It’s been a blasting year right from the start. In Jan, I choreographed Hare Ram and within days, the dance spread like wildfire around the world. I’ve never received so much emails in my life, congratulating me for the dance and asking me for the song. I’ve made so many friends too, in the US, Canada, Europe, Singapore and Australia. I’ve been invited to teach my dances at events, to perform my dances, to attend numerous parties/events and to adjudicate dance competitions. Not to mention invitations to visit the US, Europe and Canada but I had to take a rain-check for them.

Can’t say all is rosy too. Fame comes with a price. Although I tried to stay “out of trouble” and to keep a low profile, I can’t say the same for others who looked for trouble. Anyway, let bygones be bygones. I’ll just stay the same and will keep going for more choreographies as I know, many enjoyed them. I would like to take this opportunity to thank my friends and all line dancers who has supported me and my dances this year. Glad to say, choreographing is addictive and it has become an addiction! So do watch out for more of my choreographies in future!

I just took a peek of my 2008 Chinese horoscope for the rabbit and here’s an abstract:

The good part of this year is that your popularity is running high. It is a good time to build rapport, to meet new people, to meet people who could help you and to socialize and to be in a team. This year the people who could help you are females. While you are the star of the town, there are some green eyes casting their unfriendly glances at you. Remember not to make yourself an easy target for betrayal.

Sounds familiar, doesn’t it? So, to believe in horoscopes? Believing in it makes you an idiot, Not believing it makes you a fool! Time to take a peek in my 2009 horoscope

Happy 2009!

I chanced upon a Tong Hua line dance video on Kenny Teh’s channel and click on it to look at it. It was credited to Winnie Yu (who choreographed to the same song by Chen Wei Lian). I took a look at it and knew it was my (first) choreography. Thankfully, Kenny has amended the mistake. The dance was uploaded about 7 months ago and I only saw it today!

The girls were doing a performance for a Mothers’ Day event. I love their arm movements. Although they did modify the dance slightly to make it a 2 wall dance, instead of my choreographed 4 wall. The main dance is still mine, alright. Bravo to the girls. Here’s the video, enjoy!

Christmas is my favourite time of the year. It’s year end, and people put up Christmas trees and Christmas carols are everywhere. People throng the malls to shop for Christmas gifts. And I was in a mall just few days ago and heard a nice Christmas song. That was the same song which I heard last Christmas but I had forgotten its tune/lyrics when I got back. I can’t catch much of the lyrics again this time except: “Underneath my Christmas tree” and “Christmas with you”. I quickly note these down and went home to google it. And here goes, it’s the song “Perfect Christmas” sung by S Club 7. I’m not too sure if the version I heard in the mall is by this group, but it’s the same song alright, and this is the only version I found.

It’s just less than a week to Christmas. Would it be too late to choreograph a Christmas dance, especially amidst my super busy schedule? Or should I wait until next year? But next Christmas is 370 days away… I finally found a few minutes to spare after work yesterday, put on the music on my ipod and choreographed a simple dance to this song. Simple one, so that all levels of line dancers will be able to enjoy this dance.

It’s my Christmas gift to all of you line dancers! It’s been a fruitful year for me and I hope for the rest of you. Have a Merry Christmas and Happy New Year 2009!

P.s. Kindly email me for the song. And no, no video (yet) for this dance, as it’s soooo new. Enjoy!

There will be a Christmas themed line dance class on Christmas Day (25 Dec 2008) at True Fitness Taipan, Subang Jaya from 4.30 pm onwards. Instructor: Sharon Lee

There will be a gift exchange ceremony, so do bring along a gift if you want to join the event. Minimum value, RM6, no maximum value.. LOL

Line dancers are advised to wear christmas colours (Red, White, Green) and bring along christmas props such as santa hat, Rudolph’s nose, mistletoe etc…

Thereafter, adjourn to nearby restaurant for dinner. (on Dutch!)

If you’re a non TF member, you can get a 1 week free trial pass.

Come celebrate Christmas and line dance with us! We’ll have a(nother) blast!!

I’m finally back after spending 3 days in Johor Bahru, for the Dance 4 Peace, Health & Joy event, organised by Dr Lim Jit Phong and her sisters. Janice, Cindy, Desmond and I had a blast of a time there!

6 Dec 2008

Janice took a coach at 1.30am from Prai towards KL. She reached at about 5.30am. We picked her up, had breakfast and headed southbound at about 8am.

On the way to JB

The journey was uneventful. We had line dance music keeping us company for the entire journey. Weather was cloudy, good visibility and not hot which was very good. We reached JB in less than 4 hours.

Wisma Tiong Hua - The Venue

On the way to Dr Lim’s house where we’re putting up for 2 nights, we passed the venue of the event – Wisma Tiong Hua. The hall is on the 8th floor of this building. We then noticed that we’ve never danced on such “high” place before… hahah!

After dropping off our luggages, we walked to the nearby Mi Rebus shop, which Janice had eaten more than 10 years ago. It tasted very good at just RM3.50/plate. Thereafter, we had the whole afternoon of dance practise for Arabian Eyes performance and then taught Janice, Desmond, Maggie, Annie and Lesley my new dance, Innuendo, so they could assist me on the floor during my teach the next day.

Come to think of it, the 4 of us, seldom have the chance to dance together, as Janice is in another state (Penang) while Desmond goes to another class. Only Cindy and I dance in the same classes. Thus, the afternoon was a real good  get-together.

At dinner

Dr Lim and her family brought all of us to yummy dinner at a restaurant hidden in a run down building. Gosh, who would have imagined that a classy restaurant still resides in the building! And the food… there were the special fish soup, nestum prawns, etc, and coconut jelly for dessert. I only managed to snap the first served dish as thereafter, I was busy chomping away my food!

Just before hitting the sack for the event on the next day (at about 11 pm), we came up with the idea of choreographing a dance for the event, specially dedicated to the Lim sisters for organising and sponsoring the big event. The dance choreographed to the new song by our “teenage years idol” NKOTB entitled Summertime. The dance is thereafter named JB Summertime to mark the event.

The 4 of us brainstormed and came up with a set of eights each. We also smooth each other’s steps out, especially during the connection of the 8’s. The end product was quite impressing, and completed before midnight. We practised a few more times, and decided we need to rest for the next day’s event.

7 Dec 2008

The backdrop by Paulin

Dancing with the crowd

We woke up to a beautiful day. Quickly got ready and left for the venue, which is nearby. The event was scheduled for 10am – 6pm. More and more people turn up and it’s really nice to see people coming in their group uniforms, some in bright happy colours and dancing joyously. It’s also good to see some really aged men and women, but they can still dance! My hats off to them, and silently hoped that I could dance as well as they could, when I reach that age!

Teaching Innuendo

Then comes the time for me to teach Innuendo. I had Cindy with me on the stage. As I was holding the mic, I can’t show the hand movements so Cindy would be my “hands”. I also had Janice, Desmond, Annie and Lesley assisting me on the floor. The dancers on the floor were awesome, I’m surprised and delighted that many of them managed to pick up the dance, as the dance is rated intermediate/advanced with a tag and multiple restarts. More so, when the floor was crowded and there wasn’t much space to twirl and turn. And they sure enjoyed it with all the arm movements! Bravo to the JB crowd!!

Arabian Eyes performance

A while later, the four of us were on the floor again, this time for a little performance of Arabian Eyes as requested by Dr Lim. As though the dance is jinxed, again, there was a technical error (the earlier technical error happened at Mr Leong’s party in June). A wrong song was played (as we’ve edited to shorten the song/performance). False start and we only realised it halfway through the performance as we heard the “restart part”…We then restarted the dance all over again… but the crowd was really pleased with our performance – especially besotted with the lone “Arab” guy in our group. LOL!

JB Summertime

Then it’s time for our surprise performance for the Lim sisters – our newly choreographed dance JB Summertime! Haha… I guess we all forgot the steps every now and then and didn’t quite put up the perfect show. Nevertheless, the sisters were so touched by our surprise. I guess that they now know why we insisted to have the performance after Robin’s return (the DJ) as we’ve “pakat” with him what to say…haha!

We met up with so many fellow line dancers, from Ipoh, Melaka, Johor and Singapore. We got to know that many were avid followers of our dances. Which is so cool as we’ve no idea how far and wide our dances went to, besides those put on youtube. Also to finally meet many of the correspondances via emails/instant messaging, we can finally put a face to those correspondants.

We re-recorded the JB Summertime again after everyone left as we bugled up earlier, but this time without Desmond as he had left the event earlier. Will put up the video when it’s done uploaded. After that, we were taken for another good dinner with fabulous food – duck, fish, prawns & yam basket… thinking of them, makes me hungry again!

We went home and started watching all the photos and videos we had taken the whole day, haha, like a post mortem where we commented, “oh boy, I look fat like this” and “oh no, I made a mistake here”.We also retire early after a long tiring day, also to prepare to travel home early the next day.

8 Dec 2008

Woke up to heavy rains in JB. Had breakfast with the family and finally got on our way back to KL after bidding them farewell and thanking them for a wonderful time and hospitality. The weather was gloomy and wet, all the way from JB to KL. The whole journey took us almost 4 hours this time, due to the wet roads and poor visibility. We had to rush to send Janice back on the bus to Penang by 2.30pm and luckily there wasn’t much jam on the way. Phew!!

We plan to make this a yearly event for us. It’s indeed one of the happiest moment of our lives!