Interpretive Dancing to Celine Dion

I'm leaving in 3 days.

!!!!!!!!!

I've really stepped up my game in preparing for my departure. Thus far, I have packed.... drum roll please.... 4 pairs of undies and my bachelor's degree. Yup, I'm basically set.
It is starting to set in that I'm actually leaving. It's weird; I've left the country many times before (see my first blog post) but never for THIS long... I'm leaving for a whole friggen' year. What the hell am I getting myself into?

This seems to be the common reaction when I tell others what I'm doing with post-graduation life. "Oh hey, you're a Spanish major and you are going to Taiwan for a year? That's ... interesting... So, you speak, uh, ... Taiwanese...?"

I'm trying to prepare myself as much as possible but it just isn't happening.

Anyway, to summarize what's been happening recently, I finished my TRiO job. It was an awesome job - I worked with fantastic people, great students, fun opportunities and many random shenanigans; however, I'm glad it's over. My life became so TRiO-centric and I didn't have much time for anything else (hence my lack of preparedness for my upcoming adventures). We ended on a great note though - building a badass fort. At 1am the guys across the hall and I decided to use 2 mattresses, 6+ blankets, a mop, a broom, some random kitchen supplies, a piece of wood, and various pieces of furniture to create pure epicness. Here we are, role modeling maturity for our high school students to look up to.

Of course, in tradition with past blog posts, I am at the point when I'm writing 0% Taiwan-related stuff and 100% awkward-related stuff. But what type of blog with this be without those stories? I went to a wedding yesterday, which provided for many uncomfortabley awesome situations.

First of all, the ceremony and reception were 3.5 hours apart. Jessica and I thought we could drive around Byron Center and find something to do during this time, but we got lost for almost an hour. We did end up taking a picture with giant chicken and a pirate pinata at a dollar store though, which is always a plus.


Right from when we walked into the reception and Kenny G was pumping from the speakers I knew the night would be awkward. Kenny G continued to play for about 1.5 hours, which is simply too much Kenny G. Really, two songs is too much Kenny G.
We attempted to amuse ourselves by interpretive dancing to Kenny G and making fake lighter-at-a-concert hand motions, but really, how much fun can be had when excessive Kenny G is happening? Not much. Not even interpretive dancing could increase the funness.

90 minutes later the DJ stopped that madness for the bride and groom's first dance. Then came Celine Dion. I thought Kenny was bad, but oh man, did I yearn for his sweet saxophone music when My Heart Will Go On was played straight for 25 minutes. I'm not even joking - the DJ kept hitting repeat over. And over. And over.


The interpretive dancing begun again, of course. The wedding photographer noticed my extreme skills of beat-boxing and interpretive dancing to Celine Dion and he and I started amusing ourselves by creating drinking games as to whether the song would be repeated again. I realized this was only going to make me quite intoxicated as Celine was one her 6thish round at that point. The poor wedding couple is going to find many pictures of me chugging drinks on their wedding album...

Finally, the DJ wised up and ixnayed the Titanic song and played some classy music, Ke$ha. This DJ has style... two hours of just Kenny G, Celine Dion, AND Ke$ha? Wow. I wonder if I could pay him to follow me around with a boombox so he could create a continuous soundtrack of my life?

Jessica and I decided to hit the dance floor because no one else was, and besides, Kenny G inspired interpretive dancing and Celine Dion drinking games were getting old.

The DJ threw in some typical wedding dance music - Cupid's Shuffle, Apple Bottom Jeans, etc., and then threw in some Michael Jackson. At this point, the dance floor had been evacuated, as had most of the older crowd from the place entirely. However, one lone soul represented the 50+ generation who had left in order to make their 9pm bedtimes. And wow, did she represent them well. Put this in a new tab so you have background music to make this story seem more epic. Billie Jean inspired her to jump up on the empty dance floor and impress us with her Michael-inspired moves. There were body spins, crotch grabs, and pelvic thrusts galore. This was entertaining in itself because again, this was a drunken grandma aged lady in pearls and a suit who was dancing alone on the stage to Billie Jean. Then, she got a little too crazy. And fell on her face. Literally. I give her props though, because after she fell she pulled herself up and continued to pelvic thrust.


On that note, I should go to bed as it's quickly approaching 2 am. Hopefully the next time I am posting I am in my hotel in Taipei and I am describing all of the awesome that is happening. I shall leave you with the moral of this blog post: Don't dance too hard to Billie Jean. She is not your lover. You will only end up falling on your face. If, God forbid, you do fall, just keep pelvic thrusting like nothing happened.