name :: Bi Mian-ju // ROI // Teki Koujin

player :: Shoji [[swall0wtale]]

position :: King of Masks
[[ dance, choreography, german wheel, banquine, russian bar, cerceaux, tissu, funambule, floor acrobatics, many others ]]

group :: L'Ombra

Appearance.

I've always needed a shock factor to survive.

My eyes are egyptian and my hair's blonde-- always.

Everything else changed too much. It's not important.

It's in the nature of my art to have a constantly changing face.
Trust that, if you look away for a second, it'll be gone.

Background.

Masking is an art of rapidly changing faces. My family has always specialized in this, passing the torch from father to son and so on.

I grew up in a circus called Asile, because my father performed his art there. I think it was a good place for a child to be-- with so much whimsical fantasy and beauty, the imagination could run wild. My best friend was a young boy, the Ringleader's son; but I remember very little about him, now, and suspect that he's changed quite a bit.

When I was eight, there was a fire in my family's trailer that claimed the life of my Japanese mother. Following, closely, my father punched the Ringleader in the face over a game of cards and alcohol, and left the following day because the Ringleader would no longer have him.

We performed in the streets to earn a meagre living until I was eighteen and my father fell ill. Fortunately, my skill with the masking was enough for me to fine tune it to perfection, and i continued to perform, eating little and sleeping even less, in order to make enough money to save my father's life.

Eventually, I joined a cabaret, because stripping made more money than masking on the street. I never told my father why I was suddenly bringing home more cash-- He would've been so ashamed.

I started choreographing more interesting routines, and eventually the cabaret turned into a troupe, and the troupe formed an avant-garde act called Shingetsu.

We performed that way for three years recieving much success, I suppose. I choreographed a couple other shows for fledgeling troupes, and aided a few others in gaining funding before a man came to me-- I remember him from my childhood: Doc Qiang, an old trapeze artist who'd destroyed his career with a bad fall-- and asked for my help in forming a new circus.

I agreed because my Father told me to do it.

I guess, maybe, it was his own way of getting back at Pai Sr. for making our life so hard.

The girl who headed this circus was the ex-lover of Asile's current Ringleader-- Pai Ban-bao. Forcibly cast out, pregnant, and constantly crying. I think, at some point, I felt sorry for her.

So I helped her get her act together.

I brought in people that I knew-- for set construction, costumes, a few loose acrobats. I called on a few contacts to hook us up-- a train, a tent, all the necessities.

One man came who used to work on sets for me in Shingetsu. His name was Zhao and, though he was always quiet, I always thought that he was quite interesting. To look at, anyways.

And then it turned out that he was a faggot, and things worked out just fine.

These days, I perform and I choreograph and I teach kids things that they think they know, but they actually don't. I share a trailer with the fag that's been taking up space in my bed for the past fifteen years, and I consider myself quite content.

Activities.

Training.
Choreography.
Bitching.

Ideals/Motivations.

I need to find an heir to continue the art that my father taught me.
It doesn't look like that's happening anytime soon.

Attitude.

Why can’t I rise to the sky?
Like the wind, like the clouds
Why don’t I have wings?
Like the stars, like the moon
That all wrap up together and sink into the night
I don’t have wings

Why can’t I rise to the sky?
Like the wind, like the clouds
Why don’t I have wings?
Both this love and this wound are dear
Now my beloved sends me grief.

[ dress . buck-tick ]