Celebrating Dance 2005 - reviewed by Guppy

To say I felt a little apprehensive as I pulled up outside Torquay’s Toorak Hotel, one Friday evening in October, would be an understatement. As a new dancer of two months, I had booked the Celebrating Dance weekend in a moment of bravado but now, a month later, the big day was here I was feeling more than a little new and inadequate as I lifted my suitcase out of my car.

I needn’t have worried though. From the moment I walked into the welcoming lobby I felt at ease and my reservations dissipated. Many dancers had arrived ahead of me and chatted excitedly in the lobby. Their warm smiles and friendly greetings made me feel accepted as one of the belly-dancing sorority and I felt relaxed as I checked into my comfortable room.

In the restaurant, large tables with free-for-all seating arrangements meant that everyone instantly made friends and no one was excluded. After a really lovely dinner, with equally pleasant company, I popped back to my room for a quick change into my tribal gear. Embarking on my first ever attempt to tie a turban, following the instructions which I had downloaded from the wiggle.org website, I hoped I could ‘wing it’. Two attempts (and a couple of glasses of wine) later I was satisfied with my efforts.

All ready and off to the Celebrating Dance Friday Night Hafla, just downstairs from my room in the hotel’s grand ballroom. We were treated to superb performances by some of the delegates of the following day’s classes. There was a lot of variety in the styles demonstrated and my personal favourite was a cross between flamenco and belly dancing which was delivered with such passion that I was itching to join in, if only I knew how! The performances were followed by general belly dancing, until very late, and I had great fun putting together some of my basic moves and attempting to copy the moves of the obviously more experienced dancers.

Saturday morning and a delicious buffet breakfast boosted my energy stores for the day’s classes. My choices for Saturday were Michelle Pender’s ‘Tribal Style’ and Dondi’s ‘Drum Solo’ workshop. These classes were so much fun and the structure meant they were suitable for all levels. Dondi is such a sweetheart and has so much charisma; she really is an inspiration as well as delight to watch.

The bazaar opened for business on Saturday morning and I’m sure was the cause of more than a few dancers being late for their workshops. I for one spent quite a lot more than I had intended but I excused my overspending with an ‘oh well, it’s only once a year’.

Once the workshops were over, I wrapped Saturday afternoon up with a relaxing swim in the hotel’s amazing themed swimming pool, in the style of an ancient Aztec temple with soft multi-coloured lighting and warm soothing water. Just what I needed after a day’s hard work!

After another yummy dinner, Saturday evening wound up with a gala show by the Celebrating Dance tutors including a tribal performance by my own teacher, Sara Shrapnell and her co-tutor Emma Pyke. I loved their dance, very earthy, exciting and strong. These ladies owned the dance floor! Dondi and Morocco stole the show with solos of very contrasting styles and the evening’s performances drew to a close with host. Afra Al-Kahira’s powerful ‘Wings of Isis’ which to my untrained eye, and forgive me as I’m sure my description is lacking, was a dramatic and emotional performance. As an observer, I really felt captivated by the emotion of Afra’s dance and was hypnotised by her heart-rending expressions and mesmerising movements. General dancing followed the gala show and soon everyone was shimmying and twirling on the dance floor.

My first class on Sunday was Sara Shrapnell’s ‘Frame and Flow’, which I found very motivating. Sara showed us how to dance in pairs and threes and how to draw attention to the ‘lead’ dancer by framing, whilst still playing a valuable part in the dance itself. Lots of changes of partners meant we all learned from one another. This gave me a lot of new ideas and I found myself picking up new moves and trying out ideas without really thinking about it as we mirrored one another in our pairs.

Next on Sunday was Morocco’s ‘Moroccan Schikatt’ workshop performed to ‘Mach Mach’ by Ali Hafid. This was definitely the highlight of the weekend for me. Morocco is an amazing woman! She has a rare combination of wit and wisdom, which she exudes effortlessly in her brusque yet amiable New York manner. Morocco is a delight to learn from and I haven’t laughed as much in a very long time. We covered politics, religion, sex and prejudice and most appendices thereto, yet still learnt the Schikatt in its entirety. I only spent a few hours in Morocco’s company but I left with a real hunger to sit and learn some more. She was like an old friend whom I never realised I had. Her brusque language may upset the more sensitive, but Morocco told it like it is with her no holds barred approach and I loved her for it.

This was one workshop I really had reservations about as the description suggested it was suitable for intermediate levels, although advanced beginners might ‘try it’. As I was neither intermediate nor really an advanced beginner I thought I might have bitten off more than I could chew, but again I was proved wrong as Morocco’s excellent teaching methods meant we kept drilling the steps we had learnt over and over until they were embedded in our muscle-memory and only then tagged a little bit more on the end of every 6th repetition, until the dance was complete. I left Morocco’s class with a broad smile on my face and lightness in my step, feeling that I had really accomplished something and at that moment in time was I definitely ‘king of the world’!

Will I be back next year? Ha ha, just try to stop me!!

Guppy