Debut

My goodness it's been a long time since I posted. One of the things I've been doing while not writing blog posts has been dancing. For the last I've been going to Nia class 2-3 times a week which has done wonders for my strength, balance, and overall well being. But for pure, all out, goofy fun, nothing beats the Bollywood dance class I started taking in January. Keeping track of the choreography isn't that easy for my old brain and physically it's quite challenging (I generally have to recover with a serious nap on Sunday afternoons) but what a great time we have.

In the 8 weeks since our little group started we've done well enough that our teacher Sushmita decided to put us up on stage twice last weekend, complete with garish custom-made costumes and an astonishing amount stage makeup. I knew that the opportunity to perform would be offered to us but I didn't think it would come so soon and I figured my debut would be in some dinky little community center or grade school cafeteria.

In fact, we went on stage at The Roseland, a huge venue where we saw Manu Chao a few years ago. There were a few dance groups performing before "India's Most Famous DJ" came onstage and, surprisingly enough, hundreds of people showed up for our warm up acts. Yes, it was just a little tiny bit nerve wracking but we were great--at least it sounded that way from the applause.

Saturday evening we were part of a community Holi celebration which was a completely different experience. Friday night was all young hipsters, Saturday was a family event with lots of little kids all over the place and numerous performances--dance, poetry, theater which was all in Hindi so I had only the slightest idea about what was going on which was actually fine.

Both events ended with dancing and especially Saturday's dancing with local DJ Prashant was the best-- a perfect way to let go after the mild terror of being on stage. Despite the terror, it was loads of fun and I can't wait for our next performance.