entertainer

clown tom bolton

Tom with the Finnish National circus.

Clown Tom Bolton relocated from USA to Europe in 1983. I traveled throughout Scandinavia during the summers from 1983 to 1995. In 1984 a performer from the Kansalis Finnish circus who I had met in Spain invited me to do some shows which in those days were strictly juggling. It took me a week to track down the circus which had changed its tour dates. I only stayed some days but it was a fun experience. I had done some circus work in the States, poorly paid and literally made to shovel elephant shit 5 minutes after having done a show. If you are not a big name act in the circus, it sucks big time.

Tom with thai hilltribes.

I spent many winters traveling in third world countries where the weather was warmer and the cost of living cheaper than staying in Europe. I first went to Thailand around 1988. In this photo, I was on a trekking tour of the hilltribes in northern Thailand. The kids loved to see the juggling or some slight of hand magic tricks, all of which could be done without special props. Here I simply used stones and clumps of dirt!

The Philippines were not quite as culturally exotic as most other asian countries but English is used everywhere so it has it's practical aspects. 99% of Filipinos seemed to think that all of their problems were somehow the fault of America yet they would give thier left testicle to get a greencard to reach the land of plenty where money just grows on trees. I often made small shows in the market places or in the evenings at the typical village disco, which would be some christmas lights strung up at the local school's basketball court.

Suprisingly, the Filippinos are CRAZY about basketball. People always asked me where I was born and when I mentioned Puerto Rico, they ALL knew that the Philippines beat Puerto Rico in Mens Basketball at the 1960 Olympics in Rome. The other thing always asked in the Philippines was to "sing us a song from your country". I never met a people so amazingly musical as the Filippinos and they strongly disliked it when I said I REALLY cannot sing. Like...how about this juggling trick?!...yeah, but NOW sing us a song! Oh F**k!

Tom making show in Rabaul, New Britain, PNG.

PNG is simply a crazy place! Wildly beautiful but a dangerous mixture of beliefs and customs out of the stone age thrown into the modern world. Here I made a show in the market at Rabaul. I also did shows for the kids of the workers at a prison. Yeah, they lived and grew up within the prison compound surrounded by barbed-wire. I guess that's what they call a "captured audience".

Nepal was a fantastic place. Jungle in the south, highest mountains in the world in the north. The people were truely friendly, honest and gentle who maintained many traditions of their culture yet accepted that we tourists had other ways. Even the hash dealers were respectful. When I told them I was not interested they smiled and went their way. This was a relief having come straight from Bali where the beach vendors were like flies on shit, persistant and annoying. But the seeds of discontent that have plagued Nepal the last decade or so were already to be seen in 1990. Many young guys who worked in the larger villages impacted by the constant stream of trekkers were getting aggresive. They seemed to long for the material wealth of the foreigners and seeing the extreme poverty, who can really blame them. Here I made shows by the temples on Durbar square in Katmandu, alone and accompanied by my good friend Steve Goetz who I just happened to run into.

Tom at Bali Temple.

Here I was mobbed by curious kids near a temple on Bali. It's a beautiful, fertile island and while not everyone is rich, people sure aren't starving. As I arrived on a boat from Java, a woman approached a group of us disembarking tourists, holding up her baby as proof that we should give her something; as if 2 billion other people on Earth don't also have kids. Someone gave her a loaf of freshly baked brown bread which she threw in the dirt, screaming that she wanted money. Seemed everyone on Bali wanted to beg or cheat you or at least sell you something you had no interest in. To actually take a vacation, which westerners may take for granted, is a luxury many people on earth will never know. Yet in light of the extreme poverty I saw in India and Bangledash, most people in Bali are living in paradise.

Babaj, Guatemala highlands.

Guatemala was my favorite Central American country. There is still a large Indian population many of whom still wear their colorful traditional dress which is unique to each village. The Indians were generally very shy with outsiders. In this highland village people told me they felt safer with tourists around who could be witness to the military oppression. I made a small show on the plaza in front of the church. Someone started ringing the church bells, bringing much of the village to see the spectacle. The day after I left this town there was a firefight with bullets flying in the street between soldiers and rebels.

Tom at Machu Pichu.

One of the highlights of my extensive travels in Peru was seeing Machu Pichu. One takes the train from the old city of Cusco. So many thieves and bag snatchers worked this train, watching their attempts was entertainment in it's own right. Then a bus up a long winding road. It's breath taking but such a hard to reach place, you wonder how it was found again none-the-less ever built. Some hardy tourists trek a section of the old Inca trail in or out of Machu Pichu. When I asked one such adventurer what I missed, he said it was ten days of cold torrential rain and mud. Sorry I was on too tight of a schedule to enjoy that. In Lima, I stumbled onto the circus school and theater group "La Tarumba". They teach circus skills to kids and bring messages of hope and fairness to an impoverished country which was emerging from years of civil unrest. They inspired me that a clown can actually impact society as a whole.

Bolivia was my favorite country in South America. There are the beautiful Andes which in the east drop into the Amazon basin. A bus wreck in these regions means you go off the side of a mountain and fall a loooong way down like something out of an old road runner cartoon. The high plateaus toward the border with Chile contain the Atacama desert. Suppose to be the driest place on Earth but it drizzled one afternoon I was there. The nights are so clear, it is worth camping out under the stars but take a warm sleeping bag. Trips across the salt flats are popular and this high altitude lake is much saltier than the ocean yet it supports microscopic life which thousands of flamingos there thrive on.

There were public strikes throughout the country while I was there, stopping all public transportation. I and a bunch of other tourists got tired of being stuck in a small village. A travel agency paid a private bus to pick us up outside of town and bribed the local strikers to let us leave peacefully. But some locals didn't go along with the plan. They chased the bus, throwing stones for kilometers, with us running across the desert with our heavy backpacks trying to catch up. Half of the tourists were young Israelis fresh from the military. A good run through the desert with a heavy load and stones flying was probably just routine for them but it was ball breaking for me.