Ozzy serious about competition at clown conference
Javier Canul is a Emergency Medical Technician or paramedic who works for the Belize Emergency Response Team. It’s a job in which he encounters families during trying and stressful times. However, Canul does not only interact with the public during emergencies. He is a bit of a clown at times and that is meant to be taken literally. On the weekend or at children’s parties, you may recognize him when he dons his other face of Ozzy the clown. Ozzy is Belize’s only professionally trained clown, and being the sole funny man, Ozzy is serious about his participation in an international gathering of clowns next week in Mexico. News Five caught up with Canul this evening as he was making last minute preparations for his trip to Mexico City.
Javier “Ozzy the Clown” Canul, Attending La Feria de la Risa
“La Feria De La Risa is a clown convention where clowns come from all over the world gather together; Peru, Brazil, you call it, all over the world. Everybody get together and every compete against each other in terms of—there are different competitions like balloon twisting, stilt walking, paradability through the streets, acting on a stage; performance in front of everybody. So the best thing about this thing is—and what we also do is we get together and we give each other new strengths, for example, since I am the only professional clown in the country, I try to attend every year because it gives me strength to continue to move on.”
Jose Sanchez
“So clowning is a very serious profession?”
Javier “Ozzy the Clown” Canul
“Well I will say that laughing, yes it is a very serious profession. We have clown ethics; things like you don’t drink in your clown suit, you try to get out of your clown suit as soon as possible, you don’t create fuss in you clown suit. But we are all human beings so the best thing to do is come out of your clown suit as quick as possible.”
Jose Sanchez
“You’ve been at this event before, have you won anything?”
Javier “Ozzy the Clown” Canul
“I’ve been to this event ten times and twice I’ve won something. The first time I performed the five different events and I came in the top ten in all five. The second, I performed and focussed mainly on one event which is like mime acting with music and all of that and I came in the top ten again. This time I’m planning to come in—and I have awards for those if you’d like to see them—this time I’m planning to go into balloon twisting, stilt walking competition and acting and performing on a stage in front of thousands of clowns, international clowns.”
If you would like to find out more about the event you can visit the website at www.laferiadelarisa.com. Canul says the convention finishes late Thursday.
