Today was our last full day in Chepo, how crazy?! These past three days, full of dance moves, broken Spanish, and lots of smiles, have flown by so quickly. Today we finished up the choreography for each of our classes in preparation for the showcase tomorrow. Both the teachers and the kids have been working hard on the dances to show their parents how hard they have worked these past few days.
It has been a really fun and eye opening experience to take part in a dance exchange, especially when the biggest challenge is language. Using “classroom” Spanish in real life is much harder than you would think, especially when teaching something completely new and different to a group of high-energy kiddos! And it is even harder when you don’t know any Spanish, aside from the couple of words and phrases that we went over prior to teaching class. But that’s the really cool thing about dance : it is it’s own language altogether, and so long as you have air in your lungs and a positive attitude, you will always be able to find a middle ground of communication.
We spent this afternoon at el río Límon, where we got to hang out and cool off from the day. I say “hang” because we were literally hanging on the rocks to avoid drifting down the river with the current. We then had a Passo Passo class with Jorge, a friend of Elisandro’s, who taught us three different types of Passo Passo dance. The class was awesome, and it was cool to learn one of the social dances that is so prominent in Panama’s culture.
All in all a great day, filled with many apples (aka. high points throughout the day). Ready to ring in the New Year with my MoveEx family!
Light & love,
Isi, Dance Diplomat from Indiana University
Move to Change 
Leave a comment