fandomhigh | Dance 1, Period 5 Thursday

The first thing the students would see upon entering the dance studio was the row of mirrors facing them and the hardwood floor.

The second, and very out of place thing, they would have seen was the black-clad man to their side standing next to a guitar case. As they passed, he indicated that they should take a syllabus from the small table next to them and sit down.

"Buenos dias. Welcome to Dance. If you absolutely must know, the name the school has me under is," he grimaced, "El Mariachi. El for short. But that is all rather irrelevant as, to you, I am Professor."

He popped his neck. "Alright then, let's begin."

"Dance has been a part of human culture since before history. So long as there has been music, there have been people who danced to it. There is something, primal, raw, and sexual in dance, yet at the same time, it is something graceful, refined, and poised. Like most arts, dance is everything at once.

Some of the dances on the list you have in front of you require partners. Some do not. This leaves us with something of a problem, as we have a gender imbalance here. We have seven women and two men. Obviously not enough. Now, Miss Santos will be my partner in all class demonstrations, as she is the TA. And both of us will be on hand to help someone of the opposite gender if necessary, but you will have to share partners to practice. For tests, I have arranged for an extra male partner or two.

If you have any questions, or indeed, any suggestions on how this problem could be handled, please feel free to tell me.

Now, let's start with introductions. Tell me who you are, where you are from, and why you are taking this class.

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All Collapsey like.

And remember that only El is cool enough to not have a name. Well, except for V. And Yondaime. And technically, Darth Vader is a title...

"Now, a question for all of you, and feel free to discuss this. What, to you, is dance? What does it mean? Why is it important still?"

With a sudden movement, El dived into the guitar case, and pulled out a black guitar, which he plugged into the amplifier behind him.

"Alright then! Now, an important part of this class. I have been told that some people are embaressed to dance in public. If I am going to teach you, you must be absolutely fearless of dancing, no matter what your skill! So, if you please, come up and dance for me. It doesn't matter what you do, it doesn't matter how you do it or how good you think it is. You can even grab a partner if it makes you feel better."

And with that, he started to play a fast, lively, latin guitar tune.

I don't have an OOC icon for El yet.

What would make a good OOC icon for El?

Armand from IWTV? The original Mariachi? Tony in Spy Kids?

Pippi Longstocking

I thought it was going to be the terrible mustache from spy kids?

Walter Dornez

"I'm Pippi Longstocking. I'm from the open sea. I'm taking this class because I love to dance. I taught myself the Schottche, and Walter taught me to Jitterbug. I think it's more fun to learn a dance from somebody else then teach yourself."

"People laugh or cry when they feel something so strongly, it bubbles out. Dance is like that, only more so. People try to standardize it or regulate it, but it's not the sort of thing that can really be contained. Sooner or later it's just gonna burst. It's... inbred."

"I'm Walter Dornez. I'm from London about sixty years ago. I'm taking this class because my employer signed me up, but Nadia pointed out that it's good exercise and good for flexibility and coordination, so I'll say that's why he signed me up."

Walter thought about what he did when he used his wires and nodded to himself. "Dance is what you do when you let your body move to some rhythm. It doesn't matter if there's music or not.

"What it means depends upon the context. In here it's not going to mean the same thing as it might in private with just the radio and a single partner, or fighting, or dancing in the rain on the roof.

"I'm not sure why it's important, but I know I enjoy it and most of my friends enjoy it, and that's good enough."

Nadia Santos

"I'm Nadia Santos, from Buenos Aires, Argentina, and I've been dancing since I was about five years old. In my community, if you didn't know how to tango . . . you were just about the biggest nerd alive. So it's a good thing it's also very fun."

"Dance is expression. It's an art, like painting, or poetry, or music, it just uses your body instead of paint, or words, or notes. There are structured dances, for . . . showing off, which are like sonnets or portraits or songs, but you could also . . . make it up as you go along. Both have their place.

"Dance is important for the same reason that any art is important. By using a creative, social manner of expression, even if you're not sharing it, you give yourself an outlet for things you can't, or don't want to express in other ways. A man who is jealous of his ex-wife's new lover might work out that jealousy by presenting a ballet in which the scorned lover wins the woman back or kills his competition. He's not going to do that in real life, but by presenting it in another form, he can feel better and move on."

Nadia stood and looked around, for anyone who might need encouragement to be dragged up and start dancing.

River Tam

Pippi jumps up that looks like a cross between belly dancing and doing the jitterbug with herself.

"I'm River Tam. I'm from the future. I love dancing. And I took dancing lessons as a child, although perhaps not dances widely known here."

River nodded to that. "The form is just to give it a shape and structure and make it stronger."

River had no problem whatsoever dancing in public. In fact she really enjoyed it. She caught the rhythm quickly and began to move her feet quickly, her boots making noises when they hit the floor.

Walter looked quite dubious at the idea of dancing by himself for an audience and tilted his head inquiringly toward Nadia.

Lana Lang

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Dance 1, Period 5 Thursday

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