A quickie stop for the Salsa dance competition

October 15, 2006

After rushing through work and not really finishing it, I headed home a little after 8 for a meal before heading of to Club Salsa to check out the competition.

I did make a perfunctory effort to find a dance partner for the competition by trying to get in touch with 3 people (and succeeding with only 1). I failed. No big deal. In the back of my mind, I thought it is always possible to just pick a random person as a partner at the last minute if I felt inspired enough.

Dance competitions do not interest me very much for variety of reasons. Perhaps I care least about the fact the quality of the dance is judged by some arbitrary onlooker(s) using some arbitrary definition. For example, Cristian (tonight's judge) would have looked for a number of factors possibly including difficulty of moves, quality of partner-work executions, stylistics or artistry, musical interpretation, showmanship, shines (if any), etc. There might be other things he might have looked for as well as overlooked. He might place greater importance on some things over others. Almost certainly his opinions would not be identical to mine. This of course applies to anyone - the judge could be Ivan, Sally, Johnny, Serap, Joe Davids, Sergio, Cyrille, Rhona, Helen, the Salsa team, Frankie Martinez, Eddie Torres, etc. Different people will have different standards, and standards change over time too.

Perhaps the most intriguing part of entering competitions for me is the preparation. Thus far Salsa dancing involved practicing routines taught in class during the class, using the material learned in class during social dancing and experimenting and playing with things I learned in class or by accident while social dancing (aside from a very small amount of practices outside the class (e.g. working on body isolations, spins, shines by myself for a minute or two occasionally or reviewing turn patterns with random available person after a class). A concerted practice for a performance or competition offers interesting possibilities (some of which I might not realize until I actually do one).

I arrived after 9 PM. It was a little on the quiet side. Vishal was suffering from a hangover. I guess he partied too hard last night.

More people arrived after me. I had not seen Zern in a while (he has different regular nights also) - he entered the competition with Euvian and made it to the next round. Cyrille also arrived later - still smarting from his hand injury.

Stephanie was there too. She has become a real revelation. In addition to having improved her technique and style, she also developed a quite a taste for (or strong opinions about) music. Everyone has different taste of course, but in my book she has a very good ear. Long time ago when she first danced with me, she declared that I can dance with her anytime (or something like that -- at least that's how recall it). Back then, I thought was she was pretty good but I would not have gone as far as to return the compliment. Probably the best thing about her was that she was happy to dance with me. Now she's simply great period - and I am thrilled that she is still happy to dance with me (at least when she likes the song) - and not just once a night either. You never know how people will turn out in a relatively short amount of time.

Stephanie was a last second participant of the Salsa competition - she says she dislikes competitions but she was dragged into one twice in a row now. This time, William was her partner. They made it to next round too.

I didn't enter. I wasn't inspired enough.

Near the end of the evening, Zern and Cyrille talked themselves into leading each other. I decided that it would be fun to join in. Zern's a little easier to lead than Cyrille. Zern said he also found Cyrille difficult to lead. We also talked about possibility of going to the Scala this Saturday.

Eventually the music ended and I went back to work. I will worry about Bachata but not until tomorrow.