Gettin’ Carried Away

Happy Halloween!

It’s no secret that fall is my favorite season. Naturally, I enjoy Halloween, as well. I love to watch terrifying movies (even though I’m easily scared by the smallest noise), and I always have fun putting up scary decorations. Most of all, though, I live for the costumes. Over the years, I’ve dressed up as a lot of characters: Jasmine from Aladdin, a referee, Devil Wears Prada. However, I think that my costume for Halloween 2009 trumps all of my past outfits.

For those of you who are unfamiliar with Carmen Sandiego, let me give you a brief back story, courtesy of an amazing vocal group, Rockapella.

Well, she sneaks around the world from Kiev to Carolina.
She’s a sticky-fingered filcher from Berlin down to Belize.
She’ll take you on a ride on a slow boat to China.
Tell me, where in the world is… Carmen Sandiego?

Essentially, Carmen, and her merry band of crooked followers, travel the globe, stealing famous landmarks, paintings, sculptures and more. She was the subject of an old computer game that taught young kids geography. You had to follow clues and chase her around the globe to secure the loot and a warrant before you could arrest her. For example, a clue could be: “I think she was headed towards Montpelier, the capital of the East Coast state.” Then, you’d head to Vermont to keep the chase going.

I first played it on an old Apple Mac (one that had a black screen with green lettering and used actual floppy disks) during my computer class in grammar school. Eventually, the game was made available for our home PC (an IBM at the time), and I played it religiously. It also evolved into a TV show that was on every day, Monday through Friday.

Being an avid traveler, I don’t know why I never thought to be Carmen Sandiego. She may be a thief, and a fictional character, but she has traveled the globe more times than I can count. Another lyric from her theme song reads, “She go from Nashville to Norway, Bonaire to Zimbabwe, Chicago to Czechoslokvaia and back!” Aside from trying to lift iconic landmarks like the Eiffel Tower and Big Ben, she’s my idol. And so, for Halloween 2009, I dressed up as the “double-dealing diva” known as Carmen Sandiego.