It is a Zumba class community one could say although that is also a bit wrong since we do other stuff than Zumba, but most of it takes place in a Fitness centre and it is centered around an energetic and very skilled dance and fitness instructor called Lela.
Most of the people in this little community did not come to learn dancing originally they just came for fitness reasons, to lose weight or to get more fit but then some turn out to be cool dancers - and most of the people involved in this community developed an affinity for dancing and moving that goes beyond the fitness level. At the same time these people are "normal" people, not dance enthusiasts as such. This blend of "normal" people, who through time became skilled and subtle in their expression as "dancers", I encounter as something quite rare and unique. Sometimes I wish that I could bring forward some of the subtle and very personal expressions that these "dancers" manifest.
The situaton that I would like to tell about here takes place in a "Bounce dance class" Thursday the 5th January 2017. Lela is teaching and we do a dance to the Rihanna song "Pon de Replay" which was already a favourite track of mine. In front stands Lea, a wonderful tiny woman and close to her is a new woman whom I haven't seen before but who has some serious skills and a cool style, and then of course there is Lela. Seeing these three individuals next to each other, so different in style and look and each in their own way sublime, caused me to totally lose interest in my own dancing at that moment. I just moved around with the rest of the group only really focusing on watching them dance - a little piece of art going on.
After the class I managed to get a hold of the three woman and ask if I could make a video recording of them dancing this choreography to that track. I guess that they found my request a bit weird but I also guess that they are used to me being a bit weird in this artist like way and they accepted, so I got my video recording.
Now there is an extra layer to this story. Something that I did not realise until after the recording was done. Lea, the small woman who dances in the middle in white and who tends to steal your attention, at this moment has cancer. A few days before the recording she had been informed that the chemo she'd received had not had any inpact on the cancer and that she would have to undergo surgery. The beautiful perfomance she makes here is just even more impressive when understanding what she's going through.
