From Shanghai to Beijing...
I taught dance workshops on Thursday evening, and spent most of the day in the studio preparing for them. I slept extremely well at the end of that night. I'd say that the only downside to the day is that there wasn't much time to eat.
The first class was a group semi-private session for the more intermediate dancers in Shanghai. I was planning on doing plenty of technique with them, but through exercises and figures. To my surprise, they were fine with (and asking for) pure technique. What? Yes. A dance instructor's dream: a group interested in technique. And because of the small class size (6 dancers in total), I had a chance to work with each person individually. It was a lot of fun for me, and I think they all got something out of it, too.
The second lesson was a larger (and longer) workshop on the Big Apple choreography (Whitey's version). Whew, was that exhausting. But it was great fun, and by the end of the class, the students felt quite comfortable making fun of how much I say, "cool."
I had a great time teaching, got plenty of positive feedback from the students, and am looking forward to meeting them again some day. Thanks to Orchid for organizing; a special thanks to Nick Cruse, without whom, I'd have spent even more of my time in Shanghai deciphering fuzzy black-and-white video; and big love and thanks to Fred, who is always there for me.
Friday was a travel day (Shanghai to Beijing), but I managed to enjoy a little more of Shanghai in the morning and early afternoon. Gurie and I started our day at a hair salon. For a fashionable looking place, I was surprised to see the priciest wash-cut-blow combination at 120 RMB (~$15). A tall Chinese man with broad shoulders and diesel jeans spent over an hour on my hair: he cut it wet, dried it, cut it dry, then made sure all the layers would fall in the right place. Absolutely no tip required or accepted. Strange, but true. ... I really wanted to tip him; he did a great job, but Gurie told me it wasn't the way things were done here.
After the salon, we walked a few doors down to have a full-body blind massage. I was somewhat sore from the dance workshops (especially my calves), so some of it hurt a little, but by the end of the hour, I was sleepy (in a good way). By the way, it was 35 RMB for 50 minutes (~$4.37).
Feeling relaxed and stylish, we did a sweep of the neighborhood shops for bags, shirts, and accessories before heading home to do some last-minute packing. Then it was off to the Pudong International Airport for me. In keeping with the theme of this trip, my flight had a delayed take-off, and therefore, a late arrival. Though I was supposed to arrive slightly before Christine (who was taking a long weekend off from her work in Hong Kong to join me in Beijing), I arrived to find Suerie (sister #2) and Christine waiting for me together.
