Laughter competition with a difference
12-Apr-07On 7th January 2007 we were invited to a 6th annual laughter competition day organized by Aarey Walkers & Laughter Club.
They invited 10 laughter clubs from western Mumbai. The unique feature of this year’s competition was that each laughter club was to send 10 members to present a “Theme Story”, incorporating laughter exercises into their stories.
It was amazing to see the creativity and playfulness that laughter club members have developed over the years. These ordinary people have developed a remarkable sense of humor through laughter.
Here are some of the examples of theme stories from the competition:
The award winning story was about an American couple coming to visit laughter clubs in India. Each group member wore an outfit representing a different state in India and each was laughing, dancing and talking in a different way. The American couple was amazed by the diversity of Indian laughter clubs.
The story which I liked best didn’t win a prize. It was about 9 laughter club members walking to a laughter club when they found a person lying by the road looking like he is about to die. One said take him to the hospital. Another said No No No nothing doing — there is no medicine like laughter. We’ll revive him with laughter. They checked his respiration and pulse and then started doing laughter exercises around and over him. After two exercises he started moving his fingers and toes. After more laughter exercises he improves further then gets up and start laughing and dancing with them. Ho ho ha ha and no need to go to iCU.
Another story was about a laughter group that went out on a picnic and did different laughter exercises while they were having food, talking on the mobile, discussing and arguing with each other.
Another club presented a story in which the laughter leader explains about a guest who stayed in his house. The guest was a poet. They made different laughter exercises out of his good and bad habits — for example he burped and farted out loud, made lot of noise while eating. It was very funny.
