Went to a great party last Saturday. One of our students turns 40 in August and her husband wanted to surprise her with a trip to Singapore. Unfortunately destination far east requires multiple innoculations, three months in advance and he figured it'd be kind of difficult to get her injected without her noticing. So instead, he arranged a party for her and time-shifted her "official" birthday (eeh, she's just like the Queen; two birthdays!) forward three months, so he could still surprise her with her trip. For weeks he's been scheming with friends and family and whilst not normally brilliant at keeping secrets he's played an absolute blinder with this and she suspected nothing. Indeed when she walked in, expecting just to pick up her friend to go to a fashion show, and 40 of us shouted "Surprise!" she was totally flummoxed."They can't mean me," she was thinking, "it's not my birthday!" The look on her her face as the reality dawned was classic.And what a lovely party too. Hosts were friends of the birthday girl who have a large house (complete with big garden) on the edge of Harrogate. It was a daytime affair so Trisha and I were both able to go, taking Luca along with us. He loved the garden, running around chasing any girl that happened to be wearing pink. He seems to have developed this fascination for pink. I'm not sure if I should be concerned...I was driving so Trisha had a couple of glasses of wine and was decidedly squiffy by the time we left. She doesn't drink a lot these days and it went straight to her head. She spent most of the journey home to York fast asleep.
Saturday evening, and I had a date with The Asterdale Club in Borrowash. Miguel Havana (Havana Nights, Leicester), one of my favourite cuban style teachers was taking class for Lee hunter, who, under the guise of Absolute Salsa, runs the bashes at the Asterdale. The turnout last Saturday was the smallest I've seen at the Asterdale and even though it busied up a little later, it still remained essentially quiet.I thouroughly enjoyed Miguel's lesson, stuff I've kind of done before with with new twists and variations that I haven't previously tried. Nice. I thoroughly enjoyed dancing with his co-teachers Georgiana and Marilyn too. I especially enjoyed dancing with a friend from Notts who I haven't seen in over a year. I probably overdid it - we must have had six or seven dances throughout the evening, but like I say it was quiet and she didn't seem to mind. I spent most of the evening on the dancefloor and wished someone else was driving home but alas I'd come by myself, unable to whip up a posse due to half my regular crowd being away in Spain at the moment. I was so tired I had to pull over and take a 30 minute nap on the way home. Thanks to Trisha for letting me enjoy a lie in on Sunday morning.
Off up to Newcastle tomorrow evening to The Black Swan, teaching for David and Margaret Blackmore's Salsa Amor (www.salsanewcastle.co.uk). Looking forward to it too. We didn't know what to expect the first time we went up there, in February but in the event, found as warm and friendly a buch of folk as you could wish for. They seemed to like us too - they keep inviting us back anyway. As well as tomorrow we're already booked for June 29th. Come and say "Hi" if you're there, and as always, any comments left to let me know I'm not alone in the Online World will be most welcome.Until next time, by which time I may have learnt how to post some piccies onto this blog thingy...
Thursday 24 May 2007
Tuesday 8 May 2007
I'm not alone! Bradford All-Day
Hey! Someone read my blog! I know coz they left a comment for me! Thanks Gary & Jan - it's nice to know I'm not just writing to myself.
Had a quiet night in on Friday, then up with t'little one early Saturday morning - he likes to be up before 7am - no idea where he gets this from, certainly not me!Then hand-over to Trisha and off I went to Bradford for the Latin XCes All-Dayer. I was booked to teach at 6pm but wanted to get some of our new flyers out on the desk so they'd be there all day and also wanted to hang out generally and do a few classes with other teachers. I spend most of my salsa time teaching myself these days that it's nice when I have the opportunity to go and catch a class with someone else.
First up was Nicolai and Helena with an intro to Cuban Salsa. I always enjoy classes with N & H (they were amongst my first teachers when I started) and they don't seem to mind too much when I heckle from the sidelines. Gotta say actually, that Nicolai in particular has had a massive influence on my salsa teaching career - starting when he didn't show up to teach class one Monday and I had to step in and help Caroline out with a routine. Over the next few months he encouraged me to do more and more, and continues as a source of inspiration for me.Anyway back on subject. I did a cross-body turn pattern lesson with Ces and Kerry (which I've since forgotten, shame, coz I enjoyed it at the time - that much I can remember) and then caught a Bachata lesson with them in the afternoon, before leaving to collect Trisha for our dips class. A year ago I'd used to hate Bachata but I had a turning point on holiday last year whilst watching a couple of friends. They were so in sync, the way their bodies were snaking together, it opened up a whole new world for me, that I've since been quietly warming to. There was one particular partner in Saturday's lesson (you know who you are!) that I just seemed to click with and we really seemed to find the root of the dance between us (not that there was a great deal of rom between us - it was Bachata, after all).
And then our Dips Class...We're always a little bit wary of teaching dips etc as there is so much potential for injury when not done well, and we never know what sort of standard we're going to get in the class. As usual there was a real mixture of abilities, but most seemed to be picking up on the essence of what we tried to put across, and to my knowledge no injuries ensued. Which is nice. We had three types that we wanted to teach and they were all well received. The first was a slightly complicated kind of triple combination that we spent quite a lot of time on, but it was nice to see pretty much everyone doing it well. I've gotta say we got the LOUDEST and longest cheer at the end of it that I've ever experienced. Thank you all! Hopefully Ces will have us back later in the year to do some more?
If you see me, let me know; "Deej - I read your blog!"
Had a quiet night in on Friday, then up with t'little one early Saturday morning - he likes to be up before 7am - no idea where he gets this from, certainly not me!Then hand-over to Trisha and off I went to Bradford for the Latin XCes All-Dayer. I was booked to teach at 6pm but wanted to get some of our new flyers out on the desk so they'd be there all day and also wanted to hang out generally and do a few classes with other teachers. I spend most of my salsa time teaching myself these days that it's nice when I have the opportunity to go and catch a class with someone else.
First up was Nicolai and Helena with an intro to Cuban Salsa. I always enjoy classes with N & H (they were amongst my first teachers when I started) and they don't seem to mind too much when I heckle from the sidelines. Gotta say actually, that Nicolai in particular has had a massive influence on my salsa teaching career - starting when he didn't show up to teach class one Monday and I had to step in and help Caroline out with a routine. Over the next few months he encouraged me to do more and more, and continues as a source of inspiration for me.Anyway back on subject. I did a cross-body turn pattern lesson with Ces and Kerry (which I've since forgotten, shame, coz I enjoyed it at the time - that much I can remember) and then caught a Bachata lesson with them in the afternoon, before leaving to collect Trisha for our dips class. A year ago I'd used to hate Bachata but I had a turning point on holiday last year whilst watching a couple of friends. They were so in sync, the way their bodies were snaking together, it opened up a whole new world for me, that I've since been quietly warming to. There was one particular partner in Saturday's lesson (you know who you are!) that I just seemed to click with and we really seemed to find the root of the dance between us (not that there was a great deal of rom between us - it was Bachata, after all).
And then our Dips Class...We're always a little bit wary of teaching dips etc as there is so much potential for injury when not done well, and we never know what sort of standard we're going to get in the class. As usual there was a real mixture of abilities, but most seemed to be picking up on the essence of what we tried to put across, and to my knowledge no injuries ensued. Which is nice. We had three types that we wanted to teach and they were all well received. The first was a slightly complicated kind of triple combination that we spent quite a lot of time on, but it was nice to see pretty much everyone doing it well. I've gotta say we got the LOUDEST and longest cheer at the end of it that I've ever experienced. Thank you all! Hopefully Ces will have us back later in the year to do some more?
If you see me, let me know; "Deej - I read your blog!"
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