We stayed at 40 Winks which were service apartments. They were incredibly luxurious. There were 14 of us at the 40 Winks so we all bonded quickly taking the shuttle to and from the congress hotel. On a side note, I think it was a really smart idea to keep all the international guest instructors at this separate venue. We were really well taken care of with beautiful accommodations and butler service, but because they were in charge of handling the shuttle for us, it assured that we would be at the event all day for the workshops and on time for the shows and dancing in the evening. We were all exhausted, but no one complained because we were so well taken care of. The hotel provided wonderful complimentary room service and the promoter, Lourd Vijay, provided delicious all-you-can-eat lunch and dinner at the hotel. When we arrived on Friday evening, we had just enough time to get some dinner and get dressed for the evening shows and party. The Friday night shows were fun and showcased lots of the local student teams around India. Afterwards we had dinner, joined in on the dancing, and then came the biggest surprise. The event ended at 11:30PM!! It was actually a welcome shock since we were all suffering from a little jet lag and were ready for a bed. Jon, Kris, and I hadn’t seen a bed since Tuesday night and it was Friday night (well, Thursday afternoon in California).
After getting a little sleep on Friday night we were up bright and early to head out to the teach the first workshop of the day, “Power Shines.” Giju taught us the shines choreography in the congress hotel lobby the night before while waiting for our shuttle and modified it in the morning in the lounge area of our service apartments. As usual, Giju was concerned that they would be too easy and not enough material. And, as usual, the attendees found the footwork super challenging, but super fun! We had a good turnout and after we finished, Giju and Kris were surrounded by tons of people video-taping their demonstration. The video below is their demonstration with music and you can see all the people behind them recording with their cameras.
After our workshop, Arieh gave a wonderful workshop on body movement. After his performance that closed the show on Friday night and two really successful workshops, he's becoming quite the celebrity here in India. You should see everyone lining up to get their
photo taken with him and ask for his autograph!We spent the rest of the day in workshops and tech rehearsal. Jon and I were very frustrated and nervous at tech because the floor was terrible.
In our routine, there is a turn pattern that’s tough enough on a great floor. The performance floor was wood panels covered in a cover that was strange but not terribly sticky to spin on. The scary part was that the two floor boards that we were dancing on bounced up and down in opposition so there was always a big crack to trip on and the bouncing made it really challenging to spin quickly. We told the crew about it and they were incredibly responsive and had it fixed much better by the time we got back for the performances.After a long day of workshops and tech rehearsal, we got back to our rooms with about an hour and a half to shower and get ready for our performance. We had a couple of little mistakes, but, overall, the performance went pretty well. I also really appreciated one of the festival sponsors in particular… the Red Bull girls! The long day combined with some residual jet lag made the Red Bull seem like heaven in a can.
After the performances we were treated to a nice dinner at the hotel restaurant that lasted until 11:00PM, which we sadly did not realize. We were just enjoying the food and the company and didn’t keep track of the time. By the time we finally got into the real dancing party, there were only around 5 songs left in the night. Promptly at 11:30PM, the police came in and shut it down. It’s pretty amazing. It’s actually illegal to dance in places where alcohol is served here. In order to have dancing, alcohol cannot be served or consumed in the same place where the dancing is. If anyone wants to drink, they have to go to the hotel bar and stay there. It makes for really fun dancing since people aren’t being crazy drunk all over the dance floor. Also, the floor was pretty sticky on Friday night so on Saturday night they poured a powder (similar to baby powder but finer) all over the floor. It was a little like dancing on an ice rink. Lots of people didn’t like it, but I was in heaven.
After the dancing was over it was still fairly early in the evening so we hung out together in one of the rooms back at our service apartments. Like an idiot, I forgot to bring my camera back for the performance so, unfortunately, there aren’t any pictures from Saturday night at the event, but there are a few funny ones in our PJs hanging out back at the rooms. We stayed up laughing, talking, and dancing until the wee hours of the morning. Knzo, an incredible dancer from Paris, even gave Kris, Jon, and I a private hip hop lesson since we couldn’t attend his workshop the next day because ours was scheduled at the same time.
We were given the option to sleep in some on Sunday, but I couldn’t really sleep in so I went to the first workshop on ladies’ styling by Diana, a belly, cabaret, and salsa dancer extraordinaire. It was well worth the lack of sleep! I’ve never attended so many workshops and enjoyed them so much as I did on Sunday. Juan Matos, from New York, showed us an incredible body work pattern and, after lunch, his partner, Candie, taught some beautiful ladies styling with Bob Fosse flare.
After Candie's workshop, Giju & Kris ran a workshop on complicated turn patterns. And when I say "complicated", I mean CRAZY complicated
for the attendees. It was a great challenge and the attendees really enjoyed learning something so new and impressive. ...And Giju was worried it would be to easy! Jon, Elena, and I helped out and got to meet lots of new people.
After the workshops we went back to our service apartments relaxed, ate dinner, showered, and got ready for a whopping 3 hours (definitely appreciated!). They sent a later shuttle for us and we still got front row seats to the evening performances. The shows were absolutely amazing! There was a huge variety of hip hop, Bollywood, cha cha, flamenco, belly dancing, contemporary, and, of course, salsa dancing across the three nights. The big highlights from Sunday night for me were an incredible cha cha from a World Championship finalist couple, Anne & Aniche, from Germany and an elegant yet humorous routine by Juan Matos and Candy to close the show.After their performance, Lourd had all the instructors and his students come up on stage to show his
gratitude and gave each of us a framed flyer to remember the event. We spent a good amount of time taking pictures of all our new friends, which you can find on my picasa page.
Some of the people that really made an impression for being so nice, fun, and genuinely friendly were Lourd (of course), a group from Thailand (yeah, represent!), a promoter from Hong Kong (hilarious & quite the dancer), Kaytee & Ash from Mumbai (some of the most fun I’ve ever 
had goofing on the dance floor), Knzo from Paris (such a diverse talent and constantly dancing), and the Sambaleza girls: Helen, Sue, and Tina (so sweet and friendly and seriously sexy on the stage) from Brisbane, Australia. It truly was an international experience! We danced a ton (since we didn’t do dinner after the shows) and I was just completely drenched with sweat. With the storming rain outside, the humidity was ridiculous. The floor was covered with even more powder and actually got even to slippery for me (which never happens) so I spent most of the night dancing on the carpet, which was actually just about perfect for my taste. It had plenty of the powder spilled over from the floor too so it was also pretty slick. 
After the dancing ended (again at 11:30), Lourd invited a group of us up to his room for an after party, which was fun, but super crowded. 
Lourd gave a nice little speech of gratitude and we enjoyed a nice conversation with Aniche from Germany. After we left Lourd’s a bunch of people (including Lourd) migrated over for an after after party back at our place where we danced, chatted, and partied until the wee hours of the morning. Some people didn’t even go to bed because a huge group of people actually left for a salsa cruise at 5:00AM. They’re such troopers! Lourd went on the cruise (I think he organized it) so Kris, Elena, and I will be staying in his room when we stay at his place this week.
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