Weekly Swing Update

Hey Taipei Swingers,

Looks like Spring has finally decided to join us :-)  So come out and celebrate your Spring spirit with 3 days of dancing this week/weekend:

Thursday @ Danswell

8-9pm - intermediate lesson

9-9.20pm - practice

Last week we added the Lindy Circle to our 8-count repertoire.  Join us this week to practice and hone the basics we've already covered and to learn a new move or two.  I see swing outs with inside turns in our future... and more!

Friday @ Capone's

BoPoMoFo is back!  Kick off the weekend right with lively jump blues, great drinks, a friendly, fun-loving atmosphere, and of course, lots of dancing!

Sunday @ Barbados

7.30-8pm - intro/beginner lesson

8pm - open dancing

A swing scene is only as strong as the number of newcomers joining.  Sundays are the time to invite your friends and encourage newcomers to give swing a try and see just how much it is.

See you on the dance floor!

Maria

Live jump blues, 4.10

Taipei Swing is getting BoPoMoFo-cated tonight, 4.10, at Capone's.  We're all on a dancing high after our fabulous weekend at the Korea Lindy Revolution (KLR) with the Silver Shadows and many of our international dance friends, so we're eager to get out and cut a rug.  Come join us!

BoPoMoFo plays live jump blues from 9-11pm.  For location information, go to www.capones.com.tw.

Also, for anyone interested in meeting up beforehand, we'll be meeting at the Sun-Yat Sen Memorial Hall MRT stop, exit 2 at 7.30pm to go grab some grub before we dance.

See you on the dance floor!

BoPoMoFo play again this Friday 3.13

BoPoMoFo, Taipei's jump blues band, will grace the stage at Capone's again this upcoming Friday, March 13.  Come out for some great Italian fare and jumping tunes that are sure to get your feet up and dancing and your booty shaking in the air!

Capone's is located on ZhongXiao East Road, Sec. 4, just outside Sun-Yat Sen Memorial Hall MRT stop, exit 2.  

For exact time and address, go to www.capones.com.tw

See you on the dance floor!

Schedule updates for January

All right, after all of these cancellations lately, it's time for some GOOD news to go up on this blog! While there is one more cancellation for class this Wednesday (1.14), it looks like there will be social dancing again at Barbados this Sunday (1.18).

Also, beginning next week, we will very likely have a new studio space available for our lessons. So a big thanks to JC for going out and pounding the pavement to find us a new home!

Check back regularly for more information about exact days, times and locations. And in the meantime, keep swinging!

Christmas Swing

Season's Greeting Taipei Swing Dancers!

Just a reminder - because this upcoming Wednesday (12.24) is Christmas Eve, Hips is having a special Christmas event - which means NO swing at Hips this Wednesday. Class will be held instead at my special "garden" apartment. Email me for directions - maria.kelley@yahoo.com.

After class, we will all head up to Sappho to dance to the live music of Taipei's BoPoMoFo.

What better way to welcome Christmas?

Hong Kong Lindy Exchange (HKLX) 2008

This past weekend, 11.21-11.23, was the first-ever Hong Kong Lindy Exchange, put together by Karen Tong. Dancers from all over Asia attended the event, including lindy hoppers from Singapore, Vietnam, South Korea, and both Beijing and Shanghai in mainland China. While the Taiwan showing was small, we were proud and glad to represent ourselves with Mindy, JC, and Maria. And did we have a blast! This event was held in a fantastic city and hosted by a crew of fantastic people - we had too much fun to really put into words.


We are so grateful to Karen for putting together such an all-inclusive event - from social dancing Friday night, to dancing on the Avenue of the Stars (through sunset) on Saturday, riding a junk boat, then heading off to a Jumbo boat and restaurant for dinner and dancing Saturday night, only to be topped off with an excursion to the big Buddha Sunday afternoon (replete with dancing, of course), a thrilling cable car ride down the mountain, and a rocking farewell party at Grappa's Sunday night.



This was a great chance for Taipei Swing to be recognized within the Asian swing community and for some of our members to experience the extents that swing dancing can carry you. It was a truly magical event that has left us thirsty for more dancing and socializing - more, more, more! We miss all the new friends we made in Hong Kong!

Some recent goings-on from Elizabeth

Vickey's Farewell
Vickey, a dancer from Toronto, Ontatrio, Canada is leaving Taiwan later this month, and that meant a farewell gatearing of sorts was needed. Having the event Mother's Day weekend meant that many places were gonna be busy, so I did some early scouting for places that could easily accomodate a larger group on one of the busiest weekends for restaurant. Hung Kan was the place of choice, and it's a 24-hour Cantonese place in the heart of the city in a busy strip along Zhongxiao E. Road. It has something for everyone, from small dim sum items to main dishes and desserts. It was a night where 12 of us got together for dinner wher we wined and dined on some good cantonese food. Nearly everyone had a camear, and there was quite a bit of shutterbug syndrom going on, with Jan taking the cake for shutterbugness. Vickey came up with the idea that we should treat ourselves to dinners like this more often, and voiced her opinion that Hung Kan should be a place of choice, as I have a VIP !
card to dine there, and I should organize this stuff. I think we need to have dinners/get-togethers like this more often, and perhaps we can promote swing dancing at the same time. After dinner, some of us headed over to Vieshow to catch Iron Man, and Gracie, a dancer from Chicago made an appearance to hang out with us before flying home the next day. As the only showing we were able to get was a late one, we grabbed smoothies from the food court, looked at pics taken over the course of the evening, and relaxed a bit before some of us called it a night to catch the last MRT's back home after fun evening out.

Azabu Sabo and Coldstone
It's Mother's Day sunday, and I came up with the spur-of-the-moment idea to rally together those of us in Taipei without Mother's Day plans to get dinner and dessert afterward. We went out to Azabu Sabo by 101, and as Leven and Cadence had just gotten back from Thailand, dinner discussion was about the adventures they had for a week in Thailand. After dinner and several rounds of green tea, we took a short walk to Coldstone for their ice cream creations. It might've been the ice cream or the habit of dancing sunday nights or both, but wer started dancing outside New York New York, with an audience watching, possibly gawking, but who knows. Anyway, some of hummed or sang some swing tunes and thsoe not humming were dancing in the dark.