It Was A Success

The talent show was yesterday. It was a long, grueling day but it was awesome. The students performed well and we didn't forget any steps in our dance (the teachers). That's right folks, I danced in front of people. The only thing that happened was that Agatha's stick broke during the dance but she was a trooper and didn't even hestitate! She was the 'hero of the dance'.

I was stressing out about the whole talent show thing for weeks. The kids practiced but some didn't seem to take things very seriously. It seemed that the organization was all over the place. One of the students here has a medical condition that causes her to faint and we had to work with her on arranging what to do if she fainted during the show. Then one of the students got sick and we had to cancel his act. The day before the show another student came to us and said that she had an exam in Kandy in the morning and she didn't know if she would be able to make it for the show! It was crazy! Even when we were practicing our dance, we werent' able to do it properly. It felt like nothing was going to work out.

The organization did pull together and we had everything that we needed for the show. The sound guy was awesome. The lighting worked and the curtain even got fixed! The student with the medical condition didn't faint and the student with the exam was able to make it back in time and everything worked out well.

Now what I learned from all of this is that I was looking at things from my North American point of view which tells me that if you are going to put on a performance everything must be perfect or at least close to it. If the performers are ok but not great then they are cut from the show. Everything must be planned down to the "t". It's all about the performance. Here I began to realize that it wasn't so much about the quality of the performance but about the chance to get together and enjoy being there. It didnt' matter that some of the notes were flat or that dancers messed up there steps or even that the stick broke at the beginning of the stick dance, it's about doing things together. It's about people not performance.

Everyone who came thuroughly enjoyed themselves as did the students and the teachers.

SIDE NOTE:
I will be in possession of a video of the Talent Show when I return to Canada for those who would like to see either the whole thing or even just the proof that I danced with sticks infront of people.