August 2004
The month of August was packed with three major line dance competitions in consecutive weekends. Of these three, I participated in two: the One Day Equatorial Line Dance Championship and the Nestle Omega Plus Dance For Your Heart Fest in both the team and individual events.
14th August 2004
The championship consisted of two categories: the team category and the individual category. There was only one team category which meant it was an open division; as for the individual category, there were four divisions:
I was part of the team going into the team event, in which we had to do one dance choreography which was preselected by the organisers, and another of our own choreography. Since we were there, I thought that I might as well join the individual event, i.e. Open Amateur division to see how well I fared. Each individual division has two preselected dance choreographies which must be performed by each participant within that division.
Actually... truth be told, the only reason I joined the Open Amateur division was because one of the dances was the same as the one which I had to prepare for my Nestle competition. I figured that since I was already preparing for that competition which was only one week after this one, I might as well go in for both. I did not have that much confidence in my dancing to think that I would be able to win anything. If I had a choice, I would've signed up for the Open 16 years & above instead; the only thing stopping me was that I didn't know either of the dances in that division.
I think I surprised a lot of people that day. Those who have seen me at last year's Bangi competition were amazed at the improvement I had over the past year; a lot of people came up to me to say that I've improved so much. The person I surprised the most is... myself. Before the competition I was feeling a steady rise of panic from my stomach and was inwardly regretting my decision to sign up for the individual event. All very normal nervous feelings, of course. However I was just so happy when I made it into the finals... I was expecting to get 5th or 6th at most.
And I got SECOND placing!!!
To top off the happiness, my team won FIRST place!!!
Other noteworthy news: My coach Bronya tied for first place in the Open Advanced & Professional division, and my teammate Yvonne won first place for Open 45 years & above.
21st August 2004
Having won a friendly competition last year with a dance of their own choreography, the Rhinestone Cowgirls decided to see how their choreography ranks in a national-level competition by bringing it into the Nestle Omega Plus Dance For Your Heart Fest. In this tournament, everyone went straight to semi-finals due to the lack of participation, which was held on the 3rd of July at Kompleks 3K in Subang Jaya.In the semi-finals, all the teams made it through to the finals; as for the individual events, a total of 10 per age division were selected to enter the finals. The team and individual events are divided into four divisions by age:
For the team events, each team had to bring in one dance choreography of their own choice; for the individual events, each division had two preselected dances which must be performed by the participants in the respective divisions.
For the finals, the Rhinestone Cowgirls chose to do a different dance from the one they did in the semi-finals, and had only under seven weeks to prepare it; and this was on top of all other competitions they had to prepare for. In spite of that, the Cowgirls still emerged champions of the Team Youth division... plus the added bonus of getting the Top Performer in Semi-Finals (Team Youth) award!
As for the individual events, only I participated in the finals. Tiffany had also made it but pulled out due to personal reasons.
Anyway, I had really exhausted myself from the previous week and my body hadn't fully recovered; plus I had many late nights the same week AND the very morning of this competition I had to work. I had my own self-imposed pressure as I knew that there some in the audience who had seen me in the Equatorial competition and would expect me to perform just as well, if not better. Plus, the competition was full of excellent dancers who I thought I could never hope to match; I saw them during the Semi-Finals, and quite frankly, they scared me.
The moment I started my first dance, I knew I was in bad shape. The moment I stepped off the dance floor I was almost in tears knowing that I had done a horrible job; and this was a dance I had learnt since the beginning of the year although obviously I hadn't practised enough lately.
Fortunately there was a break between my first dance and the second; so in between I was stuffing myself with ginseng and vitamin B complex to try to pump myself up with energy, and it took Helen to calm me down. My teammates were also very supportive of me, with Hui Koon taking me out of the noisy hall to the quiet lobby to get my nerves calmed down.
People said I did better in my second dance; personally I thought I botched it up as well. The second dance was the same dance as the one I did in the Equatorial competition. When it was over, I was so happy... after this was the team event, and I'm glad to say I did much better in it (as can be seen from our champion title!). I had given up my individual event as a lost cause, but I didn't want to bring my team down.
Dinner took place after all the dance events, and I was happily stuffing myself with the limited amount of food prepared by the hotel (you'd expect more for RM70 per person which even the participants had to pay), and it was as I was biting through a tiny fruit tart that I heard my name called over the PA. I literally dropped the tart and ran to the emcee stand to clarify the announcement; it turned out that I had tied for a placing with another competitor, and they wanted us to dance again as a rematch!
"What, NOW?!" I asked.
"Yes" was his reply.
"I can't dance now! I've just eaten!"
Fortunately right at that moment Bronya (my coach) came up and so did the other girl, Vivian Khoo. Vivian also said that she's just eaten her fill and there's no way she could dance immediately. Bronya then told the emcee that they had to give the two of us time to digest and get warmed up.
"Is 10 minutes ok?" he asked.
"Obviously not! They need half an hour at least."
"But the prize-giving is supposed to be in 15 minutes. Unless we delay the prize-giving..."
"Yes, you have no choice."
Thank goodness for such a strong voice like Bronya. Otherwise I might be in the hospital until today being treated for appendicitis.
I couldn't help thinking, "Dammit, here I was enjoying myself thinking all that pressure is over, and now I've got to get stressed up all over again" but Catherine kept reminding me, "This is a positive thing!"
Anyway we were given 30 minutes to prepare ourselves before the rematch. My teammates said I did much better this time; my moves were sharper and more controlled. But the other girl was really good too. I think it was a really, really close fight.
After that, it was only the results which I was waiting for. We hadn't known what placing we were tied for, the emcee didn't announce. I kept saying that I'm probably tied for third placing (meaning the rematch is for 3rd and 4th placing) because I'm not good enough but everyone of course shushed me.
And the result was .... the girl I rematched with got THIRD placing! I had won the rematch!
So that's my big news for the moment. I didn't get first but I sure did better than I personally expected. I'm still not sure I deserved a placing at all. But then, I've always underestimated my own abilities :)
To sum it up, in both these big tournaments... my teams are the CHAMPIONS, and I got second place!
|
Read more about the major competitions participated by the Wild West Babes and its members at our website.
Take a look at some of the photos taken during the competition! |