Boundlessly Curious: RE: Folk dance the actual last: PAC 2

I pretended to start this post earlier. But I simply couldn't write this post without having finished our summer tour. And man I'm glad I didn't, because so many wonderful things happened on this tour!

Quickly in the year I established who my BFF's would be. After a week of killer rehearsals (we learned all of our World of Dance stuff in one week!) we went to a cabin retreat in the middle of nowhere, Utah. It was so far out of the way I was concerned that Mike Romney was really leading us to our death. But there was a cabin and we did retreat! Soon after arriving I was wandering around, wondering who to room with. I was already good friends with basically everyone on the team thanks to the fact that I was the TA for SPAC the year before. However I didn't know who my "group" was yet, and had no idea who to room with. Thankfully, I peeked in on Kelsey's room (we had been SPAC roommates and dear friends since then) and she invited me to stay in that room with her, Mikayla Ellison, and Amber Shepherd. Mikayla and Amber were both girls I loved and wanted to be great friends with but didn't know if they would be friends with me (perpetual high school feeling anyone?).

Thankfully I was intensely wrong. We bonded over Buzz Lightyear, nougat, and lots of laughter. That was the first of many sleepovers that hopefully aren't yet finished even though Kelsey and I have graduated.

The retreat was super fun and awesome and was extremely indicative of the rest of the year. Everyone got along super well this year. We were all just great friends and worked really well together. And our new director, Jeanette was perfect for this group of people. There was just a feeling of fun but still hard work that permeated our time together. She was the reason! This woman is a fun hard-worker. Both.

The year started with a bang. For World of Dance we did Lucnica, our Slovakian Suite, Keltatak, our Irish Suite, and Classical Indian. World of Dance this year was infinitesimally better than last year. I was much more comfortable with my spot on the team and with the BYU dance department in general. So I actually talked to people from the other teams much more than I had the year before. I only wish I could do it again because then I would make even more friends! My only regret from that show was that I had only a CDT number (Chakra) to get ready for Classical Indian because their piece was about 8 minutes long. So I didn't get to see that number for the whole run of the show. Bummer.

After World of Dance we did not slow down. The first half of our semester was full of rehearsals as we had two professional choreographers come to teach us some new pieces. First we learned Volyn (Ukrainian) from Luba. I love this woman! She was definitely tough, but she was really kind and helpful and a very strong woman. Apparently she was dancing on a broken foot? She kept telling us she couldn't do things full out but she was still doing them eons better than us. Volyn ended up being one of my favorite dances ever. I was really disappointed when I was taken out of it after Christmas Around the World for logistic reasons. The best part about her visit was that when she left she gave us a little pep talk and told us that she had been much easier on us than she usually is because she just cared about so much. She got teary eyed and you could tell she had really been affected by the Spirit she felt around us. We sang "God Be With You 'Till We Meet Again" and she cried and some of us cried (meaning me) and it was such a wonderful experience.

Our next choreographer was Richard. Now, with these choreographers we would add on to our MWF 2-5 rehearsals. The choreographer would come in Thursday so we would have a Thursday night rehearsal, our regular Friday rehearsal with an extra Friday night rehearsal and then a Saturday morning rehearsal. Richard was choreographing a gypsy dance for us and the first two parts of it was just boys, so the girls didn't have to come until I think Friday night. So by the time the girls came on Friday the boys were quite practiced in the styling. Also, boys tend to have a lot of motivation when it comes to dances like this (dances around the Hungary region) because they are slappy and manly. The girls first rehearsal with Richard was...intimidating. But we all got through it and by the end he even smiled when we performed it! I similarly loved this dance and was really sad that I never got to perform it (even though Richard picked me to be in it originally. Not bitter.)

After these choreographers was a rush of performances for visiting dignitaries and then the scramble to prepare for and perform Christmas Around the World. This year was much better than the last year when I was terribly ill. Although there was some drama and it was emotionally challenging, but just because it is widely acknowledged that this was the most demanding PAC repertoire...ever. Every single dance we performed in CAW was completely new to the program except for 1, and that was the only one we had already performed in World of Dance. We were all taxed. But we made it! I weeped openly in the moments before my last Hopak in the Marriot Center and thankfully had an understanding partner (thanks Thomas!). It didn't help that this year there were transitions in between each dance which actually tied it into Christmas, and the transition before Hopak was especially spiritual.

The next semester was, um, hard. Just for me really. As I've said before, student teaching while doing PAC and having a job wasn't the best idea I've ever had. I had to be approximately an hour late for rehearsal every day. I missed warm-up everyday as well as E.D.D's (every day drills) which I actually really was sad to miss! Our team also started running together and I never got to do that (though this was...less sad to me). But because of this I had a hard time really feeling in the loop and part of the team for the semester. Weekend shows helped, but we actually didn't have very many of those at all.

Our "home show" at the Covey Center in Provo was...interesting. We were down 1 girl from the get-go because she had been sick for a while and didn't know yet what was wrong. And a few numbers into the show another one of our members had to stop because he was also quite ill. There were a lot of last minute adjustments and prayers said and thankfully both of those members recovered for upcoming performances.

Then came summer tour! This year not only was our director different (Jeanette instead of Edwin) but we had a different tour director (Julie instead of John) as well as a new tech manager (Travis instead of Mark). A whole new team! I can't pretend I wasn't worried about a let-down of a tour since I had gone to Europe the year before. But after hearing what was planned I was pretty much stoked and continued to be throughout the tour. Here are some highlights.

Aztec ruins! AH! History nerdiness. This was a building removed from the rest of the complex that had concentric circles. Um, tabernacle of Israel anyone?