Bus: Vilnius-Warsaw
I have not presented you with anything new for a while. It certainly isn't from the lack of things to say.. In fact I have even written, but for some reason I did not post it here. I wonder if I will let you in on those old posts, or if I feel that they are as unrelevant to you as they are to me.
I am happy to say, that though I haven't written. I don't consider this a slip in my goals, even though I had meant to write something every day. These weeks have been busy, and full of new experiences. It's hard for me to count how many times I have had to go out and do something that is out of my comfort zone. I've discovered that I can still develop a sense of urgency (and dangerously, that I am still quite capable of stressing out).
In my last post I mentioned that I was working on a Lindy Hop event in Cracow. Well, that happened a little over a week ago (Nov 10-14), and that was quite something. This was the first time that anything like this has happened in Cracow, or even Poland. The closest thing in Cracow was an event called "Swing Era Festival,” but that mostly consisted of beginner courses in a swathe of dances (Rock n' Roll, Boogie Woogie, Lindy Hop, "East Coast Swing”...), and though there were parties, they had so much music that was not really danceable for any of these.
In Poznan in late Spring of this year, was the first Lindy Hop camp in Poland. It only featured one international instructor (Fatima from Sweden), and she taught authentic jazz. They were good at getting Polish dancers to come and though I wasn't there, they created a noteworthy camp. Unfortunately no one outside of Poland had even heard of it. I can't brag too much about the "international” aspect of Dragon Swing, my camp. Beyond the instructors and the Rhythm Junkies, we only had 4 foreign dancers. However, we certainly made our presence known, abroad, and we put on parties that haven't ever been seen in Poland. Largely thanks to the instructors who love dancing so much that they can teach, DJ, and still tear up the floor for 5 nights. They also put a spectacular performance for our Saturday Swing Show, which we pretty successfully advertised to the general public.
It wasn't perfect, of course. We racked up a little bit of debt, some of our events got stalled to the point that casual passerby got discouraged, and left, before the real stuff happened. But they were applauding the social dancing, which I think was funny, and I hope that they were satisfied with that..
My own role in this, besides freaking out and making sure that everything is working smoothly, was leading two beginner crash courses before the parties, translating during some of the beginner track classes and MC'ing the Saturday night party and show.
Monday morning when all the serious stuff was over, I had a body full of tense muscles and a unsettled state of being. To the point where many people saw it very clearly and recveived with various types of response, some who smiled and embraced me saying "It's ok, just relax,” to those who would sit down seriously at a table and said "recently you're not quite yourself, you seem anxious and tense, we've done really well, and what's done is done.”
I still wasn't quite relaxed on Tuesday, when we taught what almost certainly was the second blues class in Poland ever (we taught the first one to a class of 4 students a few weeks before), to a class of 30 or 40 young dancers: "young” meaning, "approximately my age” That was incredible, though I have never taught with a microphone before, and and Ania annd I sometimes pulled the micophone from eachother mid-sentence, also we both hit the other in the teeth (by accident) with the mic. Those were small problems, though hopefully we can figure out a system next time, in which we can finish our sentences and not knock each other's teet out.
In the meantime, I had decided that I would go to Vilnius and put together a quickie choreography with my friend Kaste, for the Lindy Hop Classic Couples competition. Due to missing a bus on Wednesday, I arrived in Vilnius on Thursday afternoon, and the performance was Saturday night. So we had only two nights to create and practice our choreography.
I'm sure next time will be even better, but this is the first time I have performed my own choreography.
As I'm writing, I'm on my way back to Warsaw, from Vilnius. I've done a helluva lot recently, and I hope I can keep pace.
All the best,
Tomasz/Tomek
PS. I have, for at least the last ten years, usesd the name "Tomasz” in English-speaking nvironments, or rather non-Polish environments. While in Polish I always use the molification, Tomek. However, Dragon Swing brought out a little bit of a clash for me. Do I introduce myself as Tomasz or Tomek? This is something I need to figure out.
I am happy to say, that though I haven't written. I don't consider this a slip in my goals, even though I had meant to write something every day. These weeks have been busy, and full of new experiences. It's hard for me to count how many times I have had to go out and do something that is out of my comfort zone. I've discovered that I can still develop a sense of urgency (and dangerously, that I am still quite capable of stressing out).
In my last post I mentioned that I was working on a Lindy Hop event in Cracow. Well, that happened a little over a week ago (Nov 10-14), and that was quite something. This was the first time that anything like this has happened in Cracow, or even Poland. The closest thing in Cracow was an event called "Swing Era Festival,” but that mostly consisted of beginner courses in a swathe of dances (Rock n' Roll, Boogie Woogie, Lindy Hop, "East Coast Swing”...), and though there were parties, they had so much music that was not really danceable for any of these.
In Poznan in late Spring of this year, was the first Lindy Hop camp in Poland. It only featured one international instructor (Fatima from Sweden), and she taught authentic jazz. They were good at getting Polish dancers to come and though I wasn't there, they created a noteworthy camp. Unfortunately no one outside of Poland had even heard of it. I can't brag too much about the "international” aspect of Dragon Swing, my camp. Beyond the instructors and the Rhythm Junkies, we only had 4 foreign dancers. However, we certainly made our presence known, abroad, and we put on parties that haven't ever been seen in Poland. Largely thanks to the instructors who love dancing so much that they can teach, DJ, and still tear up the floor for 5 nights. They also put a spectacular performance for our Saturday Swing Show, which we pretty successfully advertised to the general public.
It wasn't perfect, of course. We racked up a little bit of debt, some of our events got stalled to the point that casual passerby got discouraged, and left, before the real stuff happened. But they were applauding the social dancing, which I think was funny, and I hope that they were satisfied with that..
My own role in this, besides freaking out and making sure that everything is working smoothly, was leading two beginner crash courses before the parties, translating during some of the beginner track classes and MC'ing the Saturday night party and show.
Monday morning when all the serious stuff was over, I had a body full of tense muscles and a unsettled state of being. To the point where many people saw it very clearly and recveived with various types of response, some who smiled and embraced me saying "It's ok, just relax,” to those who would sit down seriously at a table and said "recently you're not quite yourself, you seem anxious and tense, we've done really well, and what's done is done.”
I still wasn't quite relaxed on Tuesday, when we taught what almost certainly was the second blues class in Poland ever (we taught the first one to a class of 4 students a few weeks before), to a class of 30 or 40 young dancers: "young” meaning, "approximately my age” That was incredible, though I have never taught with a microphone before, and and Ania annd I sometimes pulled the micophone from eachother mid-sentence, also we both hit the other in the teeth (by accident) with the mic. Those were small problems, though hopefully we can figure out a system next time, in which we can finish our sentences and not knock each other's teet out.
In the meantime, I had decided that I would go to Vilnius and put together a quickie choreography with my friend Kaste, for the Lindy Hop Classic Couples competition. Due to missing a bus on Wednesday, I arrived in Vilnius on Thursday afternoon, and the performance was Saturday night. So we had only two nights to create and practice our choreography.
Click to viewI'm sure next time will be even better, but this is the first time I have performed my own choreography.
As I'm writing, I'm on my way back to Warsaw, from Vilnius. I've done a helluva lot recently, and I hope I can keep pace.
All the best,
Tomasz/Tomek
PS. I have, for at least the last ten years, usesd the name "Tomasz” in English-speaking nvironments, or rather non-Polish environments. While in Polish I always use the molification, Tomek. However, Dragon Swing brought out a little bit of a clash for me. Do I introduce myself as Tomasz or Tomek? This is something I need to figure out.