Once Again, Please?

Sunday's Spex practice.

When I normally go dancing I try to clear up my mind. If I think about the steps or figures I won't be able to follow my partner's lead, and if I think too much I usually just stumble with my steps. Well, this method doesn't really work when I'm trying to dance a choreography, as I realized in our Spex dance practice. All the other girls were absorbing the moves instantly while I had to keep asking the choreographer to show the steps again and again, slowly step by step. When I finally thought I got the steps right for chorus, I already had forgotten the verse's figures. Great. I felt myself such a burden when the others would have been ready to continue further but I had to keep asking "could we do it once again slowly without music?". I guess I simply have to keep repeating the choreography until my body knows what to do without me thinking about it. This means extra practices on my own in addition to the normal Spex practices. Then I have to add my HOT-dancing classes and practices with JV and Mr. A. to my weekly schedule... I just wonder when I will have time to study now that I had to take extra shifts also at work! At least I've found out a good way of spending my long bus rides to uni/work: going through the choreography in my mind!

So yesterday we had a Spex practice for dance 4, which is really fun and energetic dance. Then again, the music is fast and this doesn't really help me memorizing the quick moves. Before the practice I also joined one Spex dance's practice in which I don't actually dance (I just happened to have some extra time), and I must say I'm pretty happy I'm not in this dance because the choreography was too challenging for me. So after this the dance 4 felt pretty manageable! We also had a shared practice with all the dancers where we went through every Spex dance (or at least those that had some choreography done) and scheduled this week's practice times. When I saw some of the dances I felt like I would have wanted to be in some of the slower ones instead of fast songs, because I think it would have been more my thing, but I'm sure I'll love all my dances when I learn them properly. What comes to scheduling, you can imagine how hard it is to match everyone's calendars! Somehow we made it even though tho whole weekend is booked for Spex go-throughs. Its amazing how adaptable everyone is!

Before Sunday's Spex practice I got together with JV after two and half week break from Zouk, and the long gap between our practices showed. The previous sense of lightness that I was able to find before was gone and it felt like I had forgotten almost everything JV taught me before. These kind of breaks are no good! Good thing is that I somehow happen to find really patient dance partners. After dancing Zouk we talked quite a lot about the Zouk feeling because I wanted to know what kind of emotional attitude I should have while dancing Zouk. I still haven't figured this out and it would really help me to give the extra thing into my dance. JV showed me some Zouk videos and explained the two main Zouk styles; the other is more dramatic and the other more cheerful. Looking the videos made me want to learn Zouk even more but unfortunately we both are going to be quite busy in the coming weeks so we just might have to have a long break again. Luckily I registered to a Zouk festival that is going to be held in Helsinki on 25.-27.11. I have no idea how I can find time for the festival but I figured that I would regret not attending so much that I'll find the time somehow. It is simply an event I cannot miss!


This is my only dance-free evening for the week so I decided just to take it easy, hang out home and maybe strech my tired muscles. I didn't expect that dancing would make my body so sore everywhere. Let's see if I even have time to update my blog during this week, but if not, you know I'll be busy dancing!

Yy, Kaa, Pusi Pusi.

On Thursday's intermediate HOT-dance class I got to know once again a new dance: Humppa. Apparently Humppa is not one of the most popular Finnish ballroom dances since there were only around ten people in the class compared to the normal 20-30 dancers' group. Humppa is a fast Finnish music style and the dance reminded me of Samba. The basic step has a lots of bounce as Samba does, but the rhythm is different, 4/4 beat, and the hip movement is missing. I was a bit afraid of going to the intermediate class with no experience of Humppa, but it turned out that also the others had difficulties with the basics, so we spend most of the time practicing the basic step and simple figures. Humppa is really energy consuming dance so all of us were quite exhausted after jumping around for two hours. I felt sorry for the leaders because they didn't have any breaks between dance partners; at least us followers could rest while waiting the next dance.

After "warming up" with Humppa, many of us continued to an advanced class of Cuban Salsa, which attracted lots of dancers who normally don't come there. Also for me this was a dance class I didn't want to miss! Even though the class level was advanced, we started from the very beginning. For me this was perfect because Cuban Salsa differs from the Salsa style I'm used to even with the basic steps. The hardest thing for me was to keep my knees bent all the time and to restrict my hip movement only to side to side movement (not to do the 8-shaped movement that I tend to do automatically). We also practiced some really basic Cuban Salsa figures, such as pausa, dile que no and dile que si. We'll have Cuban Salsa also for the next two times so we'll have time for some more advanced figures in the coming weeks.

On Friday I had my first actual Spex practice. As I told before, I'm going to dance in five dances in our student musical Spex. Since I cannot reveal the songs, I'm going to call the dances with numbers 1-5 in the order they appear in the show. So Friday's practice was for a dance 1, and this dance's song is definitely one of my favorite ones in the Spex. The choreographer for the dance 1 is one of the Spex dancer's sisters' boyfriend (someone correct me if I got this wrong!) and he is a dance teacher in Footlight dance school. In addition to his great skills in dancing and teaching we were able to use the dance school's space, which is a perfect place to practice! From the first glimpse, the choreography seems really awesome. It has lots of small tricks that look great but are not too hard to learn. I think most of the girls (including me) dancing in this dance don't have much experience in this dance style so the choreography couldn't even be too challenging or we wouldn't learn it well within the limited time we have. Because this dance style is totally new for me, even the simple and basic things takes a lot of time to learn, and most of the time I was the slowest one to get the steps. This leads to one thing that I really liked about our choreographer: he looked at me many times with a patient and kind look as saying "yes, be both know that you are doing many moves wrong but don't worry, you'll get them with time!". I could see after the practice that I wasn't the only one who got really excited about this dance and the choreography. I'm telling you: it's going to be spectacular!

In Friday we had also a small Spex dancers' evening party at one of the dancer's cozy apartment. Everybody brought something small to eat which ended up a table full of different kind yummy treats. We ate well, took some drinks and got to know each others. We, for example, played this game "who of us would most probably..." which revealed some interesting things about the other dancers. I must say the evening was a success and everybody had lots and lots of fun. I can't remember when was the last time I laughed that much (no wonder my abbs hurt when I woke up this morning)! Around midnight we headed to a near bar called Korjaamo from where we later continued to Roska for some party dancing. Around 2:30 am I was already heading to the main bus station with two other dancers to get a bus home, but we ended up to this new night club on our way and danced until the place closed! Today it wasn't a hard decision to skip the dance class I was planning on going and to sleep late. Thank you all Spexers for the unforgettable night!

By the way, today I finally bought myself new dancing shoes! I love my high-heels but they just don't go with every dance and I have been needing flat shoes for a long time. I went to Suomen Tanssitarvike and after trying on different kind of shoes I settled on black leather sneaker-like dancing shoes. They just felt the right pair for me the moment I put them on. I can't wait to wear them in tomorrow's practice and see if they were worth of the buy!

Back From The Holiday.

Usually I hate coming back home from my travels. I'm rarely homesick, and the only thing I'm usually glad about coming home is not having to live from my backpack all the time. This time, however, I was happy to come back to Helsinki, not because I was homesick, but because I missed dancing. Fortunately I came home late on Tuesday night which meant multiple dance practices for the rest of the week starting from the very next day. I managed to arrange a dance practice with my new practice partner, Mr. A., already for Wednesday, so I got my dancing back on track right from the beginning.

I couldn't say I got that much new out from yesterday's beginners Waltz lesson, but it is good to go back to basics every now and then. In short, we started with Vienna Waltz and after an hour or so continued to Slow Waltz, the emphasis being on the basic steps and the rotation of upper body. Interestingly, some of the beginners' class leaders, who apparently want to get feedback and guidance from me (and have noticed that I easily give it!), have spotted me and kept coming and asking me to practice with them. Somehow I also unintentionally kept on bumping into one specific leader, which actually turned out to be a good thing in a way that we were able to adjust our dancing into each other's style. In the end off the class we did much better than in the beginning (plus we had much fun dancing together!).

Even though it is good to practice the basic steps, I must admit that I enjoyed my practice with Mr. A. after the HOT-dance class much more than the basic step training. After dancing with beginners it was so comfy to dance with someone who is an excellent leader and knows what he is doing. This was our second practice together, since we practiced once before my trip to Spain, but I felt like we already danced quite well together and were able to find a good connection. What I have noticed is that it is not enough your dance partner is a good dancer or a good leader to be able to dance with him well. I find it really hard to follow some brilliant dancers whose dancing style differs lots from mine even though they definitely know how to lead their partners. Well okay, I'm still just a beginner, but I bet I'm not the only one feeling this way.

I know Mr. A. could teach me lots about dancing, especially about some dances I haven't danced before, but for now I feel like I should stick with the dances I already know when practicing with him. I liked the feeling that we didn't have this teacher-student relationship that I had with Nic and have with JV, but that we both could somehow learn without the other's teaching. If there was something to comment on the other's dance, we did that, but other than that we basically just danced different dances, mostly Slow Fox, Fusku, Tango and Cha-cha. The best way to learn to dance, after all, is to actually dance. Okay, I have to admit that going for new dances with Mr. A. would mean stepping out of my comfort zone, so in a way I'm just taking the path of least resistance. Well, let's see how this partnership develops.

Biodanza.

I'm the kind of person who likes to try new things,especially if it is related to dancing. So when I was browsing through a pamphlet about Malaga area's events, my attention was drawn by an ad of Biodanza. Immediately I was like wait what is this thing and why haven't I heard about it before? It must be something to do with dancing since the ad said no dancing experience needed. I convinced my sisters to come to the evening's class with me and so we headed to this place called La Casa Invisible later that day.

When we arrived to the place it seemed a bit suspicious. It was located in a small side street and there were bunch of people smoking weed outside it. It took a while for us to find the right room, La Sala Verde, but when we finally got there, there was a small group of people smiling at us and welcoming us in.

The Biodanza class started with a short introduction of Biodanza since me and my sisters were there for the first time. The instructor was really kind-hearted and warm person, and her eyes were full of happiness and beam. The way she described Biodanza was unforgettable: she said Biodanza had opened her a landscape of butterflies, flowers and beautiful colors. Yes, sound really hippie-like but the way she expressed it, wasn't. All the other people in the class also said Biodanza has had a big effect on them even though the classes have just started in Malaga not so long ago. That is also the reason why the group was relatively small.

The class was definitely different to any dance classes I've been. It wasn't about any dance technique or music genre, but more about expressing yourself through the music and connecting with the other persons during your dance. We were emphasized that it was really important to watch into each others eyes during the whole class; in that way you couldn't isolate yourself from the others. It was also prohibited to speak during the class. It was only the instructor speaking while she was giving us instructions. We made a different dance to each song and each dance had it's own theme, which usually included some specific emotion, like happiness, anger or pride. Connecting with the others started gradually first with eye-contact, then continued to gentle touches and hugs. The strong contact with the group during the whole class made me feel like I would somehow know the strangers even though I hadn't spoke a single word with them.

Since dancing for me is a way of expressing myself I really liked the emotions connected to the dances, even though sometimes it was hard to find the right emotions in a short time. I also found some surprising emotions inside me. What I would have wanted more was more actual dancing. Anyway, Biodanza was really liberating experience for me, and I hope my sisters also enjoyed it as much as I did. Unfortunately Biodanza is not danced in Finland, at least yet, so I won't be able to continue it any time soon. Maybe I'll stop by on Monday's class if I have some time.

Dance With Me?

I know I have been dancing enough when I don't have time to write about it. I've spent most of my week going to dance practice after work and just crashing to bed when I get home. I don't know if it is because of that, but now I feel really tired and happy about the free weekend.

Well, a lot dancing-related has happened. On Tuesday I had a Zouk practice with JV and I feel like we are now slowly getting into the same wavelength in our dancing. To be able to concentrate more on my technique, I first have to get used to my partner's leading style so that I don't have to think about it too much. At least I enjoy dancing more when the following comes naturally, without thinking. That is why I'm also happy about having a practice partner, and JV has already proven to be a good choice (he, for example, saved me from an awkward situation later that evening!).

JV had a good idea of videotaping our dancing so that we could easily see our mistakes and learn from them, and so I took my camera with me. Now that I have a video of me dancing Zouk in a real beginner level, I can later see my development concretely. This is what I should have done with ballroom dancing too. And it is true what JV said, the camera is cruel what comes to mistakes! I noticed my hand work is horrible and that I really have to work with my stance. I have been watching some Zouk videos on YouTube to improve my hand movement so maybe next time I can try to work on those. I also have to concentrate on stepping with toes first, because now I'm doing too much heel steps.

After our practice we went to Havanna for Noche Romantica -party. There were heaps of people and many good dancers, which is always a sign of a good party. Downside of it was that the dance floor was little bit too crowded from time to time, which can sometimes lead, like what happened to me, a painful elbow hit to head, ouch! My friend's friend came there too, and I definitely got her hooked on social dancing. It is good to know I now have a party friend for Salsa clubs! It was such a pleasure to see her smiling face when dancing. I love meeting people who gets as much happiness and joy out of dancing as I do.

To my surprise, I nowadays like dancing Bachata more than Salsa. Actually somehow I've lost my confidence in Salsa, and I feel like I cannot really dance it anymore. I had terrible difficulties following many guys, but then again they were dancing Cuban style. Well, we're going to have Salsa classes in HOT-dance and I think after those I'll do lots better. I also bought a voucher for Baila Baila dance school's classes so I can take some Salsa classes there too.

On Wednesday's HOT-dancing we had a revision class, so we went through the main things we have learned in Foxtrot, Bugg and Cha-cha. It is amazing how fast you can forget even the basic things! Again, I was so lost in Bugg, didn't do that well in Foxtrot, but loved Cha-cha. On Thursday the intermediate and advanced classes continued with Waltz. I had pretty horrible day and I was quite pissed off before going to the classes but after dancing I was wondering why I even thought my day was that horrible. This might show how much I just love Slow Waltz! After the classes I also got an irresistible proposal: I was asked to start practicing ballroom dancing with someone. Actually, I had been thinking earlier if I could somehow ask him to be my practice partner in a way he would agree (I know he is quite busy with dancing and already has many practice partners), so I was really happy he was the one asking me. We might start practicing after I'm finished with Spex though. Let's see how much time I will have when the Spex training starts.

Talking about Spex, I finally found out in which dances I'm going to dance in! I'm dancing in four songs in total, so the exact amount of dances I hoped for. Two of the songs are what I really wanted, and I avoided the two songs I disliked, so it's just perfect! The practices will start in two weeks, can't wait!

On Monday I'm going to Spain with my family for a week, so I might have a short break in dancing unless I find something from there. Okay, I admit, I have been looking for dancing schools and Salsa clubs already online...

Connecting People.

Saturday I almost had the same feeling as when I went to my first Zouk practice; the Zoukkers had a birthday party for Zouk in Finland in Helsinki Salsa Academy's studio. The location was definitely the kind of place you wouldn't just happen to jump into and find out there was the most amazing party going on, so good thing I'm already getting into the Zouk circles! Even though the studio was a bit secluded place, it was a great place to have a dance party.

The plan for the night was simple but couldn't been better: to dance Zouk, dance a little bit more Zouk, and then dance some Zouk. My mission to dance with as many different people as I could was accomplished easily when all the dancers formed a big circle and did a Roda, which is a group Zouk dance. Basically you do certain moves after which you change partner. It was a good way to get everybody involved and after that I didn't feel uncomfortable asking people to dance since I already danced with everybody. Later we also did a birthday dance for two dancers who had their B-days. All the girls circled the B-day boy and the boys did the same for the girl, and they got to be in the middle of attention and dance with all of the opposite sex. How cool, I want to get that for my birthday too!

The only thing that was bothering me was that I promised one of my best friends to go out night clubbing with her later that evening. The moment I walked in to the Zouk party I knew I didn't want to leave early! I almost texted my friend I'm not coming after all, but I didn't want to be the kind of person who breaks her promise. So after midnight I had to say goodbye and head to the Tiger. It felt so nice that everybody were trying to make me stay, asking me for the "last" dance over and over again. Even though I am a new Zoukker and didn't know most of the people there, I didn't feel outsider even for a second. It is amazing how dancing connects people!

I am already spreading my zest for Zouk to other people. I took one of my friends to the Zouk party and yesterday I got a message from him saying he has been thinking about Zouk a lot since that (oh I know how that feels like!). Today I'm taking a new acquaintance to Noche Romantica, a Kizomba, Salsa and Bachata party in Havanna. I met her through my friend on Saturday and she seemed like a person who would just fall for the dance. Right okay, I might have a hidden agenda behind this, since none of my current friends are into social dancing, which means no one to go with me to Salsa clubs!

Before the today's party JV is giving me another Zouk lesson. After introducing Zouk to my friend in the Zouk party, I might now understand why some are willing to practice dancing with beginners. It feels great to see their positive reactions to a new dance. It is like giving something precious to the other person, and I do like to make others happy (then again, who wouldn't?). Well, I just have to first learn myself before passing the present along.

Shy Dancer.

I have this weird tendency of getting really nervous when I dance with someone for the first time. I get even more nervy if I dance with someone I know is a good dancer. When I get nervous I cannot relax and follow the lead, and the dance ends up near to a disaster from my side. So basically the better I know my partner is, the worse I dance. Shouldn't it be quite the opposite: the better my partner knows how to lead, the better I should be able to dance with him from the start? Okay, there are few good leaders who I feel comfortable dancing with starting from the first dance, but I cannot really know why. I wonder what the reason could be.

Today I had my first Zouk practice with JV, and I must admit I was quite nervous about it, even though JV is one of the exceptions from my main rule. Maybe it was because I really wanted to dance with him and was worried of doing something so wrong he would regret ever asking me to practice with him. Writing this down now sounds pretty foolish, doesn't it! Not surprisingly, I couldn't relax enough in the beginning, but after an hour or so I was finally able to get over from my nervousness, and I feel it really reflected to my dancing. I was even able to forget my surroundings during dancing, which was good because there were lots of people going around and organizing some kind of party for the evening.

JV taught me some basic elements of Zouk that don't appear in most of other dances, and so are maybe the most difficult to adapt intuitively. We started with head movement around and from one side to the other, and the signals to make the girl move her head. It is quite hard to make the movement relaxed and slow enough, and I felt like loosing my balance quite easy while moving my head around. Next teaching was moving the whole upper body all way down to horizontal level. I know it is going to get more natural for me, but at the moment I just feel somehow uncomfortable doing these kind of movements. I just feel ridiculous stooping my back and staying there for quite a long time. Well, it was a great choice from JV to teach me these kind of things. All I need now is just lots and lots of dancing to get used to them. Anyway, thank you JV for the great advice and pleasant dancing moments, I'm already looking forward our next session!

What happened in HOT-dancing this week was, firstly, that I realized Foxtrot is not my dance. Seriously, I almost left the dance class on Wednesday. I don't know why I find it so hard taking long steps backwards, and when I make my steps too short, I get walked over. Foxtrot is not even that fun dance to dance it would motivate me to start putting a lot of effort on learning the steps right. It is not that I am going to reject the whole dance, but I am just saying there are so many other dances that I'd rather do.

One of those dances is my favorite standard dance, Slow Waltz, that we luckily practiced on both Thursday's dance classes. In the intermediate class the emphasis was more in the technique while the advanced class concentrated on figures. Even though Nic taught me lots of technique I learned lots of new things about the basic steps and how to make the "waves" right. The thing most of us were doing wrong in the beginning was going down on the first beat even though you should already start going down the waive on the third beat. Waltz is actually really hard dance although many people think is the dance everyone can dance.

I must say that even though technique training is really important and I like doing it, I enjoyed the figure class more. Our teachers taught us American Slow Waltz which is really figure-focused and space demanding dance. Still the dance has the same glory as the competition Slow Waltz, and I love imagining myself in a big old ballroom wearing beautiful evening dress, trying to do all the movements as exquisite as I can. Lovely! Thursday's Slow Waltz class ended up in a way I wouldn't have ever expected: my teacher gave me shoulder and feet massage! What a good run for my money this dance class has proven to be!

It has definitely been a great dancing week! I have also been thinking a lot about my relationship to dancing, and I've also discovered some new aspects of myself. I've realized I don't quite know what I really want from dancing at the moment, I just want to keep on doing it. Tomorrow I'm going to the Zouk in Finland 1st Birthday Party, and my goal for the night is to dance with many different people to get over my fear of dancing with new partners. I'll report later how I managed it!

An Exciting Suggestion.

I don't know how good of a person I was in my last life because life is treating me so well now! On Monday evening I got a surprising Facebook message from this one Zouk dancer I've met couple of times. I got so excited about the message I had to hold back not to jump around my apartment and scream hysterically. My reaction was due to this: the dancer said that he would like to start practicing Zouk with me! I mean, wow, this was exactly what I hoped for! I don't know why he would like to practice with me, a total Zouk beginner, but it doesn't really matter for me! Apparently my huge enthusiasm for dancing compensates my lack of experience. Oh, I'm so happy about this! Okay, maybe I shouldn't count my chickens before they're hatched, since we haven't had our first practice yet. I hope it will go well and we will actually start dancing together. You should see my wide smile when I am even thinking about this!

Oh, yesterday evening I went to one dance party in bar Havanna and learned a new dance, Kizomba. It is a African pair dance, originally from Angola, danced to Zouk-like music. I have seen people dancing it in some Salsa events, but I never got the basic steps and so didn't try dancing it before this. Somehow I had the image that Kizomba would be a mixture of Salsa and Bachata, but after trying it, I don't think so anymore. It is a slow, wavy and sensual dance, and the dance stance is r-e-a-l-l-y close. I happened to meet one Salsa dancer just before the short Kizomba lesson and it was almost awkward to dance that close body contact with someone you just met. I am already used to the strong physical contact in other dances, but I might not recommend Kizomba as a first dance to start with to some who haven't been dancing pair dances before. Other than that, it is easy to follow and allows you enjoy the music and closeness. Anyway, we were both Kizomba beginners and ended up having heaps of fun learning this new dance. The basics are quite easy so we got into the dance pretty fast. The hardest thing for me was the down-backward hip movement, since I've used more to right-left movement, and after dancing a while I could definitely feel it in my back. Great night all in all, the only thing missing was a bit more people in the dance floor.

Spex Secrets.

Saturday was an exiting day: they revealed the script for Spex! All spexers gathered to "read-through-party" where we also finally found out what songs are going to be in the show. I cannot reveal anything but I can say this: it is going to awesome! All of the dancers got super exited about the songs and I think we are all looking forward being able to start working with the choreography. There were couple of songs to which I would really like to dance to, but the division is up to our team leaders. I think next week I will know which songs I'm going to be in. So exiting!

After reading through the script we headed to Swing karaoke bar for an after party. Everybody were having a great time singing karaoke, having couple of drinks and going crazy in the dance floor. Accidentally, some of the HOT-dancers were having a social dancing party in the same place, which ended up me being in the dance floor most of the night, either with them or with spexers. I even tried to get some of the dancer girls to try pair dancing, but my efforts were not that successful.

How cool is just to go to a bar and conquer the dance floor with a bunch of dancers? And who said ballroom dancing would be boring?! One of my favorite moments was dancing something Tango-like into heavy metal music. This proves that there are no rules in social dancing. I love it!

Oh, we also had a dance practice before the party earlier that day. I had some serious difficulties finding the practice place and the others had already started when I finally got there. We did some technique training and a fun oriental-like choreography to the end. I am really hoping they will not put me into a choreography where I have to do lots of spins because I just cannot make them right. This is the problem of a short dancing history: a lack of technique in countless things. Good thing that our dance group is so supportive and everybody is really helpful. I am sure this dancing experience is going to give me so much. At least a dozen of new friends and sore muscles.

Here is a video of me dancing to the heavy metal in Swengi. It is a bit dark but you might get the idea from it. Fun times!