Springville World Folk Dance Festival

I'm getting way behind again in my posts, sorry, but things have been pretty crazy. I will try to catch up. My mom took me and Bailey to the dance fest in Springville at the beginning of August. I had been there years ago as a kid. It was pretty fun and the weather was really nice, which was great because it was outside. Also, surprisingly, we got zero bug bites. We saw several countries perform which was especially neat seeing as we never even had to leave the state to experience so much culture. Most of the performers were really cool, with just a few exceptions, which I will explain in my picture captions.

We did miss one country when we didn't return from intermission in time. Bailey had her heart set on buying a Spanish fan from a vendor with her own money and we ended up having to wait behind a lady with a special order of just about 10 of everything and she wanted each similar item to be different (did that sound like an oxymoron?). For example... she wanted 10 fans, but they all had to be different so the guy had to sort through all of them. When we finally got Bailey's fan and headed back to our seats my mom was already there and told us we had missed some cool dancing from one particular country ( I can't remember which one?). She said they did some really neat acrobatic dancing and tumbling. By the time we got there, they were ending their performance with their rendition of "God Bless America", which I could have heard sung just about anywhere. Oh, well, Bailey has a really cool "Spanish" fan; I actually think it was probably made in China. The vendors were suspicioulsy not native and of mixed ethnicity, they were also selling several items from "different" countries. My mom got Bailey a cool magnetic bracelet that benefits some poor indigenous people somewhere and a purse from China (I thought all purses were made in China). My mom also was nice enough to get me some new poi balls (can't remember the spelling). I really was hoping they might be selling some since my old ones from BYU-HI had long since been ruined. We also shared a yummy scone with honey butter-yum!

Anyway, we had a really fun time and I know Bailey had a blast, so thanks Mom/Grandma! If we are still around and actually have employment and a house again, I think it would be really cool to host a dancer during the festival. They all stay with host families while they are here. I've always wanted to do that. It's nice, too because it's a short term committment, not like a foreign exchange student who would be living with you for a year. In this case, it's only for a week or two, long enough to get some culture and not get sick of hosting someone.

Well, enjoy my pictures, even though some of them are not so hot. I need a better camera. Also, this guy sitting 2 rows in front of us was big and had a huge head. I usually was able to get around him with my camera, but unfortunately I couldn't see when it came time for the fire knife dance and I have a lovely shot of his big, fat head. On the other hand, he had this really cute daughter who couldn't have been older than Emery. They were Asian and I think they were there with the China group, because she knew all of their dance moves. It was really funny watching this tiny, maybe 2 yr. old stand on her chair and immitate all the dance moves along with the people on stage. She was pretty good, too. She would do other dances as well, but she knew all the Chinese dance moves almost flawlessly. I wish I would have gotten a picture of her.
Samoan Fire Knife Dance with the big, fat head in the way. You can kind of see he is laying on his back holding the fire on his feet. Pretty impressive, especially considering the dancer was only 13 years old.

More fire knife dancing and big, fat head.

New Zealand Poi Ball dancing. She's dancing with the short pois, the ones I got are long.

I believe this dance is from Tahiti. I wish I could have got a picture of this Polynesian dance troup's women Tahitian dancers, but they were surprisingly scantily clad for a Utah dance group. They were really impressive in shaking their hips, but they were wearing next to nothing. Some times I wondered if they'd shake their costumes right off. The picture would also have been still, so it would probably have just looked like soft porn, so I passed on taking a photo. I'm pretty sure I saw a staff member from my OBGYN up there shaking it, or at least she looked really familiar, hard to tell though since again, not much in the way of being clothed. Side note: It's funny because everyone thinks the fast Polynesian dancing with hips is Hawaiian, but it's actually Tahitian, Hawaiian is slow and graceful.

I believe this country was Hungary, but I'm not sure, I will have to double check and change it later if I'm wrong. This performance was my least favorite. They sang the whole time while they were dancing through about 3 dances. It sounded like a manic, monotone, screaching, with an occasional pitch change here or there. It was really agravating and started giving me a headache.

Native American Hoop Dance. The little boy behind him was really cute. He just stood there the whole time holding his hoop.

Another Native American Hoop Dancer. This guy was really weird and kept making weird faces the whole time he danced. I got the impression that he was a bit of a show off. After he was done he ended in some sort of summersault and splits and then got up, bowed, and pranced off the stage.

China: Dance of a Thousand Budhas

China: Dance of a Thousand Budhas

Korea: This group was made up entirely of children, which I thought was pretty cool. The kids were really cute, and also really talented.

Korea

Korea: Fan Dance

Mexico

Belgium?: Again, not sure exactly on the country. This was my second least favorite dance performance. They did like 3 or 4 dances, but they were exactly the same, except for they would change their flags. They would walk around on stage, usually in a circle and wave these huge flags around and occasionally toss them in the air. I'll admit, there was some pretty impressive air once in a while, but it got really old fast.

China