Dancing Around The World

When I was eight, we had to do square dancing in P.E. and it was sheer torture. All the boys I got partnered with had sweaty hands and irritating smirks. None of the halfway decent ones were available. Inevitably, I found myself stuck with some awful boy with slicked-back hair and a goofy expression, or a lumbering idiot who liked telling jokes about poos, who clowned around at lunchtime by drinking his milk through his nose. I was terrible at dancing myself: I could never remember when to do what or where to put my feet.

At university, my friends danced while I sat and watched, struggling to work up the courage to join them. They did the Latin hustle, the bump and the funky chicken; they waved their arms around, they dipped and bobbed and gyrated and danced stiff-legged while I chewed my lip and studied them. A few times, I actually went out onto the dance floor myself. I did my best to copy my friends, but it was tough going: I never knew how to hold my body, where to put my feet.

I took an African dance class when I was twenty, but the minute I caught the teacher smiling at me, I stopped dancing. I suspected that her smile was not one of encouragement. A few years later, I signed up for a jitterbug class with a friend. She was great; I wasn't.

During the summer in Japan, I watched as people did bon-odori, special folk dances the whole community takes part in. Old men and women in their street clothes or kimono, girls in yukata, everyone danced, moving their bodies gracefully. Every dance was different. One step forward, two steps back, spin, arms held up to the sky, arms sweeping down to the ground, two steps forward, turn around... Egged on by friends, I tried bon-odori a few times. Surprisingly, it was a lot of fun. I was awful at it, though: I could never tell when to do what.

Ballet was easier than bon-odori, though more physically demanding. When my youngest daughter was old enough to start ballet, I asked the teacher if I could join in to encourage her. I was awful at ballet, but the teacher liked me: she asked my husband and me to play the king and queen during the class dance recital. We still have the videotape somewhere: you can see me resplendent in crimson gown and silver tiara, engaged in a discrete tug-of-war with my husband as I set off towards the wrong exit.

In Scotland, I went to ceilidhs. These are traditional Gaelic social dances where you dance to live music, generally featuring fiddles, tin whistles and accordions. In our town, ceilidhs were generally held at the Catholic and Presbyterian churches.

The Catholic ceilidh was wonderful. Some dancers were good and some were not, but it really didn't matter. Everyone danced with everyone else. Grandmothers danced with their grandsons, sisters danced with brothers, strangers grabbed the hands of strangers and pulled them onto the dance floor. I got pulled onto the dance floor too. I was awful, but nobody really cared, so I didn't either.

The Presbyterian ceilidh was not a success. Too many people were good dancers, and the atmosphere was all wrong. I sat in a corner and watched everyone until a friend finally persuaded me to join. I was awful and I know for a fact that everybody noticed. I'm not a Catholic, but I made it a point to go to their ceilidhs after that. Catholics in Scotland know how to have fun. And they definitely know how to show other people a good time.

Turks love dancing. When I come back to class after the break, my students have Arabesque music blasting out of my CD player; a few of them are dancing, eyes closed, hips swaying, arms held overhead.

The other evening, I went to a party at work, taking my youngest daughter along. We sat and watched as girls in shimmery costumes belly danced, rotating their pelvises, swiveling their hips, shimmying their shoulders. They tossed their hair about a lot too, and flashed their eyes. The music was so loud you could hardly hear yourself think.

After a while, the belly dancers left and the band got even louder. Colleagues stood up and wandered out to the dance floor until it was standing room only out there. But the dancers didn't care: they swayed and shimmied and gyrated and flashed their eyes. Turks dance with their arms held high overhead, hands and fingers very much a part of the whole process. It wasn't just the young and fit who were dancing either. Middle-aged men were out there, grinding their hips and grinning away; full-figured women in their fifties were moving on the floor, eyes closed in rapture, fleshy arms held high overhead, wrists rotating, hands twitching like small birds, fingers waving.

I watched carefully, trying to figure out how they did it. "That looks like fun," I had to admit as a woman my age twirled around, arms held high, hips swiveling, an expression of rapture on her face. My daughter turned to look at me. "Mom!" There was such desperation in her eyes, I had to smile. And I almost wished I'd had more to drink.

Next time I go to a place where there's dancing, I believe I'll leave my daughter at home.