There's only less than a week to go before our show. This is actually my first official show as a scholar, and I'm actually excited. We've been rehearsing, practicing and polishing our dances, and I don't really mind all the late nights, even if I still have to go to work early in the morning.
Before we had to leave the Guico unit at the Grove during our outing a couple of weekends ago, Mommy Val had asked us to write about our core-giftedness and dreams, as it will be included in the show's souvenir program.
I got to read all of my fellow scholars write-ups when I was tasked to photocopy them for Ma'am Ying. I realized that I was still somewhat well-off compared to them, and I really should consider myself lucky and be grateful at that. I may not have a sob story to tell unlike some of them, but what was similar among all of us is our passion to dance, and that somehow this avenue gave all of us some direction in our lives, regardless of how young or old we all are.
I remember certain reasons why I decided to keep on pursuing ballroom dancing. I loved my work in theater as an assistant stage manager, yet I don't think I would want to cut it as an actual stage manager in a big production. And of course, there's also that feeling that I forget everything that I've been thinking and worrying about when I dance, even just for one hour a day. And yes, one of those trivial things that I shouldn't even be thinking about involved an old flame. So I then used dancing as a means of escape, until I eventually fell in love with it completely.
Anyway, let's go back to the present, shall we?
We were told to rehearse our 3-minute costume change on Friday evening's rehearsal, and because our first number was Bali Ha'i (the Polynesian hula dance), we needed to rehearse fixing our hair from wearing it down to putting it up in a bun. Because I was still growing out my super short hair, I was thinking of getting either extensions or a wig from Landmark. When I told this to Mommy Val, she offered to bring her extensions, but because it has a different hair coloring, she said that I might have to color my own hair. It's a big no-no for me because I don't want to color my hair while I'm growing it out. But thanks to Roan, she gave me a really great tip off.
So that was how I ended up at the toycon at the Megatrade hall, and got a really nice wig at a discounted price. Super thanks, Roan and Lynelle House of Hair Fashion!
Yesterday was a pretty long day. We were first divided into 2 groups during the morning. Some of the more tenured scholars were taken to Rockwell to be interviewed for the show by Miguel (one of Mommy Val's twin sons) and Kerstin, while the rest of us stayed in the studio to polish our dances. When we were all together in the afternoon, it took 2 trips to Treston College for our dress rehearsal that evening, as we also had to transport the wooden benches (for the sayaw sa bangko) and the bamboo poles (for the tinikling).
We were taken to the big holding area upon arrival, and once we all had settled in and the costumes were organized, we all picked out our respective places and started getting ready for the dress rehearsal. Thank goodness I came prepared with dance shorts, because our costumes for the Bali Ha'i number were simple wraparound pieces of cloth, so it was easy to take a peek even though the fabric was already pinned together.
Anyway, after we were dressed, most of the time was spent just camwhoring and such. Miguel and Kerstin were just there, taking photos and videos of us prepping up, practicing certain dances and stuff.
The dress rehearsal began a little past 8 in the evening, and we ran through the entire part 1 of the program with little adjustment. It's nice how we all easily managed to pull off the quick changes. We didn't take a break anymore in between the two parts of the program, and went straight to part 2. After our first couple of dance numbers, we all ended up changing costumes immediately until I had remembered that we weren't supposed to change costumes just yet, and reminded the others about it. Thank goodness Sir Brando just noted it and kept going. Maybe we'll rehearse it in the dress tech next Friday anyway. The cultural folk dances seemed a little more tricky, but I was pretty grateful that we had polished those dances earlier that day.
After the entire dress rehearsal was done, we got to eat our late dinner outside the venue, then headed back to the holding area to fix all of our stuff before we called it a day.
So this is will be my first official performance as a dancer, and it would be very nice if some of you guys would come watch.
The event is a fundraiser under Idance Foundation, called Step Up To Freedom. It will be on Saturday, June 22nd, at Treston International College in Bonifacio Global City, Taguig. Cocktails will be served at 4:30pm, show proper will begin at 6:00pm. If you're interested to buy tickets, just text me or leave me a message on my Facebook.
Hope to see you there!
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