From around the world Thanks, as always, to our international correspondents, to Lyn Edwards for covering Australia in this issue and, especially, to Marjorie Crawford who is retiring as our New Zealand correspondent. Africa
Asia
Correspondent: Terry Lynne Harris
Correspondent: Arthur McNeill
harritl@unisa.ac.za Cape Town Branch’s Grace Lofthouse, Scroll recipient 2001, past president and teacher (1974 to November 2007) celebrated her 80th birthday in class on Monday, 2 June 2008. In her honour we danced 80 Years Young, choreographed by Pat Donaldson. Our 80-year-old dancers are an inspiration to us all. The six of them are pictured in the photograph. How many branches can equal or better our amazing record?
amcneill@hkbu.edu.hk
Stephen Li with some of his students
dances. They are now preparing a demonstration video, which should help to promote Scottish country dancing to even more Chinese dancers. Stephen is aware that learning Scottish country dancing involves more than a mastery of techniques. The workshops included cultural elements such as the stories associated with particular dances, some dance etiquette, the kilt and other dance clothing, and an appreciation of the music. If Scottish country dancing is to make a serious impression in China, classes taught in Chinese are likely to have the highest impact. Perhaps the soundtrack of Stephen s video needs to have instructions in both Cantonese and Mandarin. .
Australia
Seated: Grace Lofthouse (80) Left to right: Jean Houliston (80); Mollie Moles (82); Alf Husband (81); Brenda Brebner (83); and Dulcie Nicol (80) Irene van Maarseveen, long-standing Pretoria Branch member and teacher, left Pretoria in May 2008 and moved to Belfast in the province of Mpumalanga to join her partner, Sid Jones, and take up a new job. Born in Johannesburg, Irene grew up in Pretoria and obtained her BSc degree in Physics and Maths at the University of Pretoria. Her interests include music, hiking, photography and, of course, Scottish country dancing, which has been a passion of hers for almost 30 years. In 1986 she passed her preliminary exam and in 1994 she became a fully qualified SCD teacher. She has devised numerous dances, two of which, Joie de Vivre and Noah’s Ark, were published by the RSCDS. Pretoria Branch’s two books of dances, Dancing Thistles and Many Happy Hours, both contain a number of Irene’s dances. Irene is sorely missed in Pretoria. The Branch is sincerely grateful for her friendliness and vast contribution to SCD in Pretoria.
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www.rscds.org
In most Scottish country dance groups located outside the English-speaking world, the members are a mixture of locals and expatriates, and classes are generally taught in English. In Hong Kong, where 98% of the population are native speakers of Cantonese, there are probably many potential dancers who would like to learn Scottish country dancing, but would prefer to be taught in their native language. To find out whether classes taught in Cantonese would be popular, Stephen Li, Hong Kong’s only Chinese (almost) fully certificated SCD teacher, devised and conducted a series of workshops, taught in Cantonese, following the RSCDS teaching principles he has learned both in Hong Kong and at the St. Andrews Summer School. During 2007-2008 a total of five different workshops were held, ranging in length from two to five days. Between 30 and 35 participants attended most days. The workshops introduced participants to the basic steps and formations and typically started with a simple dance like Cumberland Reel and culminated in more complex dances such as Moulin Rouge and Ian Powrie s Farewell to Auchterarder! In fact, most of the participants were enthusiastic dancers who had already learned different styles of international dances through their membership of local folk dance groups. Stephen trained his best dancers in advance so that they could demonstrate the new formations and
Correspondent: Lyn Edwards Queensland Branch (on this occasion)
lynedwa@bigpond.net.au One hundred and seventy eager participants gathered at Tallebudgera on the beautiful Gold Coast of Queensland from 6th to 13th July for our annual Australian Winter School. Teachers were Bill Zobel, Vancouver Island; Noeline O’Connor, Wellington; Avis Harrison, Leeds; Anne Kennedy, Sydney; Mary Davidson, Brisbane; and Mechthild Timmins, Adelaide. All were treated to fantastic music throughout the week by Muriel Johnstone, Vancouver Island; Keith Smith, UK; Catherine Fraser, Adelaide; Bruce Mitchell, Caboolture Qld; and Balmoral Band NZ consisting of Iain McKenzie, Sharlene Penman and AnneMarie Forsyth. Muriel led the musicians and ‘wowed’ us with her music each dance session and every social night. Keith and Catherine lead some fiddle workshops that were much appreciated by local musicians, and Sharlene took some sessions for the junior musicians who showed off their expertise at the Musician’s Social on Friday evening and stunned us with their rhythm and playing. On Tuesday evening we held a ceilidh with Muriel as an entertaining MC. Queensland Branch began with an item about the serious water restrictions in place including four-minute showers. Some members then danced the Four Minute Reel. The junior
