When You Found Yourself Dancing

I dunno how to start this but April 2013 was so damn exciting. I started the month in Makassar, found myself at the airport on 3 AM. I really had no passion to go school and to study properly, simply just because I was too busy of thinkin of many other things.

When I came back to school after the Easter getaway, I normally would sleep much or blabbering bunch of nonsense to Metta. I kept thinking about the trip to Manila (which wasn't so much fun) or managing few bucks left in my wallet. This wasn't going for long until my accounting teacher told me that she wanted us (Metta and I) to join a traditional dance competition in an annual event called FL2SN. I'm familiar with the event but I never imagined that I would be one of the participants, not until the day I finally dressed up as a dancer. I grew up by believing that I was talented in Math and English, especially for giving speech. I have no hesitation to join any speech contest, even if you contacted me like exactly a day before the deadline. But for this case, everything was just strange and new for me.

We had exactly 2 weeks to prepare ourselves. That time, we didn't even have a concept nor know what we gonna dance. We contacted our teacher in Sanggar and yeah, we trained hard like 4 days a week. That was super tiring but fun. I didn't lose weigh but people told that I look thinner. Good. 

This dance thingy made me doubt my decision to go to Manila. I intended to cancel the trip in order to have more days of practice (teacher told that the competition would be on April 20 and my Manila trip was on April 14-17). I finally left the country with so much thoughts and kept thinkin how I would finally make this worth.

Glad I decided to take the risk and off to Manila because... The competition was postponed. It was just crazy because we only figured it a day before the scheduled time. I was so unconvinced about the dance that I would perform so I decided to ask my friend at the other school about the competition. She told me that the date had changed into April 30. My teacher was so completely blank about the schedule change so when I asked her about the rumor she was like, "Oh really? I didn't know that nor the committee send notification about that. Are you sure? Why on earth I didn't know that then?"

Later it turned out that I was true. Thank God. I was super glad that I started talking crap to Metta, keep saying that I was super duper happy.

Shortly, we got more time to prepare. I contacted my private dance coach and we decided to change concept totally. So we're now set off with Tari Asmarana, a modern Jaipong dance, influenced with Middle East taste and music. So yeah, expect a lot of sexy and sensual moves hahahaha.

Performing Tari Asmarana at school - April 27

Realizing that we hadn't contact the dance teacher in our school, I told Metta that we should really ask her advice in term of respecting her and maximizing our performance, although the teacher is not a Jaipong dancer but a Javanese dancer. Pure classic Javanese dancer. It was a good decision because we got a lot of good inputs from her and we also had more chances to practice under her eyes. Metta and I have a bad habit of not doing the total moves when no teacher is watching us. It's not an excuse but to dance is really tiring, y'know. Especially those Jaipong dances in Getar Pakuan style.

Actually teachers didn't know that Metta and I could dance. Yes. Nobody except our homeroom teacher and our accounting teacher because she once discussed dance thingy with us during CCA. So when the school's dance teacher monitored us during practice, she offered us to perform at school's annual event for teacher and staff. We easily said yes without much of consideration. But later, we realized that we didn't have a belt, appropriate fan and right costume. Hahaha, that's just my habit. Confirm first before thinking.

However, we performed well. Still far from good and a lot of issues to fix but we had the confidence that we could just do it. We got a lot of good responses from the teachers. I mean, they were surprised that we're not a kind of students who just sit back, talk and walk together everywhere then gossiping people. Nope. Our friendship is actually based on a very unique mutualism in many things, including our mutual interest in traditional dance.

FL2SN Kota Bogor - April 20, 2013

Finally the day came. April 30.
We came to school on 5.30 AM to get ready in costumes and make up. Another big issue was we had no chance to do fitting. Sounds crazy, yeah. I was super worried about the size matter that I tried hard to control my appetite toward junk foods just few days before it. It worked tho, I fitted into the costume! Yay!

Tho I know from the start that it would be really hard to win, even with those positive attitudes, crazy training, countless prayers and supports, still I was so touched with the effort of people who helped us. First shoutout dedicated to our dance coach, three of them. Second is for our teachers and friends at school who gave us priceless input and full support. It was so nice to have a very nice and inspiring principal that would actually drive and accompany us to the venue. I've participated with a lot of competitions since kindergarten and usually the principal would only give orders and words of encouragement but Bu Ari is different. Not to mention that I love her very much since the first day of school.

I danced without hesitation in the front of the judge. Hey, we got nothing to lose. Bu Ari said that we performed well and we deserved to win. She also said that we looked really nice and our costume was pretty. But competition is a competition where not every participants could be chosen as winners. We didn't manage to be one of the top three out of ten participants. Yes, we should be disappointed. Maybe we didn't practice hard enough or maybe we just don't have the talent. Whatever because strangely I didn't feel any dissatisfaction. Like I said from the start, I dance because I love it. I'm enjoying myself during the process. I'm not a dancer, I'm just trying to have fun in a positive and serious manner.

They said that everything happens for a reason and you gotta take a lesson from it. Nah, let me tell you the best and the worst part of it.

The best moment was when I met a lot of good old friends at the venue. I love meeting new people but I never want to forget each of person that I know. It hurts to say "Once we were friend" and no, I'm not going to say that to anyone.

Eventho it was kinda embarassing to meet Tyas in dance costume, one of my very bestfriend, I glad that we met up on her birthday. I always love to see Tyas in dance costume and I personally titled her as the best traditional dancer with wide variety of dances that she master. It's a bit strange that now I also dance, following her steps.

I also met two good friends from Student Exchange 2010, Prilli and Jovan. They were still as fun as before and we had a good talk. I managed to take pic with everyone, including my two handsome friends, Adhi Permana (can't just put him as Adhi because he got a stage name now) and Alphar. Both are future star. Especially Adhi, who is now having a rising popularity in singing after XFactor.

I took picture with winners too! Yay!
Farah, the one in purple blouse, is the first winner of the singing competition in the same event and she was the coordinator of my vocal group for Pagelaran 2010. Kinda amazing to meet a person who once worked with you before and knowing that she now stepping on the big stone. The one with batik uniform is Afu, my all-time-favorite alayers. OMG, her craziness and uniqueness are just countless. She's always gossiping everywhere but she maintains her original personality. This time, she won in composing poetry. Her dramatic and overrated personality do help, obviously.

Now for the worst moment. No, it is not the training time.

After I undo my hair from sanggul and cemara

I gotta say the worst moment is when you have to undo your hair and erase your make up. It's never easy to completely erase eyeliner and lashes glue. Worse to mention the stiff hair that you got due to hairspray effect. Not to mention my current worry about hair loss.

some crazy shot because I thought it was... weird

So to wrap up this...
I can't stop thanking everyone who gave us trust, support and chance but it's still unbelievable that I get to step in a real stage by doing my hobby. I thought I was the kind of freak student who can only sleep or enthusiastically answer every question when awake from my seat.

Keep dancing like nobody's watching.