Tel Aviv, Israel – Get Your Westie On

I visited Israel September 11-18. I’ve been looking for a way to teach and visit there since my Denver friends visited Israel for weddings, relatives, and schooling. Israel seemed foreign and exotic, has religious significance, and I enjoy middle eastern cuisine.

Between Jerusalem markets, sampling fresh halvah, slathering Dead Sea all over myself, hiking the Snake Path to Masada, eating lots of hummus, I taught many classes. This opportunity materialized thanks to Facebook’s Westie Discussion of the Day. I met an Israeli westie named Nur who asked “…. I was wondering while you were touring europe, have you considered visiting Israel:)?” Well, “Israel’s been on my mind for a while.” And “would I be able to teach there if I visited? That would help me such a trip more affordable to me.”

Israel was on! I would be teaching 6 1.5 hour west coast swing workshops for Dance Tel Aviv, run by Rena Scharf Kayat and her husband. I ended up adding an Authentic Jazz class and private lessons to my teaching schedule also. Tel Aviv has a growing and vibrant west coast swing scene. Dancers mainly come from lindy hop and west coast swing. It was definitely fun working with such a mixed crowd of different skills, levels, and dance backgrounds.

What I learned:

1. Israelis are extremely generous.

2. If you like Middle Eastern food, come to the source. It’s worth it.

3. Dead Sea mud has amazing benefits, but don’t slather the wet stuff. The drying process will take too long. Find the clay-like mud.

4. When planking the Dead Sea, do not submerge your face.

5. Those Israeli boys are bold. I haven’t never been asked to dance by leads so often. Way to step up.

6. Israel also has great international cuisine.

7. Give yourself plenty of time at the airport when leaving. Also, if your backpack has many coins from 4-5 different currencies, it will look very very suspicious to airport scanners.

Thanks to Nur for helping set this up and being a great tour guide, Rena for hiring me, Elissa for teaching with me, my two hosts, my drivers, and all the dancers and workshop attendees. Thanks for the dances and great memories.

 

Bestival 2012

Even innocuous sounding adventures have a pernicious edge. The hot Swing Patrol topic around May/June was Bestival 2012. It was advertised as an awesome party featuring lots of great music, Stevie Wonder headlining, once in a lifetime opportunity, etc. I would join the Swing Patrol team and enjoy free admission pass for the entire 4 day event.

I focused on the teaching to crowds and once in a lifetime opportunity and forgot the rest. And by rest, I mean I didn’t do my research.  After finally saying yes, I discovered I would be on an island surrounded by 50,000 screaming nutsos, sleeping in a tent (no problem, I’m from Colorado), wearing a wildlife costume (huh?), and unsure about my food situation. Fortunately, someone else was providing the tent and sleeping bag, though they decided to arrive a day later than I (lucky Vogue/Hermes gig dancers), and someone else organized a small group to take the train and ferry together.

Still, what was I thinking? I dislike smelly hippies, temporary toilets, and being surrounded by loud partiers. Well, my Denver friends understand my survival mechanisms. Find good food and pack good books. Go fully charged Kindle!

My group arrived in time to do the first Swing Patrol Friday session. Overall, all the sessions went really well. Loz managed the mic first and Scott Cupit took care of the rest. Swing Patrol brought a lot of good energy to Bestival’s Al Fresco stage. So, we demo’d social dancing, the Shim Sham, the Tranky Doo (boo faulty memory), Charleston, taught hand to hand Charleston, gave free hugs, shared raunchy Aussie-isms and kicked electro-swing ass (even blindfolded).

In the end, I was still managing a smile, albeit a deranged one. It was a long four days, but an enjoyable one. I don’t really follow the current music scene, but I follow food and swing dancing, so I made do with this crazy bunch.

For more pictures, find my album on Facebook. And if you’re interested in the food, that review will come later.

Exploring the UK – Oxford, Durham & Newcastle

Wow! The last week has been crazy. I just returned from Bestival, an outdoor music festival like no other. More on that later, but it seriously delayed any attempts to capture my recent UK travels.

I visited Oxford August 28 to teach Inappropriate Dance Moves and Blues. Vivien Nivesse runs the Tuesday dance night there. As he explained it, the dance night has morphed into a blues night featuring fusion type music for the last few nights.

I arrived early to Oxford and did some exploring. This was mostly inadvertent since I headed right past the venue after my bus stop. This did mean I found a middle eastern restaurant and enjoyed a Moroccan spiced chicken ciabatta sandwich.

Tamsin Howells was kind enough to teach with me. I’m always a bit nervous teaching with someone I don’t know for Inappropriate Moves classes. I’m quite appropriate even though I teach these classes all the time. Well, she was a good sport and really brought the energy in both classes. The Oxford dancers certainly did their part too, asking great questions and practicing to much music.

The blues class featured some moves inspired from the Spirit Moves. This got people moving with their entire body and using the floor. We also worked on pulsing, opening and closing the hip flexors, and applejacks.

September 3-5 I traveled to Durham and Newcastle. This is run by Joo-Lee and the Lindy Jazz crew. I was there to teach balboa Monday night (Durham) and blues Tuesday night (Newcastle). The Monday night balboa class features a 30 minute drop in beginner lesson and a 60 minute intermediate balboa lesson. The beginners were taught down holds with a linear and rectangular basic. Since I thought there wasn’t a break between classes, we also added a linear slide as an intermediate class preview. But there was a break.

Gillian, the local balboa teacher, and I taught the Maxie Stop Slide to the following intermediate class. Her and Andy were pleased since this move was giving them trouble. The beginners and everyone else followed along admirably to finish the night with social dancing until 10:45pm.

The next day featured a Durham walking tour and a trip to Newcastle. I planned the class with Joo-Lee and then we drove to Newcastle. These dates I visited worked for three reasons. 1. I was going to leave the following week; 2. They were right after her cruise; and 3. Both dance nights featured the once a month specialty topics at their respective venues.

My recent blues teaching focus has been on pulsing, using the floor, and being rhythmic. I’m tired of watching posing blues dancing, so drawing inspiration from the jookin’ elements works really well. We taught touch step basics along with a fun sit dip that I first learned at my first STLBX.

Oxford, Durham, and Newcastle are all growing scenes. Credit has to go to the scene organizers and the students’ energy. These organizers do a good job about creating a welcoming atmosphere while pushing their students through good instruction and music.