The Negative:
I've been finding this week quite difficult. It feels like I just don't have enough time. I need to get flexible, get ready for Pole Divas, work at the day jobs and get started on my academic work. At the moment I feel drained and stressed.
The world isn't helping much. It too seems to be coming apart. In my city we've had strikes by the postal services, fire services and buses. Nothing seems to work in this country anymore. In addition, the BNP and their existence seem to be dominating national discourse. To me, the BNP actually feel like a personal threat, seeing as multicultural products like me are high on their list of evils.
I just want to take a few days away from people and news.
Pole-wise, I've gained some fear. My back has been put out by too many one-handed bow and arrows and is taking a while to heal up. I've got the fear of that and my rubbish knee grip to overcome. It's not easy.
The Positive:
This week it is half term for schools. I'm off work so I can structure my time (mostly) as I like. I can try to get things read and written. Hopefully, I'll be able to focus on flexibilty training and some new exciting combinations. I'd like to create a sustainable routine where I can get more flexible.
I had a really good day today. Despite the interference of the bus strikes I managed to make it to the circus, where they had a 'Day of Dance'. Even though there were very few of us taking part, I still got loads out of it. It was an introduction to a number of styles, bollywood, bhangra, snake dance and gypsy fusion. The teacher was incredibly encouraging and positive, despite the fact she was more comfortable working with large groups, she still made the day enjoyable. One thing I really enjoyed was the way she ran things. She'd teach a few moves and then string them together. Then she'd tell us to get into our own space and just move to the music using what she'd taught us and anything that felt appropriate. At the end of the class she got us to work on creating our own mini routine to do together. I found this a really freeing way of learning. I've never experience that in a dance class before. I did formal dance training when I was younger and that's scared me slightly off many dance classes (long story!). It's nice to find something that I don't feel intimidated by. I've aslo been feeling stunted in my ability to just dance recently and that restored some confidence.
This week I am booked to try acrobatics on Thursday evening at the circus. Following that, there is an aerial skill-swap session. At the trapeze workshop I did in the summer I was encouraged to go. I've tried for the last 2 weeks, but stuff has come up. I'll be interested to see what I can try!
Sunday 25 October 2009
Monday 19 October 2009
The British Isles Pole Dance Competition: A Spectator Review
I suppose I should have taken the general presentation of the magazine and the manner in which I even got to see the event as a foreshadowing of what it was going to be like. My friend was given two free tickets after Pole2Pole magazine messed up her subscription when she moved as recompense (or were they just trying to get rid of tickets?).
So, on Friday I travelled down South, pretty excited as I was looking forward to seeing some amazing dancers perform, some who I'd seen before and many that I'd not. Post-viewing, I'm not entirely sure what my expectations of the event were beforehand apart from looking forward to the performances. I wasn’t let down by that at all. It’s unfortunate that my strongest impression of the whole event, the one that overrides all of the amazing pole dancing I saw, is of the incredible disorganisation of the whole event.
We arrived at the competition venue in Essex and for some reason we both felt tense and nervous. The competition was late starting. In this time we bought Mighty Grip gloves (which I’m impressed with) and I spilt my beer – my normal incompetence aggravated by my nerves.
When the competition finally started it opened with belly dance performers. I’m afraid to say that I wasn’t taken with them. Their facial expressions were set in concrete and their performance went on for ages. Finally, the amateur section of the competition began. They were quite varied in their ability, but all were unique to watch; however, they weren’t helped at all by the competition organisation. The MC regularly got names wrong, the wrong music was regularly played (one dancer had to wait ages on stage whilst they tried to figure out the right track to play) and the pole looked very slippery (they didn’t look thoroughly cleaned). In addition to this, the set up was supposed to be that one pole was spinning and one was static; however the spinning pole did not seem to be set up properly during the amateur section. So basically there were two static poles.
Through this stage of the evening, the hall was less than half full. Disappointing I suspect, though it did mean that the audience was the most respectful it was all evening.
Special cringeworthiness goes to the MC, who seemed totally unprepared and unable to handle her task. She frequently got names wrong and mispronounced them. She couldn’t remember the charities the raffle she was constantly flogging was in aid of. She was regularly sent off by the judges who hadn’t had time to confer before she ushered the next contestant on. This was due to her being unable to fill in the time between performances with anything interesting and coherent to say. By the end of the evening, people around us were shouting at her to stop talking and get off stage. I wish I could say something nice, but really, it was painful sitting through her presenting.
The professional category followed the amateur. Throughout this category the mess-ups with names and music worsened, the MCing between performances got more excruciating, but the spinning pole appeared to work. What did get considerably worse was the behaviour of the audience. There were more people in during this category; however, people talked continuously during the performances (you could hear a level of talk even above the music) and walked around through the rows and aisles. There were a number of noticeably drunk and rowdy people as well as a couple of contingents of heckling men, who got worse as the evening wore on (and it did wear on. The event overran by at least 2 hours).
There were a couple of cringingly awful MC incidents due to this factor. One when she decided to attempt to inspire a debate as to whether pole dancing was ‘athletic’ or ‘balletic’ (‘cos there are no other styles of dance you can bring in?), to which one of these men yelled ‘it’s about sex’ from the back (we did have to laugh). Another was when one dancer danced in what they later described as ‘club style’ which sent these men mad and caused the MC to run on after and condemn her style, which was both insulting to the performer and locking the barn after the horse has bolted.
What should have been the climax of the event, the champion of champions category can in late after more raffle demands and another iteration of the stone-faced belly dancers. By this time (it was probably about midnight? I seem to remember looking at the time in horror) I was pretty exhausted after all my travelling and the audience was getting increasingly restless, though a lot of people did leave at this point. Despite this, the four competitors (down from six) were breath-takingly good and performed brilliantly, despite being so late on. I only really have some impressions of how they performed and can’t remember many of the details that I’d like to as I was so out of it by that time.
After this we had the raffle draw, which took ages because some of the people with tickets they drew had left, so they had to keep drawing to get rid of their prizes! During this time the results were decided. Then the competitors were called to the stage. This took a while, as it seemed they’d been given no warning as to when this would happen and lots of them weren’t around. There was a lot of dithering as to whether the results should go ahead without them. Finally they managed to get all the competitors and judges on stage and......
THEY’D LOST THE RESULTS.
(or had they just not set up the sashes and trophies? Either way, they weren’t ready to give the results)
So everyone on stage sat down and waited for what seemed like ages. At this point it descended into even more of a farce than it had been when two men got on stage and started having dance off on the pole (they weren’t bad) and were pulled off by a bouncer. A large number of people left, many of the rest were milling about and complaining. We were ready to drop asleep, but we collected our coats, waited for the results and walked out almost as soon as they’d been announced. It was about 1am. We’d been there since 6.30pm and the event was supposed to run between 7pm and 11pm.
To be fair, there were positives to the competition. As fair as I could tell the judging appeared to be fair and was done by pole dancers. The competitors all did amazingly, despite the shoddy running of the event. What’s frustrating is that that shoddy running overshadows their efforts. The organisation and presenting was pretty disrespectful to their preparation and performances. They really deserved so much better than this.
Another thing I find particularly aggravating about the whole event is that this was apparently all filmed by the BBC for a documentary. It angers me that they have footage of how badly and unprofessionally it was organised and of how disrespectfully a lot of the audience behaved. This, rather than the amazing dancers could be used to represent pole dancing in the UK. It’s unfair that this competition, rather than the other well organised and vibrant ones I’ve participated in may represent pole dancing to the general public. People have enough of a critical eye towards pole dance and the organisation of this competition makes pole seem a shambles, unprofessional
and badly presented. I suppose I really shouldn’t be surprised as it was run by Pole2Pole magazine, which is in general riddled with basic spelling, grammar and formatting errors. It’s just gutting that they’ve set themselves up to represent the pole dance industry in the UK and worldwide. We seriously deserve better.
So, on Friday I travelled down South, pretty excited as I was looking forward to seeing some amazing dancers perform, some who I'd seen before and many that I'd not. Post-viewing, I'm not entirely sure what my expectations of the event were beforehand apart from looking forward to the performances. I wasn’t let down by that at all. It’s unfortunate that my strongest impression of the whole event, the one that overrides all of the amazing pole dancing I saw, is of the incredible disorganisation of the whole event.
We arrived at the competition venue in Essex and for some reason we both felt tense and nervous. The competition was late starting. In this time we bought Mighty Grip gloves (which I’m impressed with) and I spilt my beer – my normal incompetence aggravated by my nerves.
When the competition finally started it opened with belly dance performers. I’m afraid to say that I wasn’t taken with them. Their facial expressions were set in concrete and their performance went on for ages. Finally, the amateur section of the competition began. They were quite varied in their ability, but all were unique to watch; however, they weren’t helped at all by the competition organisation. The MC regularly got names wrong, the wrong music was regularly played (one dancer had to wait ages on stage whilst they tried to figure out the right track to play) and the pole looked very slippery (they didn’t look thoroughly cleaned). In addition to this, the set up was supposed to be that one pole was spinning and one was static; however the spinning pole did not seem to be set up properly during the amateur section. So basically there were two static poles.
Through this stage of the evening, the hall was less than half full. Disappointing I suspect, though it did mean that the audience was the most respectful it was all evening.
Special cringeworthiness goes to the MC, who seemed totally unprepared and unable to handle her task. She frequently got names wrong and mispronounced them. She couldn’t remember the charities the raffle she was constantly flogging was in aid of. She was regularly sent off by the judges who hadn’t had time to confer before she ushered the next contestant on. This was due to her being unable to fill in the time between performances with anything interesting and coherent to say. By the end of the evening, people around us were shouting at her to stop talking and get off stage. I wish I could say something nice, but really, it was painful sitting through her presenting.
The professional category followed the amateur. Throughout this category the mess-ups with names and music worsened, the MCing between performances got more excruciating, but the spinning pole appeared to work. What did get considerably worse was the behaviour of the audience. There were more people in during this category; however, people talked continuously during the performances (you could hear a level of talk even above the music) and walked around through the rows and aisles. There were a number of noticeably drunk and rowdy people as well as a couple of contingents of heckling men, who got worse as the evening wore on (and it did wear on. The event overran by at least 2 hours).
There were a couple of cringingly awful MC incidents due to this factor. One when she decided to attempt to inspire a debate as to whether pole dancing was ‘athletic’ or ‘balletic’ (‘cos there are no other styles of dance you can bring in?), to which one of these men yelled ‘it’s about sex’ from the back (we did have to laugh). Another was when one dancer danced in what they later described as ‘club style’ which sent these men mad and caused the MC to run on after and condemn her style, which was both insulting to the performer and locking the barn after the horse has bolted.
What should have been the climax of the event, the champion of champions category can in late after more raffle demands and another iteration of the stone-faced belly dancers. By this time (it was probably about midnight? I seem to remember looking at the time in horror) I was pretty exhausted after all my travelling and the audience was getting increasingly restless, though a lot of people did leave at this point. Despite this, the four competitors (down from six) were breath-takingly good and performed brilliantly, despite being so late on. I only really have some impressions of how they performed and can’t remember many of the details that I’d like to as I was so out of it by that time.
After this we had the raffle draw, which took ages because some of the people with tickets they drew had left, so they had to keep drawing to get rid of their prizes! During this time the results were decided. Then the competitors were called to the stage. This took a while, as it seemed they’d been given no warning as to when this would happen and lots of them weren’t around. There was a lot of dithering as to whether the results should go ahead without them. Finally they managed to get all the competitors and judges on stage and......
THEY’D LOST THE RESULTS.
(or had they just not set up the sashes and trophies? Either way, they weren’t ready to give the results)
So everyone on stage sat down and waited for what seemed like ages. At this point it descended into even more of a farce than it had been when two men got on stage and started having dance off on the pole (they weren’t bad) and were pulled off by a bouncer. A large number of people left, many of the rest were milling about and complaining. We were ready to drop asleep, but we collected our coats, waited for the results and walked out almost as soon as they’d been announced. It was about 1am. We’d been there since 6.30pm and the event was supposed to run between 7pm and 11pm.
To be fair, there were positives to the competition. As fair as I could tell the judging appeared to be fair and was done by pole dancers. The competitors all did amazingly, despite the shoddy running of the event. What’s frustrating is that that shoddy running overshadows their efforts. The organisation and presenting was pretty disrespectful to their preparation and performances. They really deserved so much better than this.
Another thing I find particularly aggravating about the whole event is that this was apparently all filmed by the BBC for a documentary. It angers me that they have footage of how badly and unprofessionally it was organised and of how disrespectfully a lot of the audience behaved. This, rather than the amazing dancers could be used to represent pole dancing in the UK. It’s unfair that this competition, rather than the other well organised and vibrant ones I’ve participated in may represent pole dancing to the general public. People have enough of a critical eye towards pole dance and the organisation of this competition makes pole seem a shambles, unprofessional
and badly presented. I suppose I really shouldn’t be surprised as it was run by Pole2Pole magazine, which is in general riddled with basic spelling, grammar and formatting errors. It’s just gutting that they’ve set themselves up to represent the pole dance industry in the UK and worldwide. We seriously deserve better.
Tuesday 6 October 2009
Training
So, now that I have about 7 weeks to prepare for the final I've got to get into some sort of routine. For the last month or so I've been toying with the idea of trying to get front splits on my good side by my birthday. My birthday is halloween, so that gives me just under 4 weeks to give it a go. In the preparation for the Pole Divas heat I neglected my flexibility training quite badly. Now I plan to use this blog to keep a record of how it's going in order to motivate me.
This is where I was last night after not training for a week (on the good side).
It looks worse than it did last night!
On my bad side, I have no such goals. My right leg has all sorts of remenants of knee and ankle injuries from my teens and I have to take everything very slowly and be very gentle. It can be pretty fustrating, but I am seeing improvement. This is where it's at:
Box splits are probably well over a year away. I've not got flexibility that way at all.
As for making a routine, I know that the best thing for me to do is just listen to a lot of music and see what song I want to dance to most and mess around on the pole experimenting with the combinations that run through my head for the next month. Basically, relaxing and enjoying pole dancing.
This is where I was last night after not training for a week (on the good side).
It looks worse than it did last night!On my bad side, I have no such goals. My right leg has all sorts of remenants of knee and ankle injuries from my teens and I have to take everything very slowly and be very gentle. It can be pretty fustrating, but I am seeing improvement. This is where it's at:
Box splits are probably well over a year away. I've not got flexibility that way at all.
As for making a routine, I know that the best thing for me to do is just listen to a lot of music and see what song I want to dance to most and mess around on the pole experimenting with the combinations that run through my head for the next month. Basically, relaxing and enjoying pole dancing.
Sunday 4 October 2009
Shocked, but very very happy
Last night I entered the Manchester heat of Pole Divas, the national pole fitness competition in the UK. I entered last year, without knowing what to expect and found it a real challenge, but was absolutely inspired by the professional category of entrants. I entered the advanced amateur level, which allows you to perform inverts (the amateur level doesn't).
I was probably the happiest I've been in a competition. The atmosphere was great, the crowd was good, it was well-organised and all the performers in all three categories were so amazing to watch. It was really a brilliant showcase of pole talent!
I was quite worried about entering this year as I've been worried a bit about my health and in the week before the competition I was very tired and weak (I've been enrolling for Uni and starting on more post-graduate work, so it's been intense). I'd dithered over my music choice for ages and whilst my routine came together in 2-3 days I was pretty nervous. Pole Divas this year had a list of complusory elements. I was anxious about them, despite the fact that once I got round to planning the routine it was very easy to fulfill all the requirements (though I did have to teach myself to do a hip-hold!).
This was the routine I performed. I can see loads of mistakes - particularly in my movement away from the pole. I stumbled so many times! But despite all that, I came joint first place with Sasha, from the same pole school as me. We're in the final in November and I'm really quite excitied about it.
One of the best things about the whole experience for me was that this is the routine I've created which expresses how I enjoy doing pole dance. It's definitely the most 'me' of anything I've done before. You can't see in this video, but I was grinning thoughout the whole performance, as I was really enjoying it all. It's amazing that just going for it like that got me a great result!
I was probably the happiest I've been in a competition. The atmosphere was great, the crowd was good, it was well-organised and all the performers in all three categories were so amazing to watch. It was really a brilliant showcase of pole talent!
I was quite worried about entering this year as I've been worried a bit about my health and in the week before the competition I was very tired and weak (I've been enrolling for Uni and starting on more post-graduate work, so it's been intense). I'd dithered over my music choice for ages and whilst my routine came together in 2-3 days I was pretty nervous. Pole Divas this year had a list of complusory elements. I was anxious about them, despite the fact that once I got round to planning the routine it was very easy to fulfill all the requirements (though I did have to teach myself to do a hip-hold!).
This was the routine I performed. I can see loads of mistakes - particularly in my movement away from the pole. I stumbled so many times! But despite all that, I came joint first place with Sasha, from the same pole school as me. We're in the final in November and I'm really quite excitied about it.
One of the best things about the whole experience for me was that this is the routine I've created which expresses how I enjoy doing pole dance. It's definitely the most 'me' of anything I've done before. You can't see in this video, but I was grinning thoughout the whole performance, as I was really enjoying it all. It's amazing that just going for it like that got me a great result!
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