When it comes to module track allocations, this is how I find it generally goes. Take every track I like, love, or am itching to teach, and disregard it. Take the remaining tracks, and pick the one that is my weakest to execute, and that's the track I ended up getting.
By the stage the module was confirmed, and it was confirmed to be on BODYJAM 57.
For those of you who don't have the ability to view the routines, here is a little snippet of the BODYJAM 57 training session from Sydney in July of 2011; this is the beginning of the Street Party Riot routine. The guy presenting it is the choreography of the program, Gandalf Archer. (Yes, seriously. His name is Gandalf. And he often wears grey too. Mind blown.)
I can confirm that I do not look even 1% as cool as any of the guys in that video.
Through teaching with Rhys, I had fortunately managed to teach the whole release top to bottom, non-stop, and was thrown in the deep end with it also.
As in...
| Rhys | Guess what, Rai Rai's teaching the second half! |
| Me | HUH??? |
| * Rhys throws microphone at me and runs off the stage | |
| Rhys | TEE HEE! |
From the teaching and the feedback that I got, I figured that the two tracks I could possibly be given was 1) the isolations track - Gloria Estefan's 'Go Away', and 2) a track from the Street Party Riot block by Vandalism & Static Revenger called 'Vegas'. So I started doing a lot of mirror work, scripting, listening to the tracks over and over.
Then, given that I'd put so much effort into learning those two tracks, a thought occurred to me.
"I bet I'm going to get two completely different tracks now..."
That night, an email came through from Tauvaga with our track allocations.
Hey everyone!
Here are your BJ Track allocations for the module this weekend:
...
Raina Singh - Afro Caribbean Street Party 1 - La Tromba Rising and Street Party Riot 3 - Do It Like This
...
Chur everybody, see you Friday at Britomart!
Tau
Rhys thought it was actually good, since he believed my technique was the best in the Caribbean Street Party block, and the second track was small and only had a couple of moves.
On the day of the module, I was so nervous that I felt physically ill. I headed down to Britomart early and stood in front of the mirrors and went through my tracks. Tauvaga came down and introduced himself - although he certainly didn't need to tell me who he was. He'd just presented BJ56 at the previous Auckland workshops, and then he's all over the LMI and LMNZ marketing material, including DVD artwork. (I had to do a massive double take when he appeared on the cover of RPM 47, *without* cycling shoes also)
We had clear guidance on what was expected from us, from what we were going to do for the duration of the module, and how it all fitted together. While I technically had done the module before, I felt I was receiving the information and how it related to Jam much better.
The way that the technique sessions were structured were also really good. As we had a small group, rather than going through the whole masterclass bit by bit, T split the technique sessions into two - the first half of the release, and then the second half. We each had a track from the first half and from the second half, so we all had a lot to concentrate on.
I did have a bit of a problem though. I was the Know It All of the group. Answering all the questions, and adding on to whatever T said, sometimes correcting him.
I found myself constantly apologising as I kept on piping up, because T was super nice he said "Don't be ashamed of your knowledge." Bah. I hereby apologise to everyone who was on that module with me - If I were in your shoes I would have gotten annoyed with me very quickly.
Day 1 ended and I felt optimistic. Presentations were first thing the next day, and I was nervous... but it was a different sort of nervous. I can't really explain how. I'd taught the block a million times, gotten loads of feedback on it before, so I guess what was going through my head was 'Have I forgotten anything?' I'd tried to be as thorough with my technique as possible, but remembering Sarah Robinson and all of the crosses in my technique feedback form had me a bit paranoid.
Day 2 started with our first presentation, and it actually went really smoothly. T gave feedback in a similar way to Sarah in that he gave it immediately after the presentation - though that worked well as we were a small group. The feedback he gave to me was to try and push the breakout more.
And that was it.
I had to take a moment to go. "... Really? That's... Really???"
We did some more exercises, read from the manual more, then did our second part of the technique for the masterclass. This related more to the tracks that were going to present on Day 3, though after that was done T spent some time with us one on one going through both of our tracks. This was really valuable, and I appreciate that for most modules, this probably wouldn't be possible. I think of the 16 people on our RPM module, the 10 people on the multiprogramme module, and the 16 people on the other module I did... then extend that to the 40 people on the CXWORX module... how many of them would have gotten one on one time with the trainer to go over their tracks?
One thing that T said that was heartening was he knew about my being withheld previously, and he was prepared to give me much more help with my technique but was pleasantly surprised. His exact words were, "I can tell that you've put a lot of work into your technique." That's down to Rhys.
I actually felt the second presentation went more worse than the first. I had tried to structure my coaching based on what had been covered in the material that day, and it didn't feel authentic - it felt forced. T asked me immediately after I'd presented how I felt it had gone, and I said, "I didn't like it, it felt contrived." Running with that, he said that he agreed, it didn't feel like the coaching was coming from my heart, but that it was one of those things that I would relax into eventually.
Driving home on the end of Day 2, I was tired, my body was sore, and I was looking forward to a long shower and a warm meal. It was pouring down with rain, so I was really looking forward to getting inside, fed and watered, and to bed.
On the drive though, the car in front of me suddenly slammed on their brakes. I had to slam on mine to avoid rear-ending them, and thankfully, I just managed to avoid hitting them.
But, the woman behind me had no chance. She slammed into my car at over 100k/ph. I didn't immediately feel the soreness, but I was well shaken. I pulled over, and then got out of the car to see if the other woman was all right. She was shaken as well, and I explained to her that the car in front of me had stopped randomly and I had narrowly missed them. We exchanged details and I sat back in my car.
The first person I texted was not a friend, not a family member, but it was T. After the disaster that was Wellington with the injury, I regretted not telling Sarah about it. I wasn't going to repeat it.
I wasn't aware of it at the time, but I had sprained my lower back, neck, and had mild concussion, as well as general whiplash through the neck and shoulders. I was hurting, but I wasn't sure how much of it was fatigue from the module or how much of it was injury from the crash.
I was one day away from finding out whether I was still on this Jam Journey of mine, or whether it was ending. Maybe my priorities were out of line, but I was not going to let the crash stop me. It had been far too much time, and far too much effort to get to this point and there was no way that I was going to let it all go to waste.
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