Charleston, baby!

The only place in the state of South Carolina to get my biometrics done for the UK is in Charleston. Lucky for me it’s Thanksgiving week and I could take time off, my sweet friend Lauren was driving to Charleston so I hitched a ride and payed a visit to my expecting friend Christin. It’s such a treat to hang out and relax with her and her family. Pregnancy is such an intriguing process; I keep asking her about it, and trying to get her to reveal her baby boy’s name to me, but she won’t do it!

I’m amazed at everything that’s normal about her being pregnant – she can do just about everything she used to except bend over to pull on her pants and tie her shoes. Mostly she said, you’re just very aware of changes in your body and bodily functions. I don’t believe women who say they “never knew they were pregnant”. Ya, right! You’re just not aware of this gigantic beach ball that forms right under your inflamed breasts?

Well, I have to say this is the first baby I can truthfully say I am looking forward to being born. I guess I have a reason to be interested in him since his Mom’s my friend. I am planning on being in England when he’s born, so I will be relying on sharing photos online. Baby Verkaik, on the way!!

Christin, Michael and I had some good conversations/discussions over lunch at Poe’s in downtown Charleston. Here’s what I can take away from my visit:

Edgar Allen Poe lived in Sullivan’s Island for awhile, and there’s restaurant named after him.

Charleston and Columbia are the only places to do things in South Carolina.

The only thing to do in Clemson is drink or hunt.

The gamecock is a stupid mascot.

We all identify ourselves with a group of people to a certain extent so we should go easy on Southern frat boys and sorority girls. We just don’t pay for our friends.

I can’t do anything stupid because the UK government has ALL my finger prints (not that I would).

Dachshunds are sweeter dogs than I thought they could be, although they can bark out a hyena.

There’s nothing wrong with a girl asking a guy out in our society.

That doesn’t mean it’s the norm.

Would prefer he asked her to marry him though.

Men like to feel they are men, but that doesn’t mean women need to wait on them to make all the decisions.

Yes, our economy sucks. And our healthcare system sucks. And our education system sucks. (at least paying for it does)

It’s free in most of Europe.

Why am I going to England then, except to meet some hot prince, right? Ha. The castles, for sure…And soccer, or football, so I’ve heard…

Rotary Ambassador Scholarship Interviews, day 2

Whew! this has been a long time coming. All the preparations for the interviews, and it is over so soon. I am looking forward to their decisions but am slightly sad that this process may be coming to an end for some of us hopeful applicants. It is hard to believe that I was in that room with many of the brightest, most ambitious college students in South Carolina, talking to such important public officers and successful businessmen and women. I had good scores in high school that got me scholarships to good universities, but I didn’t take them because I wanted to be a ballet dancer.  yes, I know how ridiculous it sounds. “girl follows childhood fantasy”. Well, five years later, and here I am, in college in a place I never thought I would live or even visit, and what myriad opportunities have been presented to me! I had to search for them, and I can’t help but wonder if I would have done this as a younger college student.

I feel silly for being so nervous. Rotarians are some of the most welcoming and delightful people in the world. They also all seem to have a sense of humor! I was so surprised at that Columbia Club’s Rotary meeting I went to back in March to hear the speakers all cracking jokes at the expense of their fellow Rotarians. Even in light of the recent layoffs at the State newspaper that affected one of their senior members, the club members showed their respect and support amid jokes about his career. Today I made them laugh a little in my interview, but my personality does more for “intense” and “serious” than “class clown” or ” center of attention”. I avoided talking about dance much because it is a tender spot I knew would make me tear up. Instead I focused on presenting myself in the light of being what the description of the scholarship is: an ambassador of goodwill.

What things I forgot I wanted to say to impress them in my interview, I believe I made up for in the essays we had to write there. If only everything could be in writing! I talked about how the arts and dance can give voice to promoting goodwill and peace in the world, the guiding principles of RI, but my ideas were somewhat abstract. How can they be concrete when I am unsure where I am going? Part of the reason I want to go abroad is to give me a better perspective of the arts, preservation of dance and what we can do to make dance uniquely American all the while finding where my voice  fits into all of this and can help affect change.  I have such a desire to use my gifts to help reach others and to affect change in people’s lives, but it is harder to see how to use the arts for such purposes, specifically how performing arts.

There are a few companies and organizations that have done that. The Bitone Center for Disadvantaged Children in Kampala, Uganda, made possible by the Rotary Foundation, has given many war-stricken orphans healing through teaching them cultural dance in addition to meeting their physical needs. The joy on those children’s faces is incredible.

Bitone Center in Uganda

I have had the privilege to work briefly here at the  University of South Carolina with Thaddeus and Tanya Davis. Their company’s mission is to use aesthetic ballet-based contemporary dance in conjunction with other arts to create dialogue about current issues and events. I was educated on the devastation of Hurricane Katrina by WidemanDavis Dance’s moving performance in Columbia this May, “A Katrina Story”. It was a shame not more people showed up. If we could get them to come, I think more people would care about using the arts to advance world understanding. There is so much potential and people, Americans are so blind! Where is our sense of culture, America?!

Wideman Davis Dance

The arts can build and preserve a nation’s identity and cultural history, yes, but I believe dance can be so much more than entertainment or history museums; it can convey a message deeper than words alone. Classically trained dancers have a powerhouse of potential stored up; they are acutely more aware of themselves, their feelings, their bodies, their surroundings, the music, the feel of the floor, others around them and the direction of energy toward them. Dance wields power over people’s emotions and physical response.  What my part in this grand scheme of things will look like I am yet to find out.

Eager Rotary Ambassador Scholar applicants

Rotary Ambassador Scholarship Interviews, day 1

I am privileged to be an applicant for an Ambassadorial Scholarship through the Rotary Foundation to study abroad for a year. Here in Pawley’s Island there are about 20 applicants who have made it through the first interviews with their sponsor clubs, and are here to prove that they should be chosen to represent the Rotary International and the United States. I began the process at the beginning of this year, and made contacts with Rotarians in one of the largest Rotary clubs in the country, here in District 7770, South Carolina. What an incredible experience this has been to learn about and get involved with one of the largest service organizations in the world. I am excited to see which country they choose to send me to out of my five choices, and would be thrilled if they suggested somewhere else, as long as it has a arts center for the arts and ballet company. Even if I am not awarded this prestigious scholarship, I have learned a lot about myself and this fantastic organization through the process.

The chief challenge of RI is to eradicate Polio throughout the world. There are currently only four countries left in the world today where Polio is an endemic, and that is largely due to the efforts and generous contributions of Rotarians and the Bill&Melinda Gates Foundation. How dance and writing as my course of study can help promote RI’s goals of promoting world peace and understanding is what I intend to shed light on to the panel tomorrow morning. Who knows but that one could use performing arts to bring issues like the need for one last push to eradicate Polio into the public eye? In this day and age when the arts themselves are losing ground, we must fight to use them to our advantage – for communication that is truly beyond words and has power to bridge cultural and language barriers by creating a response on a physical and emotional level in its audiences. How can we use our art to help change the world?