Dancing

On Friday, Ayi and I were talking while we made chicken salad and listened to Frank Sinatra. We talked for a while, and I found myself telling her about the music. I told her about the song lyrics, and about Frank Sinatra. He was one of the first stars (Ming xing, I said. Ge xing, if he's a singer, Ayi corrected me) back when they first started majorly advertising and printing color pictures along with records. He was really one of the first ge xing in America whom all the girls thought was really shuai. My mother's parents really love Frank Sinatra, but my parents both think he's the worst. Gag! But I like him, and I like the whole big band jazz sound.
This is partly because in high school and college, the senior center in town used to teach ballroom dance lessons during the summer. It was fun. My friends went, we met cute college interns (who were all physicists and engineers-- they couldn't have been THAT cute), we danced, and we generally enjoyed ourselves to the tune of the Big Band Era.
"Oh, kind of like here in China where the old people learn ballroom dance in the park," Ayi commented.
"No." I thought for a second. We didn't dance in the park. It was totally different. Well..... actually, the only thing different was that we were indoors instead of at the park. "Well, yeah, it's pretty much the same," I told her.
We'd learn all sorts of dances, like the Cha cha, the waltz, the tango, foxtrot, and of course, the swing. I loved it, but even then I knew it was kind of funny to be dancing with my friends' grandparents. But I loved learning these dances from people who danced them while they were young. And it's nice to know I would have been cool in the 1930s and 1940s.
I thought my story was pretty unique and kind of interesting.
Then Ayi told me her story.
"Yeah when we first had music, some friends would get together in someone's living room. It wasn't as big as this living room-- no one in China has this big of a living room-- but it was big enough. We'd close the windows and the doors, and then some of the 60-year-olds would teach us dances they knew, like the cha-cha-cha."
"When was this?" I asked her.
"Oh, it must have been about 1979."
Can you imagine?! It seems almost medieval to think of a time when dancing was banned! I think of what it must have been like. These 60-year-olds have just spent the last 40 years in civil war, followed by revolution after revolution and government campaign after campaign. They know Mao has been dead for 3 years and that they're now allowed to play all their old music and dance their old dances, but they know they still have to be careful. Even though it's allowed, they still have to hide and dance covertly, just in case the next government campaign sends to prison anyone who actually dusted off the old records and dancing shoes.
I'm reminded again just how lucky and blessed I am. I'm happy to be free, and I'm happy to be here in China where, despite the problems that do exist, progress is happening and life is improving.