by Emma Hsu
If you make a trip to New York, where American Hip-Hop culture flourishes, you might enroll at a hip-hop class like my friend I-mei did. But what if you got to go to the capital of the Czech Republic? After savoring I-mei’s story in The Foreign Exchange, I decided to take up the quill and jot down a related personal experience: a ballet class in “the Pearl of Europe”–Prague. As a birthday gift for myself I spent every penny I had earned for the past three years, plucked up all my courage and set out on a journey to Europe as a lone backpacker. Being a dance lover since my very first glimpse of a pink tutu, I managed to seize every opportunity to attend dance classes during the trip. I had longed to visit Prague, and made it the city where I stayed for the longest time. My friend Jirka, who ran a Chinese tearoom in Prague, was more than willing to help me find a dance studio. After explaining a dozen times that it was his friend, not he, who wanted to register for the ballet class, he got me into a dance camp which lasted for a week. Upon arriving in Prague I followed his vague and ominous instructions (“Tanecni Dance Center, metro red and green, then tram uphill until some dense woods where bodies of tourists might be buried”) and located the studio in the suburbs of Prague, just in time before class began. To picture the interior of the studio most vividly, just think of Edgar Degas’ painting Dance Class. Smooth hardwood floors, silver exercise bars, huge windows, black velvet curtains, and a beautiful piano standing in the glorious sunshine. Anyway, I was nearly ecstatic at the sight of a piano in the corner of the enormous studio, but after glancing at my fellow students I realized that I was the only ugly duckling in view. And all those skinny, pretty, long-necked girls seemed bewildered when they looked at me, and I was filled with uneasiness. This place is nothing like New York or any other big multicultural city. It’s more like The Stepford Wives, in which all you see are Caucasian women with blonde hair and blue eyes. The bell sounded. The sun shone through the windowpanes. All the students were on the floor stretching and chatting in an indecipherable language. They all looked between fifteen and twenty, and o-la-la, there were even two cute guys with brown curly hair. Everyone was dressed in black leotards and skin-colored stockings, and judging from their appearance they had probably been studying ballet for some time. The instructor and the pianist entered and everyone applauded for them, and in no time the students stood by the bars. In case you aren’t familiar with how a ballet class is conducted, it always consists of about 40 minutes of exercise with the aid of a bar as tall as your stomach, and 60 minutes of free movements such as jumps and turns in the center. The teacher spoke so quickly and I didn’t have the chance to interrupt and say, “Excuse me, I don’t understand a word!” And as soon as he finished, the pianist began to play. So I had no choice but to guess what to do from some French terms he used and to mimic the girl in front of me. The exercises were familiar though the combinations were very varied: “plié” ( bending knees), “battement” ( kicking one’s leg to the nose, ear or back of head), “tendu” ( pointing one’s toes on the ground), “jeté” ( like “tendu” but the toes are a few centimeters above the floor), and so on. I was amazed seeing the girls lifting their legs to the very front of their nose, which I could never accomplish due to my insufficient training. After working on the bar we gathered to the center of the studio. The teacher composed very complicated combinations of movements and only demonstrated them once. Then, the students automatically separated into two groups. I was in the second group and stood in the upper right corner, which meant there was no chance to be a copycat since every exercise began with the right side. Instead, those standing behind me had to depend on me, and oh my, you can only imagine my awkwardness. Then I discovered the secret behind the instructor’s quadruple turns: the floor was really slippery. After class I was totally drenched and exhausted. But I felt happy to have experienced the Eastern European discipline of classical dance training. I took my leave, and while descending the staircase I saw a girl sitting on the steps putting on her shoes. I gestured and said, “You were very good in class.” After a pause she apologetically beamed and replied, “Sorry, I… I don’t speak… English.” Oh well, that was the end of our communication since we never met again. But wasn’t this better than living in a youth hostel with eleven roommates and having a hangover every morning? If you are interested here is the address of the dance studio and some tips on how to get there: Address: Tanecni centrum Praha Konzervator, Street U Vetrniku 3, Praha 6 Note: Prague is divided into several regions like Paris. The most well-known sight-seeing sections (New Town, Old Town, the Jewish Quarter, Little Quarter, and Prague Castle) are all in Praha 1, meaning downtown Prague. The bigger the number is, the farther it is from the city center. How to get there: Take metro line A and alight at station “Hradcanska.” Then take tram 1 or 18 uphill until station “Vetrnik.” The next thing you should do is cross the street and look for a tall grey building behind some houses. If you can’t find your way ask people and they should be willing to help. May your days in Prague be merry and bright! a
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The Taida Student Journal has been active since 1995 with an ever-changing roster of student journalists at NTU. Click the above link to read about the authors Archives
May 2024
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