Hello David!
I just got home from training, and now I am posting before heading off to small group. I am so excited to be back! I had such a fantastic time, got to know my class a lot better, and can't wait to see my fellow interns again. Now I am all rejuvenated and itching to set up one-on-ones and events and stuff.
I have to tell you about Netherworld. I don't think I've ever been to a haunted house, and this one was the #1 haunted house in America. Just waiting and walking around outside, waiting for everyone to gather, was amazing. There must have been a dozen or more actors dressed as all different terrifying characters such as a muzzled wild woman, a voodoo doctor, a creepy clown, a tree-person, a giant bug-like thing with glowing red eyes and jaws that snapped. Entering the house cost $22, but it lasted probably 30 minutes, and just when you got to a point in the house when you felt like, wow, that was totally worth the cost...it continued and got even cooler. It employed all sorts of different sensory experiences, was a feast of creativity for the eyes and mind, was terrifying and captivating and so, so much fun. Let me slow down and give some examples.
Sensory stuff: Basically, the path you were to follow weaved back and forth through an old warehouse, and every inch of space seemed to have been put to use. At one point the walls were all mirrors, and in the dim lighting, figuring out which way is clear and which is a mirror--as well as which is your reflection and which belongs to an actor about to jump out and scare you!--is not a super easy task. At another point, there was a swamp, which was created by casting a waist-high plane of green light, under which a swamp creature hid. And the path through the swamp was flanked by blown up polyester tunnels that you had to push between, making it seem like you were moving through water. The tunnel things appeared later by themselves, creating a cloistering, dark crevice you had to push through. There were a couple spinning tunnels with stationary walking paths through them. One was lined with green dots of light, and even though I knew the path must be stationary, and even though one of my fellow interns was behind me yelling, "Molly, the path isn't moving!" my body refused to listen to reason, and I made it across, clinging to the railing and trying my hardest not to fall down. It was so, so neat.
The creativity that went into creating this attraction is mind-boggling. Around every corner is something new. There was always someone jumping out--sometimes lurking in the shadows, sometimes swinging down from the ceiling overhead, sometimes dressed as similar objects in the room, such as a chair or coats of armor or gargoyles or statues or corpses. Statues, walls, and rafters fell. Water dripped from the ceiling. Eerie lights dimly lit the fog. The most suspenseful thing for me was when I would notice that something was definitely a person, but because I was staring at it, it held perfectly still, and I passed by, the whole time with my fists up by my face (to hide if need arose I guess?) expecting it to jump out. (All I could think of was: "Don't Blink!") In the case of some of the actors, if they got a rise out of you, they would follow you through their section, saying creepy things in your ear. There was a nasty bathroom, and a spooky lair, and a deceivingly plush living room with a beckoning hag, and a mad scientist's laboratory, and on and on and on. I would have loved to go through the house a second time just to look closer at everything, and see all the details I missed on the first walk-through.
But the most amazing things of all were the large creature heads that, I learned the hard way, were not in fact mechanical. My favorite moment of the night: We had been winding through the house in a chain--Jake in front, then Rachel, then me holding her hand and the hand of Jen, who was behind me (Jen and I screamed and laughed and clung to each other the whole time. We are so much closer now, lol), then Andrew (there was another group of six interns that followed a little behind). We entered a room painted like the stormy sea, with octopi on the walls and nets draped here and there, and a giant dinosaur-shark head thing at the far end of the section. As Jake and Rachel crossed it, the shark head thrust out and chomped, just missing them. I stopped and watched it withdraw back, then spring out again. Jake and Rachel were on the other side, just through the next doorway, waiting for the rest of us to cross. I carefully timed my escape, figuring there must be some sort of pattern to the shark's movements, and because it was just drawing back, I should have enough time to dash across, right? WRONG. It pulled back, I ran, and out it came and my whole body got chomped in its mouth! I squealed, and it let go. There was a similar creature later on, and that's when I realized that there was actually a person inside the giant head. Too. Cool.
Summary: Holy crap that was awesome. I'm definitely going back next year.
I will read you tomorrow!
~The Princess~
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