick Stephenson, Minister of National Mobilization and Family Affairs, who commended the organizers for hosting the activity. He reminded the audience of his Ministry’s focus on child abuse prevention and encouraged persons to report any suspected cases of child abuse. He reminded parents that if they attend carnival activities, their children should not be left at home alone. His Ministry also hosted a booth at the fair where educational material about child abuse detection and prevention was disseminated.

In an interview on Monday, Doyle noted that he is happy that the fair was a success and that the children enjoyed themselves.

“This was bigger than last year. I really would like to thank the parents who brought their kids and to all the sponsors, especially Scotia Bank and Digicel..,” Doyle added.

According to Doyle, there were a few glitches and he recognized areas that needed some more attention.

“It is a learning process and while we may have been able to fix some of last year’s problems, we had some new ones. I think for the most part that everybody understood what and why certain things were happening…,” he said.

However, Doyle expressed his disappointment with the fact that some of the children did not get a chance to go on the water slide.

“It’s kinda disappointing to know that. It was really overcrowded behind there, but a lot of the kids had fun nevertheless…”

He also expressed his disappointment with the behaviour of some of the parents at the show.

“While we should take some responsibility as to how much attention we should give to controlling the crowd, I think some of the parents’ behaviour was something to look at. A lot of parents were just throwing their kids into the pool. It was just chaos for a while,” Skinny stressed.

Despite the few setbacks, Doyle said the children can certainly look forward to another Uncle Skinny’s Kids Carnival in 2013.

He further thanked SEARCHLIGHT, Hot 97, Nestle, Caribbean Cool, the Child Abuse Unit, Bickles and others for their support and sponsorship.(KW)