An ode to haunted house rides
We make our way across the feria. Pushing through the pools of people collecting at the edges of the fairground attractions, I feel excited and impatient for what’s to come. Everything is loud and lovely. A cacophony of sound and smells descend, and this usually designated carpark is transformed into an illuminous mass I suspect you may be able to see from space. Raffle tickets crinkle under foot as the tombola blares out his wares and treasures and urges you to step right up.
I love the feria. I have been coming here since I was a child. It is at once nostalgic and familiar. Nothing really changes here, save the stuffed toy prizes from the latest film release or trend hanging above the games. This feria is the same feria I have moved through for as long as I have called Spain home. As someone who oscillates and evolves almost constantly, this consistency is sacred.
But I’m not only here for the cheap sangria or stomach churning rides that instil fear not for their nature, but for the fact they are assembled and reassembled every couple of weeks. No. I’m here for the haunted house. For its corniness and cheap scares and rickety railway. It’s incongruous. Almost offensive to the senses and it makes no apologies. I’ve always had a small, strange soft spot for fairground haunted houses and horror rides. It began, as most loves do, in childhood. I can’t trace the exact…
