User:ChangHigh

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ChangHigh Circus

The only reggae unicycle circus in the world, who do everything on one wheel what everybody else do on two feet.

The Circus Story.......

High on Unicycles

Jean Ascher of the Copenhagen-based Circus ChangHigh describes how it all started and how he’s now part of a profitable unicycle circus with a worldwide reputation Summer 1979. The circus stared when my (at that time) five year old daughter Catjaya's bicycle broke down and I went to a blacksmith to get it melted back together, but he said it was impossible...you know ..the saddle had to be moved, the pedal was not in the right position ect... so out of the blue I said...can you then make it into a ...a you know ...a from Donald Duck....a.. the bear ride it ...a bongo cycle. He looks at me.. shakes his head and told me very plainly that if I wanted a bongo cycle I had to go to a special bicycle shop inside the city. As said as done. The next day me and my daughter went on vacation and since she also had birthday I gave her the new unicycle as a gift and said that dad will be on the beach (20 meter behind the bushes and a parking lot) reading if you needs me. 5 minutes later she was back..stating very clearly that the unicycle was too big and too heavy....why didn't I try myself.! I went ahead right away and by the end of the day I could barely walk...my couch was much more than red... the skin was slowly falling off and it was hurting and felt like I had been castrated. Had to use baby powder for the next 2 weeks and relax either on the beach or in a chair...no walking at all. Spring 1980. When I got back home and the sore had healed I kept on working trying to master this very strange one wheel muscle demanding transport vehicle. At that time I was teaching rhythmic and music therapy for the Danish government, working inside various mental hospitals and here one of the patients kept grabbing my unicycle and wanted to try. I talk the personal into buying one and this fellow is still with me today 18 years later. He now write standard and 2 meter unicycles. In the very beginning I was completely alone, but already the next spring my coming girlfriend, artist, designer and first unicycle love came walking by, pulling her bicycle along. She stopped, ask if she could try the one wheeler , gave it a try, sat down to talk to me, told me she was an artist, a painter, writer, I asked her to do some paint work, signs ect for me and before the day was over, we was making love. She stayed with me for almost 10 years. Designed our logo, stickers, postcard, 5 posters and stage curtain. She became the first violin player, playing Scandinavian folklore on top of a 2 meter high unicycle. Spring 1981 we got our first child a young boy age 9, and slowly this summer 3-4 more boys somehow out of the blue showed up, unicycling and together we started performing on the streets of Copenhagen. Spring 1982 my daughter Catjaya joined us, more children and more unicycles. All the act we did was something that I invented...such as unicycling with a handle bar, unicycling with a little trailer hanging behind, unicycling on 2 meters holding a swing between us and letting a child from the audience get a ride and a swing at the same time. We did fire stick.. turning them around in the air, around our body and between our legs and in the mouth. I got a special seesaw designed by the same blacksmith as mention before and we unicycle up and through while there was fire under and around the seesaw. Very spectacular and impressive. We practiced juggling with clubs and torches. We unicycle through a fire loop,holding it in our own hands. All the time I was talking to the audience explaining the acts and making strange funny remarks. The youngest of the children (some time all of us at different times) walked around between the audience collecting money all the time. People came up to me and asked us to come out and perform... we did quite a few shows back then. Spring 1983 more paid performances, higher prices, more unicycles, more children, more equipment, more newspaper articles...just more of everything,, more life more love more freedom and liberty. The years 84,85,86 and most of 87 simply just fly by like birds over the blue sky, like leafs in the wind...time never existed....I, we, the circus were on a HIGHway to the world of ultimate experience and existential existence. By autumn 87 my girlfriend and I decided to try Israel. We fly ourselves and 2oo kg equipment down, got a cheap flat and started to book the show. By the beginning of December we had a rather tough schedule and we order our two daughters Catjaya and Mia (a daughter of Gitta, who had learned to unicycle) to fly down and all of December and halfway into January we performed in Jerusalem, Haifa, Bethlehem, Arko, Elath on various matnacims, kibutnims and for the municipalities. We repeated the tour in winter 88,89 and 90, spending about 5 months each time. We drove the circus wan down(Europe, Italy, Greece and with boat to Haifa.) with all the heavy equipment and all the strange unicycles we had by now. From 1990 and up until now the circus have performed continually doing more and more shows each year. We have today app. somewhere between 110 and 130 different unicycles in many sizes, shape, with wheels, forms and who knows what but a unicycle freak like us. We have a square wheel unicycle, we have a geared unicycle, we have a motorized unicycle, we have a real gold unicycle, we have a zig zag unicycle, we have a tandem unicycle (for 2 persons), we have a 7 wheeler unicycle and maybe app. 20 tall ones with different heights. We have app. 25 unicycles only for teaching, renting out and all of them in chrome. We even have a very little bicycle (two wheeler) height 30 cm.

There is 12 children in the circus this year.3 boys (age between 17 and 8) and 8 girls (age between 6 and 18).The children get paid a certain percentage of the salary. The circus is self support....we DONT receive any society money at all...we are an independent business. The girls are all girls who like unicycling. When the children starts in the circus I ask them 3 questions 1. Do you like to unicycle ? 2 Do you like to work ? 3 Do you like to be dirty ? If all three is positive I take them in. The children like to perform, and travel around with me. We get to see all kinds of festivals, fairs, parties, carnivals, celebrations ect you name it. The children feel great being with me. We have a very unique inter relationship based on trust, honesty and love. We are like a family, live like it, feel like it, talk like it , think like it, act like it, work like it, surviving together in this world of so much confusion, hate and trouble.

My name is JEAN as in France but the Danish pronunciation is like Chang and in the beginning of the eighties I was smoking hash therefore HIGH. Later (stop in 86) the word became related to the expression to get Shanghaied...You know way back in time when England had opium war in Indochina the English ships officers went ashore, joined with people at various bars, gave them a lot of drinks and carried them, in the middle of the dark night on board their ships and the next morning the sailors (when they woke up) found themselves on the way to Shanghai city...there fore the expression. CHANGHIGH. Later again the the word became associated with the concept of getting up on the HIGH unicycles and today people understand the word with all three different meanings.

We, the circus very often and mostly get booked directly from an organizer . People ring me and we talk the arrangement over and agree to working time, salary and ect. I then make a contract which I together with 4-6 circus posters send to them and they return one copy of my contract and we have a deal and work. When we perform on the streets, at festivals ect where there is a possible chance of collecting money we do it. We perform app. 150 days a year and do app. 250 shows ...yeh all live with high mind-energy and soul-power.

I have planed and organized the ROUNDTOWER UNIRACER RALLY since 1983 and the world record, made by a circus ChangHigh boy is (1989) 1.48.5 unicycling 210 meter up and 219 meter down without any falls or minus. App. 30-45 participants participate each year. It is open to everybody in the world.

Privately I study Cosmology and Cosmic consciousness. Particularly THE URANTIA BOOK. .Am translating it.

I have the following educations : Chief cook, Pedagog, Music therapist, Independent businessman, Busker, Artist and street performer and circus director. I am mostly a self-taught person. Not member of any organization or union. Do my own tax papers and in all the ways possible try to control, organize and rule as much as possible within my own life. Am very liberated, moderate, study also World Peace, World Government, support Green Peace, Red Cross, The children of Africa, Blind org., Cancer org. ect.

I have previously tought Cosmology and Cosmic consciousness inside a Danish juvenile jail four times a year and 2-3 of the oldest circus children join me and teach unicycle and juggling.This is done together with a group of artist .

I handle DTP fairly well on my Power Macintosh. Make all the circus Pr material , contracts, ect. The circus drives in a Ford car.I have personally 2 children, Catjaya age 31, and Kenan age 12, 12 hens, 30 gooses and 20 ducks, a cat, some mouses, somme apple and plumtrees and lots of wild flowers and a little forest to walk in.

You can contact them at this address : Jean Ascher, Circus ChangHigh Hesbjergvej 10, 5491 Blommenslyst, Fyn Denmark Phone 65 96 80 20 other address: Rentemestervej 24. st.tv. 2400 Copenhagen NV. Denmark E-Mail : jean.ascher@vip.cybercity.dk