The Birthday Extravaganza...

Let's see... it started on Thursday.. way ahead of schedule. Dinner at Giraffe with my housemates.




Spanish Pepper Soup, chicken wings, Salmon with roasted rice... Fusion food.. Very interesting. Very nice setting. Great company as usual. oohh.. and I got a water bottle... and not just any water bottle, a really good one! Oh, and also a single journey Tube ticket... :-S




Random pictures taken on the Golden Jubilee Bridge with housemates on the way home...

Last night (28th March, Tuesday), me and Jim went to Just on St James' St.

(http://www.juststjames.com)



Was a very posh place as you can see from the pics. Me standing outside the restaurant...




When you are seated the waiter/waitress lays your napkin out for you and asks if you'd like sparkling or still water (£3 a bottle!!!) Then they bring the bread and butter and also the soup (it was sweetcorn soup) in a tea cup. Was very cute and yummy.





For starters we had the Seared Scallops. It had seaweed and raisins and nuts... For the main course, Jim had the Lamb with couscous while I settled for Barbary Duck Breast with artichoke and fore gras. Was all very delicious. All in all, the service was great, the food was fantastic and the atmosphere was to very relaxing.

But it doesnt end here... clubbing on Friday, dim sum lunch on Sat and more dancing in the evening! WOO HOO! I cant wait!! :-D

Bristol Council House '06

Bristol Council House... VERY WEIRD JUDGING. That's the first thing I've got to say. But look at all the bottles of wine we won by virtue of making it to 7 finals!

In the Ballroom events, the crazy organisers first ran the Basic Foxtrot. I HATE FOXTROT. Got knocked out in the first round. Didnt matter. Then we sat around and waited for AGES. Then all of a sudden, they ran the Student's only (Waltz, Quickstep), Intermediate (W,Fox,QS) and Pre Champ (W,Fox,Tango,QS) comps back to back. That's 9 straight dances without stop! IT WAS COMPLETE MADNESS!!! I was completely knackered after the Intermediate and I still had another 4 dances to dance. They were CCRRRAAZZZEEEE!!!! Leaving the floor I felt completely wiped out. For the rest of the day, me and Jo were just so tired and couldn't really give it our all. ANYWAY, we still came 4th in the Student's category, 4th in the Pre Champ and 3rd in the Intermediate. The weird judging is when the beginners couple beat us in the Student's only category. We're not that great, but I'm pretty sure we're better then them... still.. didnt think much of it after that.

In the Latin events, Jo forced me to compete in the Amatuer category (Cha cha cha, Samba, Rumba, Paso doble, Jive), Pre Champ (C,S,R,J), Student's only(C,J) and Basic Rumba. It was a straight final in the Ams which was great news for me. Now I can say I competed in an Amatuer final in the UK!! WOO HOO!! But due to our exhausting outing in the Ballroom section, I could literally feel Jo's energy being sapped away from dance to dance. By the time we had to dance the Jive I could feel her exhaustion. I too felt like giving up. Our legs were heavy, our movements weren't as sharp... What more we knew a few of the couples on the floor hadn't actually danced at all the whole day.

Anyway, somehow we managed to carve a respectable 4th place in the Amatuer category! It was fantastic. We beat couples we didn't think we'd beat cause we've been consistently losing to them throughout the year and also cause they hadn't danced ballroom and were fresh on the floor. We were thrilled. Anyway, It was a straight finals for Pre Champ as well, and I THINK we came in 3rd. I'm not sure.. I've got to check that... I really cant remember what else we got.. it was either 6th or 7th in the Students only (again losing to beginners.. WHAT IS GOING ON??? Confused tons of dancers) and I THINK a 4th or 5th in the basic Rumba.

By that time in the evening, I was way too tired.. beyond exhaustion to even care about how we placed. My head was throbbing and my brain was dead. The only thing that really mattered was we came 4th in the Ams and we beat a certain couple.. muahahhahaahaa...

ooohh... also, one of the girls asked me if I was interested in dancing Ex students with her next year.. unfortunately I had to tell her I would probably be unavailable :-(

IVDC '06 pics

IVDC warm up

Who were you in High school?

Popular Kid

In high school, everyone knew your name - even if you didn't know theirs. In fact, your still skating by on your looks and charm. Nothing wrong with that!

Who Were You In High School?

LOL!!! SSOO not true... would like to think so though.. :-p~

What is your seduction style?

Your Seduction Style: The Natural

You don't really try to seduce people... it just seems to happen. Fun loving and free spirited, you bring out the inner child in people. You are spontaneous, sincere, and unpretentious - a hard combo to find! People drop their guard around you, and find themselves falling fast.

What Is Your Seduction Style?

Beach Party!!! And it's still snowing in the North!!!

Alison's beach party last Friday was a blast. Dance mats... twister... food... great company... Everyone *or at least most* were in 'beach wear'. Alison and her housemate Jennifer decided they had to have a 'beach party' while it was still cold just to take the piss.

Dance mats was great fun though I was quite crap at it. As for Twister, I won the first game! muahaha.. it was a bloody long game too... Started with me, Vicky, Jo and Timmy. Vicky was the first to go. Jo is actually REALLY good. She can contort herself into really impossible positions. HOWEVER, me and Timmy *unknowingly* forced her out of the game. At a point when me and Timmy were criss-crossing each other, somehow we managed to trap Jo's head in between our butts!! When we kept putting pressure into her temples she decided she had had enough and gave up.. hehe.. it was hilarious. And then me and Tim went on and on and neither would quit or admit defeat. In the end, spectators suggested one of us fall over, so I pushed him over.. hehe... *angel*

Later we were upstairs watching dance vids *like duh... if you put a bunch of dancers together you cant not expect dance vids to somehow crop into the party*. There were also a couple of very drunk and very 'interesting' people downstairs so most of us didnt want to bother going down. Alison came running up at one point and was going on saying "OMG OMG OMG.. Piya is such a slag!". Apparently this girl who is rather obssesed with her boob size and thinks a little too highly of herself was throwing herself at a random guy at the party. So much for medic students...

Still, was a great party and everyone thoroughly enjoyed themselves.. hehe...

Twister 02

Tw02
Originally uploaded by sesater.

He doesn't seem to be very alarmed...

Twister 1

Tw01
Originally uploaded by sesater.

Timmy looking like he's really enjoying himself... *grin*

How Open Minded Are You?

You Are 68% Open Minded

You are a very open minded person, but you're also well grounded. Tolerant and flexible, you appreciate most lifestyles and viewpoints. But you also know where you stand firm, and you can draw that line. You're open to considering every possibility - but in the end, you stand true to yourself.

How Open Minded Are You?

IVDC update

I realised 3 SUDC finalists (Intermediate Latin) didnt make it to the semis at IVDC! First is Will from Cambridge who WON SUDC, then Yoni and Liz who were second at SUDC and finally Matt and Becky from Bristol who were 5th! It's also been agreed that the judging was very odd. Then again, the marking at every Uni comp is odd...

Random pose

Random pose
Originally uploaded by sesater.

We decided (or rather I decided) to take a pic in a pose. It's actually our second Paso highlight when we end... however, think I wasnt really in the right pose at the time this pic was taken...

Penguins

Penguins
Originally uploaded by sesater.

Ballroom A and B team...

Wacky bunch

Wacky bunch
Originally uploaded by sesater.

The London Team at IVDC 2006. Me sticking my head between Timmy and Jo. As you can see everyone's a little playful. It was just after the team match and everyone had relaxed a little. It's so good that the London team now has some sense of team spirit. It's become much more fun and team oriented as compared to before... a lot of it is thanx to Alison I must say...

IVDC 2006

The big one is over. The Inter Varsity Dance Comp 2006 was held at the Guildford Spectrum. Biggest ever IVDC with 160 beginners couples and 700 dancers taking part. You'd think it would be a good IVDC wouldn't you?

It was acceptable I guess. The day started with Latin. Cha cha cha, Paso Doble and Jive. I made it to the semis. Peter and Ly came third. However, Yoni and Liz only made the quarters and the rest of the team didnt fair very well. Was hoping to do better, but like I said before, don't really think we're good enough. I think Liz and Yoni didnt make it to the semis because *in my humble opinion* their paso is weak. I hated the floor. During the first round when dancing the paso, I might have been hit by somebody or I slipped but whatever the case, I fell. Luckily, I managed to recover from the fall quite fast. However, after that my mood just went out the window. I was really angry at how the competition was being run. Sure, they were trying to keep to schedule and etc etc etc, but to the expense of the dancers! In the first round, in each heat there were at least 30++ couples on the floor. It really was impossible to do anything. It's sssoo not fair to dancers. Quite a lot of shocking results, like me and Jo beat Liz & Yoni AND Matt and Becky and the Will from Cambridge who won intermedate Latin in SUDC two weeks ago. Although we were dissapointed for not making the finals, we took comfort in the fact we beat these couples.

Me and Jo only made it to the second round of the Ballroom *as compared to our fantastic outing in SUDC*. It was quite demoralizing in a sense, but I was again quite angry at how the comp was being run. HOW THE HELL ARE YOU SUPPOSED TO DANCE A WALTZ, QUICKSTEP OR VIENESSE WALTZ WITH 30 OTHER COUPLES ON THE FLOOR?! It isnt a big floor. In the second round, me and Jo had so many problems in terms of dance space. We kept getting bashed into and everywhere we turned, there was a couple obstructing us. It was VERY frustrating because we could hardly dance in that Waltz. When I got off the floor. I felt like I hadn't even danced at all! We hardly moved at all and were trapped in a corner for some time. John (the Ballroom coach, who thinks we are one of the most promising couples on the floor), then told Alison that we would have a helluva time getting into the next round. He noticed the complications.

Anyway, the second dance in the round was a Quickstep. I decided to just get out there and have fun. Again, we kept bashing into people. It's got nothing to do with floorcraft. It's all got to do with the very limited space we had to dance. At one point, 2 couples crashed into us. I noticed one couple was a friend, so I got cheeky. He was dancing in front of me and I was going to run down the floor so I literally shouted "GET OUT OF THE WAY!!!" That remark really caught the attention of many... it was really funny.. It was probably the highlight of the day for me. Just to shout out like that on the floor.. felt very liberating.

Before the Ballroom section started I realised I had misplaced my wallet. I had quite a bit of money in it and got really worried. After much searching and etc I was really highly strung. However, Katherine was so helpful. She went through other people's fleeces and managed to find it inside someone else's fleece. After that my mood got better. We started cheering for random people on the floor. In the advance though, we cheered for Paul and Vesna (Cambridge) because of all the controversy surrounding their eligibility to dance. We thought we'd be supportive of her (we have no problems with her dancing for Cambridge) so started screaming everytime they went pass. After the finals, when they were walking off, they came up to us *mainly me and Alison* and Vesna said "Thank you guys!" They would always smile when they went past us cause of all our shouting. I actually think they are REALLY good. OOohh.. we also cheered for Chris who used to dance for Sheffield when I was a beginner. He too was very appreciative. Said that I was probably the only person shouting for him...

Anyway, during the team match, I borrowed Shaun's (Jo's bf) latin top. It's like bright red and matched her latin dress. We were hoping it would be more eye cathing on the floor. Think it was quite good actually. For the team match, our C team managed to get 11th place in the 2nd division and out A team came 8th. We emulated our A team ranking from last year which is pretty impressive. We even beat Nottingham A team which have been consistently beating us since the beginning of the year, Liverpool A (though under strengthed but who cares? they still lost! After all that bragging about Advance dancers... yea yea yea), Cambridge C (who we tied for 7th place in SUDC... YAY!!!), Imperial B team lost to us too! Other then that, London couples won the Novice ballroom (Mike and Katherine) and Intermediate Ballroom (Peter and Ly).

OooOhhh.. I bought a new Latin top. It's considered practice wear and I love it cause it's white. Don't tell anyone okay? *angel*

Ramblings

I was informed yesterday that Jill developed a serious rash and couldnt come in to teach. They suspect it might be the mumps and have instructed her not to have any contact with others. Today (as in Wednesday) David Ward had to take the Latin class at 6pm (though he only started at abotu 6.15).

I was there to practice but there was a dilemma. He couldnt teach the ballroom class. He didnt feel confident enough (being a latin only dancer) so we had to look for alternatives. Unfortunately, there were only 2 couples capable of taking a class, me & Jo and Peter & Ly. However, Peter being the "I only practice and want to compete and win so don't waste my time" kinda guy, I had no other choice but to take the class. I couldnt let ULU BALADS' reputation get tarnished. So I agreed reluctantly to take the class. Jo didn't seem confident in taking control of it so I decided to just run over things that Jill had done last week, i.e. basics of Quickstep and attempt to teach them a spin turn.

After the class though, practice went into full swing. A lot of tension in the room with the more serious couples. IVDC just this weekend... Apparently Silvia had been crying cause Rob kept blaming her for any faults while dancing... Alison said she was shaking and everything. Poor gal.. she's such a lovely dancer. Rob can be quite a prick at times... Even Mike and Katherine were going at each other.. both were so stressed out and annoyed at each other... Yoni and Liz were at each others necks at whilst practising the Paso... so much strain... things between me and Jo are still quite good.. feeling the pressure of IVDC 2006 but still keeping it cool by just concentrating on improving. We're very doubtful of our chances at IVDC, so we're trying to remind ourselves to just have fun...

Anyway, when we were walking to the tube station, we bumped into one of the 'future committee' members. She complimented me. Said that I handled the Ballroom class very well.. said I have a good teaching voice! Whatever that means! LOL! Apparently Timmy informed her I also used to teach the KCL Ballroom and Latin Society. Think Jo said the same about my teaching. I really should think about putting all this teaching experience down on my CV... hhmmm...

update. Kat said two friends went up to her to exclaim that my class last night was the best Ballroom class this term so far! *grin*

London Chants

In view of the up-coming IVDC 2006, a few members of the London team had been exchanging ideas on chants we should use in support of London dancers on the floor. Here are some of the more hilarious ones:

(Who let the dogs out - Baha men)
ULU let the dogs out
Woof, woof, woof
ULU let the dogs out
Woof, woof, woof


(Tubthumping - Chumbawumba)
We'll be singing, when we're winning...

We get knocked out, but we get on again
Judges never keep us down
We get knocked out, but we get on again
Judges never keep us down
We get knocked out, but we get on again
Judges never keep us down

Dancing the night away
Dancing the night away

We drink a whisky drink
We drink a vodka drink
We drink a larger drink
We drink a cider drink
We dance cha to remind us of the good times
We dance waltz to remind us of the better times

"Oh Alison, shoot Cambridge, with your gun..."

We get knocked out, but we get on again
Judges never keep us down
We get knocked out, but we get on again
Judges never keep us down
We get knocked out, but we get on again
Judges never keep us down

We drink a whisky drink
We drink a vodka drink
We drink a larger drink
We drink a cider drink
We dance jive to remind us of the good times
We dance tango to remind us of the better times

"Don't cry for IC, Oxford's gay'er...."


(Don't Cha - Pussycat Dolls)
We know we're ULU (I know we're ULU)
We know you do (I know you do)
That's why whenever we dance around
We're all over you (ULU all over you)
We know you fear us (I know you fear us)
It's easy to see (it's easy to see)
And in the back of you mind
We know you should be on our team

Don't cha wish your partner was hot like me?
Don't cha wish your partner could jive like me?
Don't cha
Don't cha
Don't cha wish your partner could waltz like me?
Don't cha wish your partner could cha like me?
Don't cha
Don't cha