"You are very graceful." 09.22.08

Today, I went to Chinese cooking class. One of my goals was to learn how to cook a Chinese dish. A bunch of Chinese home stay mom's came together and taught is how to make Jao Zi's or dumplings. It was pretty easy and fun. We also got to eat them while we were preparing them.

After cooking class, I went to Chinese dancing class. We got an angry email from our director last week saying that no one who signed up for the dancing class showed up. I apologized to her and told her that no one informed me of the time or place. Anyway, so I went today. I was the only one to show up. We waited 15 minutes, and I even tried to convince people to come so that the teacher wouldn't feel bad. No one wanted to come. Everyone was busy studying for their test. I have my test Thursday.

It was just me and the teacher. On the way to our dance room she asked me, "Oh so you like to dance." I said, "Yeah, I like to dance to hip-hop, dance, electronic, etc. She said, "Oh you mean like this," as she moved her pumped fists away and towards her body in a kind of lame dance move from the 70's. I laughed and said, "yeah, just like that." Then she asked me, "have you ever danced Ballet?" I said, "No, never." She laughed and said, "Ohhh."

We arrived to the dance room. For some reason, I didn't really think anything of "have you ever danced ballet?" Nonetheless, the dancing we were about to do was ballet!

The only reason I signed up for a Chinese dancing class is because I want to be able to dance the traditional Chinese dance if it were to ever come up in a business party or a Chinese wedding. I would like to prove to any future Chinese partner that I know something about their culture and tradition. Chinese are very impressed when foreigners display knowledge of their language, culture and traditions.

Instead, I spent 45 minutes practicing my ballet posture and practicing ballet moves. The posture was pretty hard. The moves are hard to explain, but what ever you are picturing in your head right now, I'm sure will suffice. After doing the moves for a while, she says to me"wow, you are very graceful."

Yeah, I was like, "What!" I laughed. It was fun, but I just don't know if i''ll have the time to commit to one hour a week for something which really won't help me in business dealings with the Chinese. Next class, I'm going to ask her to teach me traditional dancing or any dance style that could be found in a party environment.

Fun and interesting day. The best part was when I showed my friends over here the moves I learned. We laughed for a good 10 minutes.