post-seajam recollection

so SEAJam 2010 came and went waaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaayyy too fast for my liking. =P

I think Sam or Shaz's alarm woke us up.. brekkie was a mixed bag, some hits and some misses. Like prata which was practically puff pastry, some corn and ham and toast and cereal XD

Sat classes were all good and dandy. Loved the warm-up session including a Big Apple session, first time at it and doing this at 930AM is definitely not something I'm used to. Hell yeah it was a warmup alright. Hanna and Mattias are awesome teachers, although they went quite fast towards the end - didn't catch half the routine in time.. watching Sam and the rest doing just fine made me gape a little, haha I was completely lost by then!

Listening to Dawn Hampton speak was inspiring. Sitting as close as I was to such a legend, you can literally see her passion pouring out from her words. Abit of a red herring but during that session, not 1, not 2 but *3* glorious KLSwing reps got to dance with her! Lino, Ming and Jordy all in the same session, how awesome is that! I did find it cute too that at the end of her session as she was recounting a piece of Indian music that made her and Frankie dance to, she made us dance Bhangra as well =P

Had lunch after at Plaza Singapura, not too far from the studio. Glorious duck rice, oh how I missed you so! However I still think the one I had @ Bugis was better XD

2nd session for the afternoon, whoah this was suuper fun XD First class with them was more to styling and techniques so that we don't look so kayu if we're not doing swingouts half the song =P Super fun ya!

And oh oh oh oh Aerials! XD I've only done so many and they actually require me to concentrate to get the cue and *jump* straight up XDXDXDXD The class was conducted by Henric and Jojo (they are such a cute couple! They'd tease each other in class and make random jokes, ending with either their attempt of "lah" or "ya?") Jumping up, jumping around, and seamlessly getting back into dancing after all that jumping around.. oh this one was pure love XDXD

I kinda regretted not going for the last class, I bet it was fun (1920's Charleston) cause we had to get ready to catch the bus for the 1938 Summertimes' Big Band performance.

Speaking of which, the performance was *really really really* good. The drummer boy had quite the fanclub, although I really like the emcee who sang quite a few songs (his rendition of "Cheek to Cheek" was quite sweet) and counted in to about half the pieces they played.. oh! Dawn got the chance to show off some moves here too to one of her fave songs - for us SEAJammers it was kinda like an encore as we had just witnessed something similar earlier in the day during her presentation.

The instructors' performances (oh the super fast Big Apple of sorts) was so so much fun to watch! Hanna, Mattias, Jojo, Henric, Sing and Matt were at it with gusto, it's like they didn't need to catch their breath - the music just fuelled their energy and it really made me wanna get up and dance too (haha although I can't dance as fast or as well as they do, but really it was very breathtaking - literally)

The 2nd half was so much funner cause we got to dance on stage XDXDXD seeing Dale (the guy who put together the band) dance was quite surprising, I certainly wasn't expecting that. And Hanna can sing really well! She did a duet with Kelvin and it was.. just.. wow. Really. Really *really*. SO we took our turns to dance on stage, and did the shim sham too XD

After the end of the show, well we were cheering them on so they did their encore piece, which happens to be one of my fave Yoko Kanno pieces of all time, Cowboy Bebop's "Tank"! Such crazy fingers flying all over the place, oh that was super good -lah-.

However that wasn't the end of the night (yay!) We headed off to Bellini's to dance it off once more XD The floorspace there is even smaller than Sid's I reckon.. but then again there were alot more people there. Had a couple of dances, and man it's a battlefield out there! No matter where we moved, we'd either end up elbowing someone or stepping someone else on the foot, both of which I happen to kena - got hit in the back/shoulder/arms couple of times by some enthusiastic follow/lead and got the heel of a stiletto digging into my foot (blardy hell that was painful sial!) But I guess it's really hard to avoid. @_@ And then there was Hong Wee suddenly pulling and aerial on me on that cramped dancefloor! On my part I was just glad I didn't trip over backwards or anything =P
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Sunday was a more relaxed day for me though, I reckon if I took Sunday classes too I'd just die halfway (but to this I got Ming doing the classic pose and voice - "You are dead to me") so I followed them down to brekkie, but as they left for class, I left for the comforts of my bed! XDXDXD So I slept a little till noonish, then headed out to Somerset to meet up with Ying and Nick for lunch.

I did not know that it was only one stop away, so haha I think I could have woken up alot later =P But aaaanyway. Had lunch at the Handburger which has pretty decent burgers, had the pulled pork burger but I think if I go again I'm trying either the portobello or the chicken burger. I loved the chips and homemade ketchup, as well as the stuffed tomato (surprisingly sweet and.. omg huge tomato!)

Walked around Orchard area for abit after.. after Nick left at about 4, Ying and I headed out for this place called "Wild Honey". It's a nice place, has a cafe-feel about it but I still think cafe's should be alfresco. =P I think I'm spoilt after having so many cafe lunches in Melb, haha! Anyway, this coffee place was alright, but the bananana pie was a little too dry for me liking.

Headed back at around 6ish, and to my surprise I saw Sam there. I thought the classes finished at 530 so.. haha yeah. Aaanyway.

Theme for the Sunday night social was "Crouching Tiger Hidden Dragon".. didn't have much Chinesey costumes in my cupboard so I just dressed down abit.. had a few dances in the space right outside the lift where the dinner palce was, so when the lift doors opened the people in the lift were most probably thinking "omgwtf is going on here? Do we get out? Do we not?" and yes, you can actually see them thinking hard about it. =P

Dinner had some really good stuff. I think the one that people liked the most was probably the shrimp and mango fritter-roll thing, since it was the most unique, and imo the best tasting. There was stuff like siumai and harkau, and ever-delectable egg-tarts, which I was happy to have more than a few XD

We couldn't stay there too long, so after Sing was quite sure everyone had a bite to eat, we headed back down into the studio to continue dancing the night awaaaayy XD
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And that ends SEAJam 2010, I am so going next year..maybe this and one other camp, see how it goes *sigh* I remember coming home and thinking "man, I wish the weekend would last longer."

Oh, and I am definitely bringing my camera along. =P
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Thinking about it, I think SEAJam really helped me improve. I'm still jittery when I miss my footing or when I'm being greeted with a new move or when I just can't seem to feel the music. But at least I like to think I'm not so kayu anymore when I'm on the dancefloor.

Practice, practice yay!