Thursday, November 13, 2008

Dance Dance Revolution

Part of my new New York life, is my new New York gym. I know it is just an American chain but it has been on Sex and the City and is the funnest place ever to work out. They have the best classes in the world – trampoline aerobics (can’t do it though), ‘wings’ yoga, which involves circus like tricks on a hanging swing (some would say I shouldn’t do this one), and my new discovery: African Dance.

I’m not going to lie to you. I was a bit nervous about this one. After all, I live in Brooklyn between two projects and nearly everyone I see is African-American. I was totally expecting the class to be full of AA women with actual booties and really good rhythm. To my surprise I found I was a blonde among many, save for three AA ladies. Great, I am totally going to rock this class.

Wrong. As soon as our instructor started moving with the beats of the drums, ALL the other blonde girls did as well. And even though they had no hips or butts, they still found the beautiful rhythm and movement of the African beat.

I looked like an Orangutan on crystal meth.

I tried my best to wiggle my hips and stomp my feet all the while gracefully moving my arms in the opposite direction. The effect, like I said before, was a crystal meth laced Orangutan who had eaten too much sugar.

I was so bad that when we went in lines, no one would go behind me. She also made us split in to two teams – my team was only 8 big and full of the bad dancers. It was torture.

But the most fun torture I have yet to endure. As much as I was terrible, I had such a great time and sweated like, well I suppose, an Orangutan.

I was having so much fun until the end of the class when we all had to stand in a circle and the dance one by one in the centre. This completely freaked me out so I pretended that my knee had popped out and hid in the corner.

I may be willing to look like a crazed monkey in a group but no way am I going that while people are actually watching.

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