I had the craziest weekend.... I went with Aura to billifeld germany to participate in the festival there, which is getting to be pretty normal... But this time it seemed like the gods were against us. First our plane was delayed, we almost missed our connection in prague and all of our bags were left behind. The airline didn't know where they were, or how long it would take to get them to us. Of course we were staying two hours away from the airport, and were only in germany for the weekend. Needless to say most of our costumes were in the bags. Luckily most of us got our bags back saturday night, and all the costumes were returned. But that was not the end of our troubles. Sunday was incredibly hot and humid, we were sweating like pigs as we rehearsed all day. It was the opening night of the festival and so everyone was there: teachers, administrators, critics, etc. After all the speaches and introductions, it started raining. Hard. The lobby flooded with water, and you could hear thunder through the music. Then during the second half of the show, the CD skipped and our music went back about 5 minutes. Disaster. Not only did we have to find some way to fill all the extra music, but because the music that we are using is very repetitive, we didn't even know where we were in the music when it resumed. Somehow we all managed to follow Ruta, who had us repeat part of the choreography and managed to get us back on the music through much whispering and a small miracle. Of course, I couldn't understand a word being said onstage which made it even more difficult. The really amazing thing is that the audience gave us a standing ovation, stomping the floor and everything. They knew that the music stopped but they had no idea that it went backwards, or that what they saw was a group improvisation. And what was most shocking is that everyone said that they loved the performance. Honestly. I guess we managed to stay in unison and keep the spirit of the piece throughout the whole ordeal. I have never had anything like this happen to me before. Life lesson #784. The director of the festival took us out after the show for drinks and some (not so intense) dancing. He really enjoyed having us and said that he wished to do some more collaboration in the future. Maybe he will come to the festival in Kaunas in the fall. I hope so. He teaches/performs contemporary african dance. Unfortuneately we had to leave so quickly that we didn't have a chance to take any classes or see any other perfomances. I would love to find out what "contemporary african dance" is and how it differs from contemporary dance and african dance...