Since being a specatator last year at the Toronto Zombie Walk, I have spreaded the word of the undead to many of my friends. EL is most enthusiastic about anything zombie-related. We've been talking about skating this event for, oh, at least several months. I was skeptical for getting in any real skating since after all, this is a walk involving slow moving zombies on crowded sidewalks! So when it came time to plan, I only dared to invite my skating friends to come drag the wheels with me. Luckily, ML was totally into having some silly fun too so the three of us coordinated our transformation before the event.
The plan was to meet at ML's place two hours before the event and transform ourselves from healthy tanned athletes (heehee) to pale decaying blood-smeared zombies. Then we would skate over to the starting point. Unfortunately, traffic did not cooperate and I arrived at ML's place with merely 10 minutes to spare. When ML opened the door, I was absolutely impressed. Between ML's hunchback zombie with tire marks across his back and EL's bleeding Spiderman, I could not decide who was more over the top! With a few final touch of blood and liquid latex (this stuff rocks!), we were ready to go.
Last year's Zombie Walk was held in drizzling rain but the turnout was impressive. However, it did not prepare me for the thousand zombies strong crowd this year! When we looked down to the pits at Trinity Bellwood Park, we were greeted by an endless sea of arms and legs and brains and blood. There were zombies from all walks of life/death: Village People Zombies, Zombie Brides, Zombie Tennis Player, Zombie Leprechaun, Zombie Chefs, Zombie Elvis, Zombie Waldo, Zombie Lolitas, even Zombie Roller Derby Girls! Instead of just dragging our wheels in the crowd, we took advantage of our skates and got to skate up and down the whole procession (while in character, of course!). We had a chance to see practically every zombie in the crowd. It was such an awesome experience. You can see my photos here.
As an aside, I think I have conquered some of my fear of street skating. My lack of agility has always been rather embarrassing and most of my friends have seen me frozen in fear of stepping on and off a curb in my skates. Today, however, I somehow managed to manoeuvre my way around traffic, crowds, and curbs with relative ease. Well, the lack of speed certainly helps but I'm still quite pleased with myself. Perhaps I can join the Friday Night Skate after all!
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