8.7. we're all a part of something bigger

It was one of the last Java Jives of the year, in the Library at Ida Noyes. During a song that we were both sitting out, Link sat down next to me, took a drink of water, and said,

"So have I asked you what you're doing for the summer yet?"

I laughed, and shrugged. "You probably have - I've been talking to a lot of people about it. I'm going to be in Beijing this whole summer." His eyes suddenly lit up.

"Wait, did I tell you that I'm going to be there?" "... No! You definitely didn't ask me, in that case!"

It was one of the more exciting realizations that we could go swing dancing together. Which I was glad about - a summer without swing dancing was something I hadn't experienced since sophomore year of high school. And a friend to go dancing with was even cooler. So naturally, after I got back from summer camp, high up on my list was heading to swing dancing with Link. We met up at Wangfujing, and got dinner at the food court in the Oriental Plaza before heading to the CD Jazz Café. We almost overshot it, and then I saw it out of the corner of my eye.

It was overall, a very interesting time. The first thing you have to wonder about is what they were thinking when they named the place. CD Jazz Café? Just say it out loud.

I mean, imagine telling a friend, "Hey, I'm heading out to that CD Jazz Café tonight!" That'll get a double-take.

We had intended to get there early and take a lesson, and then leave before the dancing was over because the subway closes wicked early in Beijing. Like, we're talking 11:30 p.m., in a city of a bajillion people? Anyway, we were in luck because the lesson happened to be free that night, and Link and I both practiced leading. Which was awesome. The dance itself wasn't all that stimulating - there were only a few people who did lindy hop really well, and Link and I liked dancing with each other better. After a while, we got beers from the American-Italian restaurant next door, and sat watching Adam's birthday dance - fun because he can both lead and follow! We ended up leaving early to take the subway home, but we'll probably go dancing again when I get back to Beijing next week.

The lesson in itself was quite interesting, because it wasn't East Coast, but lindy hop.

The one-hour beginner lindy hop lesson is an art form of sorts, I think. How do you concisely and clearly set the basics for the most intricate and interesting form of swing dancing in just an hour? To master the eight-step pattern and understand the push-and-pull dynamic of the swingout takes good connection, a basic understanding of rhythm, close attention, but also, a lot of time. So I was very interested in seeing how Adam, who was conducting the lesson, intended to teach lindy hop to a roomful of beginners in an hour.

Turns out that he didn't teach the lindy swingout as much as the lindy circle. He started off by gradually easing people into the step-step-triple-step rhythm, and then put the footwork into the lindy circle. Beginning with the back step, and then a triple-step, step-step, triple-step, back step. By the end of the lesson, people were pretty at ease with turning gradually. As Link found out while we were dancing, however, switching to the basic swing-out, which is the base for nearly all the turns, twists, etc. one can throw into lindy hop, ended up being a problem, as they hadn't encountered the steps of the eight-beat pattern. Le sigh. And I didn't agree with Adam on a few points of lindy hop doctrine - I gave Link an exasperated look when Adam briefly addressed the hand connection. He said that when the follow's hand drops, so should the lead's. Which is completely wrong, says me and science. In closed position during the swing-out, or the lindy circle, the lead's hand is slightly cupped upwards, towards the lead's body. The follow's hand rests on it, and the lead's hand bears the weight of the follow's hand, so that when the lead's hand falls away, so does the follow's, because the latter hand is resting on the former. So does it make sense that if the hand on top is removed, the hand on the bottom drops as well? Physics, the last time I checked, disagrees. And something that irked me a little more - yes, there are three points of connection, between the lead's right half and the follow's left half, but he barely mentioned the hand connection between the lead's left hand and the follow's right hand. Just because that connection is prone to be misused, when the lead is a beginner, doesn't mean it should be simply disregarded.

Following and leading lindy hop are like two parts of a conversation - a good lead is like a good speaker, who knows how to articulate just what he wants through his movements, and makes his mind clear to the follow. Similarly, a good follow is like a good listener, who picks up on any and all hints in the body language of the lead. And when the conversation goes well, so does the dance. So the lead must be aware at all times of what he's saying, and what it means to the follow, since the follow relies on all signals from the lead, regardless of where their connections are, to make a decision on what move to make next. If an important connection like the hand is neglected, it's like not knowing the vocabulary for an entire body of knowledge. If you don't know how to talk, then how are you going to tell someone what you need them to do? This metaphor is also useful for explaining why some of the best leads I've danced with, like Heather, are also follows, or started out as follows. They're simply more attuned to what body signals stand out to a follow. They know how to speak because they also know how to listen. It's hard to switch from listening to speaking, and even more so from speaking to listening. But experience in one area helps you in the other. I think that leading and following are both interesting, and I prefer following because it's what I'm used to, and because you can experience a variety of styles. But when I lead, it puts into practice all the things I've learned from being a follow. Similarly, when leads try following, they see themselves from a follow's point of view, and all the things that they do right and that they do wrong become clearer to them, translated by their own reactions to those actions as follows. They're both as interesting, and neither is superior or inferior to the other. They simply take very different mindsets to accomplish, and some people are just naturally suited to be better speakers than listeners, or better listeners than speakers.

I'm going to say that taking a year of sosc with Richard kind of warped my mind, because I can't help but think that this theory about swing dancing based around this conversation metaphor is somewhat Hegelian, and bears a certain resemblance to the master-slave dialectic. There's the self-identification by negation of everything else - I am a lead, not a follow. And then the moment of reflection, that through the other person, you can better define yourself. And finally, the dialectic comes full circle, because the lead does not make the whole dance, nor is the follow's contribution any smaller and insignificant. The union of the two becomes something greater than their sum, as swing dancing requires both a good lead and good follow to reach its full potential, just as a good speaker and a good listener, together, make a great conversation.

Yeah, I've taken too much sosc, basically, and I'm making Hegel roll in his grave with that perversion of the dialectic. But I think I've also had a taste of that mythical Hegel nirvana Richard has referred to before, when everything seems to fit into the Hegelian framework and make so much sense. Basically, "it's so true!!"

One last detail about that evening - I ended up taking a bus from the CD Jazz Café (haha) to Wangfujing, and from there, the 1 line subway home. While I was standing at the Wangfujing station, waiting for the train, a group of obviously American college students came in, and one of them acted quite annoying, by yelling out loud to the subway station in English something about New York City, which I took to be frustration over the early hours that the Beijing subway keeps, in comparison to New York City's sleepless public transportation system. Which I understood, but it still made me want to punch him, and tell him that it was this kind of d-bag behavior that so endeared Americans to foreigners.

On the train, one of them stood close to me, with his back facing me, and after a few stops, I was pleasantly surprised to note that it had the Catullus backpack quote - "non videmus manticae quod in tergo est" (which may be wrong) and a quote from Ovid as well. A good Latin t-shirt never goes amiss, as JCL makes the whole world kin, so after a bit of deliberation, I tapped his shoulder, and asked him where his t-shirt was from. When he heard me speaking English, his face lit up like a kid on Christmas Eve. It turns out that his name was Nathan, and he went to Bates, which made him sort of a fellow New Englander, and we had a very fun and interesting conversation about Latin and Chinese and languages in general. He seemed surprised to learn that I was only going to be a junior, because he thought I was a grad student or something.* I promised to friend him on Facebook before he got off at Gongzhufen, and took a cab home after I arrived at Wukesong. Overall, it was a very exciting day.

*To which I'd just like to say - for the next ten years, I'm okay with being mistaken for being older, but once I move past thirty, I'd like to be mistaken for being younger. That'd be nice.