Morris Dancing
January 10th 2007 -
I almost forgot the coolest part of the Woodford folk festival. Cousin Kathleen is a keen dancer, and somehow managed to convince me to go along to two dance thingys: Capoeira, which is a South American dance/martial art, and Morris Dancing.
I was reluctant. I really hate dancing. I was very pleased when I read on Neil Gaiman’s journal that he never dances: I felt somehow vindicated, or at least, less isolated. Many people like dancing and feel compelled to point out that it’s all about individual expression, and that you should never feel embarassed about expressing yourself. Also, who cares if you look like an idiot? Unfortunately, I cringe when I see other people dancing badly. I think they look like idiots. I don’t have the moral high-ground, and I don’t like to dance.
But I also resolved to say “Yes” more often, and what the heck, I *would* like to get over this hating to dance thing. It’s not a conscious or pleasant instinct; I would honestly like to not think bad thoughts when I see people dancing like idiots and chipping their teeth, breaking their legs, etc. I figured Capoeira might be an exception because it’s partially a martial art, and I’ve never tried that either (my subconscious has no opinion either way about martial arts; I just haven’t tried any yet. More on this later.) And I figure Morris Dancing might be different because looking silly is the whole point – I would have no trouble doing the fish-slapping dance either.
Capoeira was OK but a little disappointing. As martial arts go, I’m sure it’s better than random flailing, but I also suspect a boxer would make very short work of them. I realised that I’d already seen Capoeira in fighting computer games, where they seem to do OK, but in real life it looked rather more like dancing than fighting. It was a pleasant workout and not mightily embarassing, but it didn’t really appeal.
Morris Dancing, on the other hand, was superb; exactly as silly as I was hoping, with the instructors fully in the spirit of the absurdity of it all. We learned a stupidly complicated arcane set of moves, and performed them quite satisfactorily. Delightful.
CB Says:
January 12th, 2007 at 7:49 am
Capoiera is one of those things that you have to be really talented at to not look stupid. It is hugely popular in Ireland, but I think that’s just because whenever there are recruiting demonstrations they engage the talents of these huge buffed latin american guys (and guess what – plenty of gals).
By the way, I was requested to harness some Longreach vote power – can you help??? http://www.monopoly.com.au/