25 October 2007

Michelle, Dancing?

I've always been painfully conscious of how awkward I am dancing. That's why it took me five or twenty yoga classes for me to stop giggling at all the weird things we were trying to do. (Or maybe I still do that, Amy would know.) However, with the upcoming stake ball, I knew that it was now or never. I asked my friend Marc to teach me to do the three-step that everyone does here. The cool thing about it is that they can use their dance for any song. In Utah, people only dance together during slow songs, and that's not really dancing anyway. More like revolving or something. Marc had this other girl come into a room (he even shut the door for me, how thoughtful) so they could show me. First the basic step: right foot back (for the girl), left foot back, step the right foot closer to the left, start over. He showed me how when he stepped a certain way and when I felt his arm pull me to one side, that was for turning and I was to step kind of between his legs to execute the turn. Finally he showed me how the guy listens to music before starting (to get the beat), and how they'll kind of bounce in their upper body. I felt really stupid, but glad to be learning with someone so nice. He told me to practice and sent me on my way.

The next night, with two guy friends watching a movie at my apartment, I figured it was the perfect opportunity to practice, and practice we did. I think I'm getting better. They laughed when I told them about what they call "freestyle." Markus has been giving me a lot of great German music, so they played some of their favorites for me. Markus showed me a few extra moves. We even waltzed for a moment. He was surprised that I didn't know how to already, because, as he told me, the first dance of a newly-married couple was always the waltz and I'd better learn if I wanted to marry a German. Ha ha. I'll let you know how I do Saturday.

1 comment:

  1. "Michelle, dancing?" is exactly what I said when I read the post about the ball and then I scrolled down and you had read my mind before I even had the thought.

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