Ballroom dance is taking root from Elsies River to=20 Mmabatho, discovered JUSTIN PEARCE at Sun City last=20
SOMEHOW, it could only have happened at Sun City. You=20 know you’ve arrived there when the plastic bags flapping=20 on fences give way to coloured flags flapping on poles,=20 and inside the dimly lit halls of the Superbowl complex,=20 the sense of unreality borders on the macabre: there are=20 slot machines, ice-cream shops, little effigies of=20 jungle animals, more mirrors than a discount bathroom=20 fittings warehouse, more signs than an international=20 airport: signs pointing to The Palace, The Royal Room,=20 The Dream Machine.
Through these corridors a group of women from=20 Pietersburg wandered like ghosts, destined to walk the=20 carpeted corridors until doomsday. Or at least until =20 their bus went back to Pietersburg. With hotels beyond=20 their means, wandering seemed like the most sensible way=20 to pass the night.
So, what motivates someone to spend the weekend=20 meandering around the Superbowl for the sake of=20 participating in Rumba in the Jungle, the international=20 ballroom and Latin American dance competition? Machete=20 Kidibone says she’s there simply to learn more about=20 ballroom dancing, so she can take the experience back to=20 the dance club she helped to found back home.
“We’ve started to organise a dance club to keep the=20 children busy, so they don’t just stand on the street=20 smoking and taking drugs,” her friend Shai Skati=20
Their only outside tuition comes in the form of a=20 videotape which illustrates the various dances, and on=20 this basis they are teaching dancing to 38 people aged=20 from five years upwards.
“Some people say that by bringing the girls together=20 with boys, you’ll mislead our children,” Skati says.=20 “They’re people from rural areas. They don’t=20
“We want to civilise the people in our area,” Kidibone=20
For years, the Cape Flats were the ballroom dancing=20 capital of South Africa, and that area still contributed=20 a disproportionate number of this year’s Rumba in the=20 Jungle contestants. Elsies River is the only place where=20 I’ve ever seen people foxtrotting to techno at a party,=20 and I’ll lay a fair bet that such things don’t happen=20 north of the Huguenot Tunnel tollgate.
But, judging by the people who turned up at Sun City=20 last weekend, ballroom is taking root in cities and in=20 the scattered shards of former homelands all the way up=20 to the Limpopo. And it’s not only in the Northern=20 Province that dancers see keeping kids off the streets=20 as one of their prime motivating factors for dancing.
Also on walkabout (though at least they had a Sun City=20 cabana to retire to) were five bright-eyed, hair-gelled=20 teenagers from Mmabatho called Sidwell, Enoch, Philip,=20 Daddy and Tido, who spend two hours a day, three days a=20 week, rehearsing after school.
“The times we spend dancing, our friends are doing=20 naughty things outside,” Sidwell says. “Most of them=20 tease us — but they are the ones who are smoking and=20
According to the promoters of Rumba in the Jungle,=20 ballroom dancing is the third most popular pastime in=20 South Africa. The mind boggles at how they arrived at=20 that conclusion, but presumably there must be some truth=20 in it somewhere. National Council of Ballroom Dancing=20 chairman, Eric Jabulani Sibeko, says ballroom dancing is=20 “romantic and sexy and more expressive than running or=20 kicking a football”.=20
And of late, RDP buzzwords like development,=20 empowerment, and historically disadvantaged communities=20 have become as common on the dancefloor as they are on=20 the sports field. Hence, while there was a handful of=20 foreign competitors to give the Rumba in the Jungle some=20 international cred, the real significance of the event=20 was the 2 000-odd South African dancers, ranging from=20 middle-aged professionals to children barely out of=20
The North West province, ever ready to do some creative=20 cookery with Boputhatswana leftovers, has also seen the=20 opportunities presented by the presence of Sun City and=20 the only arts infrastructure to be set up in a homeland.
Sidwell and the gang learnt to dance courtesy of the=20 North West Arts Council. The North West Arts Council=20 orchestra was temporarily reinvented as a dance band=20 under the baton of British dance conductor Andy Ross.
Riani de Wet, the North West’s irrepressible MEC for=20 public media, arts and culture, took the podium like a=20 proud parent. “I know we often make snide remarks about=20 Gauteng,” De Wet said. “But we hope you can see that=20 here in the North West we have some jewels you don’t=20
Sun City might be a rather plasticky jewel. But only=20 there would an exercise which began as keeping children=20 off the streets culminate in an occasion that involves a=20 full orchestra and enough ostrich feathers to keep=20 Oudtshoorn solvent for years to come. Even if you do get=20 more exercise pacing the corridors than by doing the=20