Adam and I both took Friday off so that we could drive up to Media in a leisurely fashion and have the whole of Saturday with his family. The weather was gorgeous, and the drive was almost traffic-free. For a Friday afternoon on the 95 corridor, that was a miracle in itself!
Our main reason for heading to Media this weekend was to attend Mayfair, an annual festival at The School in Rose Valley. Adam went to elementary school there as a wee lad, and now his sister Elizabeth is finishing up her final year there. Mayfair is a little like Alumni Day at Hockaday, or Carnival at CMU - its a time for current students to celebrate as well as the time that former students and staff come back to visit. SRV is a small, closely-knit community school that just celebrated its 75th anniversary, so it was not uncommon to see several generations of alumni wandering around.
The day started out with carnival games, bake sales, lemonade stands, and music. A lot of the games and food stands were decorated and operated by the students themselves, and everything fit into the renaissance theme for the year. I even got to taste the infamous lemon sticks that I had heard so much about!
Once everyone had gotten some food and played for a while, it was time for the dancing to start. All the parents found seats by the blacktop, and one by one the different classes sang a song or performed a dance for us. It was especially cute to watch the teensy little 3-4 year olds try to coordinate themselves and sing their song. :)
The older grades do two special dances called the Sword Dance and, of course, the May Pole dance. These were so cool! In the sword dance kids danced in groups of six with small wooden swords, weaving the swords and themselves into intricate patterns in time to the music. At the end each group hurries to be the first to work the swords into a rigid star pattern that they then carry around the dance floor.
In the May Pole dance, the students started out in two cocentric circles around a pole with a disc on top that has 20 brightly colored ribbons hanging from it. They gathered speed for a while, and then each grabbed a ribbon to begin weaving it. First they formed some cool formations, like a star and several small "pinwheels", and then came the final weave - the two concentric circles began to weave in and out of eachother in opposite directions, and the ribbons formed a tight braid down the pole in the center! It was very cool, and all the students involved seemed really proud of what they had done. :)
I even took a small video on my camera! Take a look: maypole.avi
After all the students were done, it was time for the alumni to take the stage. Adam and a few alumni from his grade were all out there having a good time, and they even won the race to make the star in the sword dance! It was cool see how all of them still remembered the dances and the music in their advanced old age. ;)
I did indeed! Katy was probably laughing so hard though that she forgot to take video of those dances ;)
I didn't laugh at them at all, and I think its sad that people would consider laughing at them.
Not only is preserving an ancient tradition important, but everyone who was involved in this weekend's dances worked long and hard to learn their parts. Alumni came back to their childhood school, something that should be appreciated instead of joked about, and participated in something that was meaningful to them and the community around them.
What's so laughable about that?
Um, I can't speak for everybody else, but I am not laughing. I simply asked because last year I saw lots of photos of Adam dancing (or walk/skipping); this year, the video was of little kids dressed in all white. No Adam. Adam is my friend. I like to look at pictures of my friends. That is all.
One pole dance I did laugh at: Jamie Lee Curtis's in "True Lies." hee hee.
As someone very wise wrote in her own blog not so long ago, "I am not using my Web site to send messages to you." In other words, I'm not referring to you, Julie. :)
Phew. You're right--I AM very wise. :)
You have to admit, though, that pole dance in "True Lies" is pretty funny.
Dude, Jamie Lee Curtis' dance was HOT. Her body was completely smoking.
Yes, I just channeled Mr. Go, but I share the sentiments.
But what about the part where she bangs her head on the bedpost (pole) and falls down?
Didn't he make his voice sound different with a tape recorder in that scene? And she didn't notice even though it was SO fake? Ah, good movie.. :)
Oddly enough, I was just watching that movie last night (actually it's not that odd considering the fact that I'm an insomniac living in a house with thousands of free movies on cable). I just wanted to add a few funny bits from that scene.
-In the hallway, Jamie Lee Curtis suddenly realizes that she isn't sexy, and then proceeds to (perfectly) tear off the sleeves of her dress. After that, she decides to 'slick' her hair back...with water from the flower vase! Luckily there was a nice hallway mirror for her to add on some lipstick/eye shadow.
-When she first encounters Arnold, who was carefully seated in the darkness (only revealing an outline of a man - he used his hand to cover his mouth when it was time to press play on the tape recorder), he tells her to take off her clothes and dance. After removing her dress, Jamie Lee nervously progresses into her own disco rendition of the merengue. The disgruntled man of mystery then presses play from his chair, where the voice of a sleezy French guy tells her, "No, no. Do it...sexy like."
-Also, I believe that Jamie Lee lost grasp of the bedpost (during her miraculous transformation from a boring wife to an exotic dancer?), and dropped to the floor; at which point Arnold dropped his tape recorder. Don't worry though, they both recovered smoothly...
and then I changed the channel.
Uh... Hair doused with flower-water doesn't sound very sexy to me... Especially if it were water from the flowers that I keep in my house. It would be STINKY water!!!
ewwww...