An eye opening unforgettable Sunday!!

So after 15 classes and one hell of a show I have come to terms with the fact that I am better off dancing in a crowd, a drunken disco or an even more drunken marriage crowd. I am not meant to be on the stage in front of live audiences. Not for dancing. Maybe for talking; that I can do anywhere (at least I’d like to believe that until the bubble bursts), but definitely not dancing.

Now you guys must be wondering how bad I must have performed to conclude that. Hmm not too bad. But it was disappointing because I was unable to meet the standards that I had set for myself. And they were not too high. I mean I really did not go up there to dazzle the crowd with my savvy dance moves. The only thing I expected from myself was to remember every step, do it as told and come back. Apparently that turned out to be a big ask. I have hardly ever goofed up during our sessions. I was well in sync with the music and steps till a minute before we entered the stage. It was once the lights and music were on, I kind of went blank. Not kind of, I actually went blank. I was drowned in the cheering of the crowd. They were told to cheer loudest for us. Aneesha Dalal asked them to. Oh yeah she was there. She asked them so because while every other batch had like 8 to 10 dancers, ours had only 4 and we were the first to go. Well she did that with the best of intentions and so did the crowd. Neither of them knew one of those four will get so overwhelmed by the cheers that he would not be able to hear the music. That is one drawback of doing things on stage in front of a quiet audience. You never get prepared for the noisy one. Anyways, so I goofed up. Forgot a few steps, and whatever I did remember to do did not look pretty either. Had it been my first blunder on stage, I would have let it go but few of my friends from Satyam know, it was not. ;) So I have just accepted it is not my forte. Like Harvey Dent said in The Dark Knight, you either give up wisely or you just keep on trying making a fool out of yourself. Well he did not exactly say so but what he said does not make sense here. What I just said, does.

Looking at the brighter side, the show was amazing. There were people of all ages dressed up in colorful costumes. It started with a sort of a jam session where everybody just went on the stage and danced. It was called the warm up session but honestly it was just an excuse to let everyone dance freely on the stage. Then there were the performances. Other than the instructors no one there was a professional and they have been getting the same training that I was. However their performances suggested otherwise. Of course no performance was perfect but there were glimpses of awesomeness in all of them. At times I could not help myself but standing and applauding, especially for the group of deaf and blind kids and the special potential batch. SPB, I am told, is a batch created from amateurs like us. They are just a lot more talented. Most of the students from SPB were just teens and their performance had everyone on their feet. I have seen such performances only on screen but watching it live from 5 yards was a totally different experience. I don’t know why but everything looks easier on screen and thus you don’t appreciate the efforts and skills of a performer as much as you should. It’s only when you are closer to the action you realize what it takes to do what you just saw. A lot of credit if not all, should also go to the instructors. During the last couple of months I had been in complete awe of my instructor for her fitness, energy and enthusiasm (she is pretty too but I would rather not talk about that :P). Today I saw so many like her. Seemed like a different breed all together. Those guys participated in all performances in bits and pieces. The way they made entry into and exit from a running performance to balance it was a top shelf choreography. In spite of the fact that they also had the responsibility of managing the show, they never stopped cheering and dancing. It was a Sunday and they were there doing their job. But not one of them had any complaints. They loved doing it. I envy them for that. Most of the guys from my industry would share my feeling. Maybe they do not earn as much as we do (a big maybe) but I know I would give up my job without thinking twice to do a job like that, a job that I would be looking forward to doing even on a Sunday morning. And with this thought I will now hit the sack because I do have a job, not one which I love but definitely one which makes it possible for me to spend money on things I love. That’s quite satisfactory if not delightful. And yeah, I won’t stop learning to dance, I’d just stay away from the stage :P

P.S: The only blemish on today’s experience was the movie StepUp 4 which all of us went to watch after the show. It is an awfully terrible movie. Please do not watch it, thus encouraging its makers to make another one in this dreadful series.