World Of Dance Chicago 2012

Wow! This is my first World of Dance post even though this is my third year attending. Well, I guess it makes sense since I wasn't a very active blogger in 2011 and 2010.

Just to sum up this event, just like many other dance showcasing events, it's a great competition where a spectrum of different hip hop crews around the area display their talent, love, and passion for dance. It's a great, wonderful, and always super hype show. It's one of those things I always look forward to months in advance. It's just.. great!

This year, a few of my favorite acts included...

Versatile ENT

I don't know what this style of hip hop is..

But I like it.

I'm still trying to find out if there's a more specific term for it.

Vicious

Work in Progress

And lastly,

The Puzzle League (1ST PLACE)

Not only do I love watching dance, I love watching it live. There's this raw energy and feeling that you can't capture in video. It's still wonderful to watch and relive the event. For you readers and watchers, hopefully the cheering and screaming can give you a little understanding of just how hype it gets.

That Valirian Root Experiment

In a previous post, I've mentioned the good and bad effects of valirian root. Basically, good = helps you sleep and bad = gives you really f***ed up dreams.

Regardless of the bad, I wanted to try it ... AND I GOT MY ROOMIES TO TRY IT WITH ME TOO!
Let's make this really quick and dry.

Purpose:
The purpose of this experiment is to observe the effects of ingesting valirian root in tea form.

Materials:
-Valirian Root
-condensed milk
-boiling water
-participants

Procedure:
-put 1 tbsp of valirian root into a cup
-add however much condensed milk to sweeten
-pour boiling water (boil water prior)
-drink
-repeat all steps for each participant

Results:

Hiep: knocked out, no nightmares
Henry: knocked out, no nightmares
Jeff: experienced difficulty sleeping, no nightmares
Dan: experienced difficulty sleeping, no nightmares
Emily: experienced difficulty sleeping, no nightmares

Conclusion:
Inconclusive. Results varied. However, although it worked for only 2/5 participants, I would argue that it's a potent sleeping aid. Hiep, who had only been awake for 4 hrs prior to ingestion of said weed, managed to knock out for a whole day and miss his classes. Henry also knocked out and missed all his classes. Jeff, Dan, and Emily may be sensitive towards sweets and the condensed milk may have kept them awake more than the Valirian Root made them want to sleep.

Nightmares. I wish I had em. I wonder what I would dream up. In the future, I would like to try this again but without the condensed milk. Give me nightmares, damnit!

AAA FS - Fall Runthroughs 2012

Ahh... the rush of anxiety and excitement of runthroughs. Not only do I get to perform the dances I've learned and practiced on a stage--but this time around, I also get to lead a scene through the dances on a stage.

Each scene only gets 30 minutes on stage and with that small amount of time, we wanted to accomplish a lot:
     Firstly, we wanted to see how well everyone knew the choreography. We split up everyone into groups, so everyone has a chance to be in the front and we can record them and review 'em later. From our recordings, we can see which parts we may need to clarify in future practices and which parts are solid.

     Secondly, we get to try out little things now that we have a stage. One thing I wanted to try out was a little gimmick with the first line and second line doing opposite things, and see if that composition works well. For example, one line going up while the other goes down. Another is to try out line switches and how smoothly they can run.

     Lastly, we get to see our models do they thang! Even though it's not the real show, we do take it seriously. The time we get to practice on a stage is really precious. Runthroughs is like 5% of the show but getting that small glimpse of what the models can do really makes a coord proud of everything everyone's accomplished.

Clybourne (Cly's)

Day 2 with the visitees!

Group dinner! Made some rice, choy, ¿chicken?, and strawberrry poppyseed salad.

Then, we went out to dance for a little at another bar called Cly's.

Here are the ladies -- and me.

And Jeffff!!

:D!! I love this picture!! We have the same mouth-gaping-open face, but it was completely accidental. COINCIDENCE!!! I was singing a song and he just made the face and by fate, the picture was taken in that moment in time. BY FATE!

Anyways, Cly's was fun. I've been there like twice before ... and it was always fun! Always good music and a nice crowd.

Chester Street Bar (C-Street)

Becky, Ruth, and Jackie visited Urbana this weekend.

We had dinner at Teresa's. "Thank you, Teresa for making us dinner! It was delicious!!" Then, we got ready for a night out at Chester Street Bar.

First time at C-Street Bar. Glad to share it with all these lovelies.

Including Jeffffffffffff!!

Conclusion
They play techno-ed versions of top 40 hits and many female 80s and 90s artists. It was hard to dance to. However, there's a nice (and a little awkward) crowd and really cheap cover charge--$3.

For a Friday night, the crowd was scarce. I've heard so many good things about this bar, but maybe we came on the wrong night. I'll have to check it out some other time, but this time was a little disappointing. We still had a lot of fun with each other though dancing on the dance floor.

AASHO Ramen Contest - Chapaghetti Round

I comp-EAT-ed with 3 others in the Chapaghetti Round.

It's such a good noodle.

The sauce and stuff tastes just like Korean jjajangmyun (black bean) noodles.

It probably is jjajangmyun.  

Get Set...

GO!
(but first, I wanted to blow some steam away)

YUM!

Neil (my "father" in AAA), Michelle, and I all won our respective rounds. YAY! Neil got some big box o' choco-thangs, I won a big box of koala crackers thangs (I only had 3 bags left 'cause I gave away all the other bags), and Michelle won a big box of Pocky.