I wish I had more pictures, particularly of the Buratino show!  It's hard to take pictures when you're behind a curtain. I've emailed folks I traveled with to beg for pics, but gotten no responses, so after a month, it's time to move on.



Here is the only picture of the Buratino show that I have. Buratino and Pierrot are planning their next move after a major fight with Barabas Karabas (thus Buratino's dishevelment) and the police.


From all reports, the kids really focused onto the show. This is one of their stories, so they were easily able to follow the action.



This is the full human cast. Four of them have been part of previous shows in Moscow with me, which was fun. Uniformly, everyone tells me that their favorite part is when we take the puppets out to meet the kids after we have taken our bows. This was something I started right after doing a performance at an orphanage for blind and deaf children. In the middle of the show I thought that the blind kids should get a chance to "see" the puppets, too. It went so well, that now I do that after every show.



I did two different shows. Past trips showed me that some orphanage directors are concerned that their kids can't deal with a 15-20 minute show. This year I had a five-minute show that included a Russian folk tale about a giant turnip, and then a brief scene from a classic Russian cartoon of a mother polar bear singing a lullaby to her baby. This young fellow is examining Papaw, who played the part of the old man who grew the giant turnip. I'm always amused that kids everywhere like to put their hands into a puppets mouth.


We are careful to watch the childrens' reaction before getting too close with a puppet. Some kids like puppets from a distance, but you can't get them too close, or they get scared. This young lady wasn't scared, a second later she sneezed! (I'm just glad that she chose to sneeze into her sleeve instead of Katie Sue's face) Since kids seem to like having a puppet chew on their fingers, Katie Sue decided to see if her own fingers tasted any good. This was Katie Sue's fourth trip to Moscow! This time she was the granddaughter who helped to pull up the giant turnip.





These young ladies are playing with the baby polar bear.





Here Cindy and I are doing the polar bear lullaby. We didn't use any curtains or backdrops for the short show, in the interest of minimizing set-up time so that we could perform at the drop of a hat. You can see the original cartoon (with English subtitles) on YouTube here: . Even though the puppeteers were visible for the short show, it didn't seem to diminish the kids' enjoyment.




Lydia is the Director of Orphanage 11, a specialty orphanage in Moscow for 4-7 year-olds with serious medical problems. The school focuses on teaching the children the arts: dance, drawing and painting. After we performed, several of the teachers came to me and told me that the lullaby song was one of their favorites, and that they often sang it to the children. Since this was our last orphanage to visit, I gave the two polar bear puppets to Lydia, so that the teachers and children could use them. Lydia never put them down for the rest of our visit there. (Our translator, Elaina, is on the right)

Great pictures Chris.................... It was well worth the wait. Thank you so much for sharing with us. Like I always say a picture speaks a thousand words.

Billy D.

Thanks for sharing Chris - I was going to ask when we were going to hear about your trip but I tend to get impatient so decided to keep my mouth shut.  NOW I can rest easy having seen the pictures from your trip.  I am glad you were able to bring joy to those children!!  What a blessing you and your team are!!

What a nice experience....it looks like you and the team brought smiles to many faces....thanks for sharing your pictures and inspirational story. 

Daryl H