Dancing in the streets

During our trip through Andalucia we expected to see a lot of dance. What we didn’t expect was a reminder of Shanghai, and its dances on the streets. In contrast to the spontaneity of Shanghai, Granada was more organized.

We arrived in Granada, checked into our room. The Family was excited. "Let’s go out", she said, without giving me a chance to look at the map on my phone. We wandered out, and the nearest square had this wonderful dance. I have two left feet, so I was content to stand on the sidelines and shoot the video you can see here. Later we realized that the square we were on, Plaza del Carmen, with that wonderful large mosaic in the center, is in front of the city council hall.

We fell in love with Granada right there.

The most unexpected fun thing in Shanghai

The most unexpected and fun thing about Shanghai was definitely the dancing on the streets. All our reading about China never told us this. We stepped out for a coffee late on our first night there and found six women our age with a portable music system dancing away in a little corner next to the hotel. They were having fun, and motioned to The Family to join in. Further down the road we found other groups. Some were complete amateurs, and had more left feet than me, others were good (like the couple in the photo above). None of them mind passers by joining in. The Family practiced a couple of steps!

Why are they doing it? A large number look like they grew up in the years of the Cultural Revolution, and this may just be their final act of forgetting. But The Family points out that this may not be correct: there are a few youngsters in there as well. Maybe it is just what you do when your children do not need looking after any more. May be it is something that you did not do when you were young and want to do now that pressures are off.

It does not matter really, as long as you are having fun, and open enough to invite foreigners to join in. And they enjoy themselves so much that it brings a smile to the face of a bystander.