GAMA Kabali dance

GAMA Kabali dance

04/2/2017

This will always be one of my favorite dances I have done. 1 year after coming to the U.S, my mom took me to a family friends house and asked me if I wanted to dance with his group for the GAMA organization. GAMA (Greater Atlanta Malayalee Association) is a nonprofit organization that is in the city of Atlanta to bring together the South Indians all over Atlanta for cultural and charity events. Even though i had not dances in nearly 4 years, I still agreed to do it. He had already formed a group and chosen the songs for the dance, so we got straight into practice. This was almost 4 months before the actual event. We had practice almost every weekend. At first, I felt a little shaky on all the steps, as they were relatively quick. I had to train my mind to keep up with the speed of the steps, so I started exercising to train my body to increase my flexibility and agility. We had to also learn how to sync the dance so the whole stage can seem even during the dance rather than a bunch of people performing a dance that doesn't that isn't worthwhile to watch. There were times when conflicts arose inside the group concerning many steps. But we were able to talk it out and come to a common conclusion which was the best for everybody in the group. When there was almost 1 month left for the dance, we started arranging group practices with the girl’s team, and at first it was hard to coordinate with over 13 people trying to share their opinions and critics about the dance. But I have to personally give credit to the group leader, Fazal, for staying strong in his ground and managing to convince the group that everything is going to work out if we all worked together. On the day of the dance, I started feeling nervous as I began to imagine the embarrassment I would face in the stage if I did not perform good. My mom kept encouraging me say that everything is going to work out right. When the program began, and we entered the started the dance, it was a fleeting moment as one moment we were in the stage, and the next one we were out. Everything was quick. I couldn't remember how i performed because I just kept concentrating on not making any mistake and performing the best I can. When the video for the dance came out almost 2 weeks later, I saw that the dance turned out really well as we were all in sync with each other and performed the dance without relatively any mistake. When I reflect back to this dance, I imagine how we were able to work together as a team to overcome our differences to reach a common ground best for the team. Coming together is a beginning. Keeping together is progress. Working together is success.