We Danced

We danced last night. At Z's school's family disco. There are 17 kids in the whole school, and we like the parents of all of them. Talking with them and dancing with them.

Z was there with his mum and it was an odd feeling for PJ and I to be off duty parents. But I must say, that when I saw Z eating all that chocolate at suppertime, I felt happy that he was going home with his mum and not us.

Can you guess which plate is ours??

Hope you are having a great weekend, too.

Tank Man Tango

Yesterday I received an email from my friend Trudy:

Your participation is welcome to this international memorial for Tiananmen Square, on the 20th anniversary: 4 June, 2009. It's an ephemeral memorial made of dancing bodies in homage to the lone man who stood up to the tanks. A dance routine has been choreographed based on the movements of this man. This commemorative dance will be known as Tank Man Tango, it will take place in dozens of cities around the world and will be streamed on the Internet.

This afternoon I joined a group of people gathered to do the Tank Man Tango. Here some of us are, posing for the photographer from the local paper. Kerry stands in the foreground, embodying the Goddess of Democracy, the 10 meter tall statue created by the Chinese students as part of the Tiananmen Square protests.

I live in a small peaceful town, faraway from places where democracy is not tolerated, where violence is the answer if you dare ask the question. I thought that I would go this afternoon, do the dance and come home to cook a nice hot dinner. But as I moved my body, and shook my arms in defiance, I thought: I stand for something.

I opened up the paper this morning and read about still more violence perpetrated against Indian students and now Chinese students too. I stand for these students. We all shook our plastic bags, imitating the man who stood bravely before the tanks 20 years ago. I stand for that man. I try to avoid buying anything packaged in plastic, so the irony of waving my toxic pompoms was not lost on me. I stand for what the plastics industry doesn't give a shit about.

We stomped out the movements of one person's dance of anger against his government. I stand for just one person. He swung his arms and stomped his opposition onto his rightful place to be free on his land. I stand for his freedom. I stand for his right. I stand for the rights of all people to stomp their dance on their own land. I stand for their dance. I stand for your dance. And I stand for the people who don't have hands to flail, who don't have bags, who don't have legs, who don't have land. I stand for the land.

Dancing in the Right Direction

I started an exciting new contract today and spent all day writing like a champion. I feel so invigorated and inspired after yesterday. For the second year in a row I volunteered at the local primary school for Art Attack day; just like sports day but for art, my sister Kate who also volunteered described it.

Just as it was last year, it was a great day of making, playing, dancing and singing. It was a great day but it was just one day. But why? Why is it that we still teach our kids the same things we learned and we learned the same things our parents learned? You'd think somewhere along the line we'd stop and think: Now hang on a second. We have fucked up the planet good and proper thinking this way, maybe it's time to teach our kids to think for themselves and to value what's vital, not what's going to get them a job in an economy that's sucking the world dry.

The other night in bed, PJ read me this passage from Derrick Jensen's A Language Older Than Words:

A primary purpose of school – and this is true for our culture's science and religion as well – is to lead us away from our own experience. The process of schooling does not give birth to human beings – as education should but never will so long as it springs from the collective consciousness of our culture – but instead it teaches us to value abstract rewards at the expense of our autonomy, curiosity, interior lives, and time.

Art Attack day is a step in the right direction, but it's still one step forward in a straight line, when maybe what it needs to be is a dance.

I Thee Red

This is the table we sat around last night to help our friends J and L celebrate their commitment to each other. They were married several months ago in New York and last night we hosted a party for some of their Australian friends and family.

Dinner for 10 then others joined us for cake and hours of dancing. A fabulous night! - If this hangover is anything to go by.

Shit

I am sore today, from shovelling shit at a nearby horse ranch for our compost, not from dancing last night.

Up here in these wintry hills, there has to be a damn good reason to go out, even on a Saturday night. Last night we had one: TZU playing nearby. We also had: a lesson in expectation.

It was raining but we left our jackets in the car, ordered drinks and chatted with the other locals who had left their cosy homes - we were all cocked, busting to dance.

The support act was good, but we wanted to pace ourselves.

TZU took to the stage and the dancefloor swarmed with locals shaking dust from their winter crooks, but for us, the music didn't get to where it needed to go. We left before they finished the set. 

My ears were ringing, but sleep found me, an easy target.

Hula-La

Because I grew up with three sisters and now live with two males, I often find myself wanting of female company.

A few months ago, PJ and I went round to visit our friend Mr O. His niece and a friend of hers were there dressed in grass skirts doing the hula. As soon as I saw the girls, I threw my shoes off and joined them, laughing and making up moves.

Which is how I came to be invited to teach a small group of 9 year-olds how to hula at a Hawaiian-themed birthday party this afternoon.

Of course these sorts of invitations come up everywhere, but they seem to happen more for me living in the country.

Although I declined payment, I left the party with several packages of organic soup, salad and cake, homemade by the birthday girl's father. 

I love living in a small community so much.

The Best Place to Dance

One of the things I like about this video, is that the guy who made it must have spent a portion of each day looking for the best place to dance. What a great way to evaluate the world!