May 21, 2005

So another lion dance went along its merry way, and quite successfully. Of course 'successful' for a lion dance means the mistakes we made were not noticed by the auidience, but that is really not important. Anyways, the dance was held at the Exhibition Park, home to the annual Farmer’s Day Festival. However, that’s not until June 4th, this was the opening of the Country Market, a kind of farmer’s market. The team this time consisted of Sifu Playter in the head, myself in the tail, and Sifu Davies Buddhing, as the phrase goes. Master Brinker manned the drums, with Sifu Frietag on the gongs, and Sifu Dennis clinking the cymbals away. Kwan Kung was the lion of choice, as is the norm nowadays.

This was Sifu Playter’s first dance as the head, and considering how short a time in which he learned and practiced it, it couldn’t have gone better. I am a poor judge of my own performance, as I am the one performing, if that makes sense. However, I didn’t fall during the lift, and I didn’t set the lion on fire (this hall has very low lamps, you see). It was extremely useful working with Sifu Playter, as he is the most experienced tail, both with and without Kwan Kung, so he gave me some great tips.

Poor Sifu Davies, the stage we were performing on had defiantly seen better days (like the last time we were on it). As a result, if she had performed in bare feet as usual, she would have had feet full of slivers. Unfortunately, due to her…statuary inequalities (she’s short) everyone else’s shoes were too big. She therefore had to make due with the flimsy flip-flops (is there a hyphen there? I suppose it doesn’t matter) she brought. She danced right out of one, but managed to recover it before I stepped on it.

The Mayor of Stony Plain finally saw our dance, and the women who coordinates many events for the town was apparently pleased, so high hopes for the future and such. Finally I would like to bring to light the incredibly tiny size of the sausages served at this opening breakfast. If I had paid for them (on a side note: Thanks for breakfast Master Brinker) I would have been slightly put out, but I still would’ve ate them.

Next dance is on June 4th at the Farmer’s Day Festival, we’ll be doing a dance at the breakfast (it’s at Exhibition Park) and we’re in the parade. If you live in Onoway we are in that parade and are doing a demonstration afterwards. I’m not sure where in Onoway it is, but hey, it’s Onoway, I’m positive you can find us. Until then, stay tuned lion dance fans.

-Sifu Robertson