Amsterdam Zouk Congress 2014 and WCS Suburbia 2014.

When you are a true dance addict, it goes without saying that your holidays will include going to some sort of a dance festival. I didn’t have a long summer holiday this year (due to starting to work in a new workplace) but I definitely made sure that there were dance festivals available during that time. On July I went to a Zouk festival in Mararó, as I wrote in my previous post, and in the end of August I traveled to the Amsterdam Zouk Congress.

After just partying and relaxing on the beach in Mataró, I decided to make Amsterdam a real dance congress kind of a trip: to attend all the workshops, pre-parties, parties etc. as much as possible and to return home truly exhausted but extremely happy for having such a great time dancing. No other plans, no sight-seeing tours, simply a trip dedicated to dancing. And that is what I made of it. I booked the closest hotel (read: the only one in the venue’s area) to avoid wasting time for travelling around, arrived one day early to attend the pre-party and to do some required food shopping for the weekend, stayed one extra day in Amsterdam for a possible after-party and socializing with new dancer friends, and, importantly, took the next week off from work so I didn’t have to worry about recovering afterwards. Well planned is already half done, as goes the Finnish saying. So, it ended up being a true dance trip, just as I wanted it to be.


Dancing in Amsterdam Zouk Congress.

When I was in Mataró, I felt like being a poor social dancer: I got worried that I was not capable to adapt my dancing enough to dancers outside my own comfy dance circles. Luckily Amsterdam proved that perception wrong. I was shining in the dance floor. It was not that I would have felt better or superior to the others, to make that sure here, but I definitely felt damn good – and I can tell when also the other is enjoying dancing with me. This feeling of being a good dancer, I think, was something that made good for my dancer self. You see, when I feel good, I dance better, and when I dance better I feel yet again better; it is a constant positive circle. One of the best things to have in the dance floor is self-confidence (though not arrogance!) to the dancer self, because in this way the dancer will use the most out of the skills s/he has at that very moment. If I don’t feel confident it reflects straight to my dancing and into my dance mood. This boost of dance confidence was much needed after how I felt in Mataró. It also made me realize the progress I have been doing with my Zouk dancing during this year and it was great to notice that all that constant work is now showing. It is such a great feeling when my body is doing something with ease that I wasn’t able to do, say, six months ago!

Here are some highlights for me to remember from the congress:

• A great new dance connection with a certain Aussie dancer with who I unfortunately had a small misunderstanding in the last day of the congress (due to which we missed our last dances together, damn!),
• Another new strong dance connection and our extremely energetic dances,
• A dance invite for the last song of the festival from a renowned dance teacher that I however turned down (I still can’t believe it myself either),
• Seeing and dancing with my good dancer friend and having our very special and unique moments in the dance floor,
• Listening different dance teachers talking about different aspects of teaching which gave me a lot to think about,
• A leader asking me, for the first time ever, if I had warmed up before leading any demanding moves – I think this shows high respect for the follower’s body,
• Dancing with my teacher in the party and ‘passing’ his attempts to test some new moves on me,
• Seeing how much a beginner can progress with his dancing during one weekend,
• Meeting some of my old Aussie friends and making some new ones – great people!
• And maybe most importantly: being on fire on Saturday’s party – woooow what a feeling!

After recovering from the Zouk festival I had kind of a cool-down dancing time in a WCS event in Tampere the following weekend before returning to work after my holiday. Actually I was invited there to give a taster Zouk class with JV and since I was there I thought I might as well join some of the workshops and, of course, social dancing. It was our first time teaching together with him, but I think we did pretty well; at least we got lots of good feedback. If nothing else, we got some Zouk knowledge spread to new dancers and possibly couple of new attendees for the soon coming Helsinki Zouk Festival. I have wanted to give Zouk classes in WCS events already before but then the timing didn’t seem right (I got even “it will never happen” comments to my plans). However this time many seemed to be interested and we got quite a nice amount of dancers to the class. My dream come true would be having Zouk+WCS combination parties or events in the near future. Let’s hope it happens – when there is hope there is a chance. Anyway, here is our demo after the taster class; I think we did pretty well considering that we haven't been dancing together lately that much at all.

 

 

Of course I had to take part to the Jack&Jill competition on Saturday night’s WCS party. I got into the novice finals but, as I was expecting after having at least 6 months break from the dance, didn’t make it to the top three. It was interesting to notice, however, how super nervous most of the dancers were in the competition. Seriously, I could feel their heart beating wildly just by holding their hand! Maybe it is that for me it really makes no difference whether I win or come last because WCS is not my primary dance, so there is no pressure and thus I don’t get nervous at all. It was nice to get into the finals though; it gave me hope there is still a chance that there is some WSC left in my attempts to dance that dance style. After all, the first comment I got in the first workshop was to keep my dancing to at least somehow resemble WCS. Whoops!

J&J finals.

There is one last thing I have to mention concerning the Amsterdam’s congress. It got me, once again, addicted to dance festivals. Therefore yesterday I booked another flights to Amsterdam for going to the Dutch International Zouk Congress in October just a week before Helsinki’s festival! So here I go again, back being a dance congress addict… Anyway, who else is coming?!?