My family has been involved with our local Hungarian Hall in Brantford, Ontario, for quite literally decades now. My father was a Csárdás dancer for the hall when he was a boy, up until his teenage years; my uncle and aunt also danced, and my Aunt was an ambassador for the hall one year; my sister, cousins and I have been Csárdás dancers over the years as well, with my sister being an ambassador for a few years and the Hungarian Queen for our hall one year as well.
I danced from the age of four or five until I was 11 or 12, took a hiatus, and returned again when I was about 19 and continued until I was about 21 or 22 to the best of my recollection. The Csárdás dancers perform annually at the International Villages Festival and other events throughout the year, sometimes local and sometimes not so local.
I had dinner with my parents, sister and Blaine on Sunday, and my sister and I started talking about Hungarian dance and reminiscing about when I was still a Csárdás dancer. She asked me how well I thought I could remember the steps to the dances I participated in, and soon enough, we found ourselves once again dancing to songs I hadn’t danced in years.
My sister is still dancing, so our little improvisation session was no issue for her. I was rather rusty with a couple of the dances, but in others, I was gobsmacked by how well I could remember the steps. I had so much damn fun dancing to these songs again, and my favourite performance when I was still dancing was to Szekelyfoldi – my sister and I naturally started with this one, and I was delighted with how few errors I committed.
The joy and happiness I felt performing these songs again with my sister was fantastic. If you have old hobbies and activities you’ve given up, consider this a sign to dabble in them once more. You might surprise yourself with how much fun you have.
The image for this post is a screenshot of a YouTube video which can be found here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_LXdULgojEk&ab_channel=kklail1977
I’m in the middle of the screenshot with the red skirt, and we are performing the bottle dance.
ontheedgeofeverything 