Ballet in Summertime

MANILA, Philippines - I didn’t really know what ballet was, but when I was eight years old my mom took me to watch a show at the Cultural Center of the Philippines (CCP). The theater was cold and dark and I remember a lady in red dancing and she was awesome. I think I slept for the remainder of the program but I never forgot the dancer. I thought everybody who goes to ballet school can dance like that.

So I told my mom I wanted to swap my swimming class with dance class. I started in my school’s dance club. A few months later, I moved to Perry Sevidal Ballet when a school friend, Maegan Hinolan, encouraged me to enroll in a real ballet school. It was even more fun – bigger studio with mirrors all around, a balcony and the teacher was great. I love Teacher Perry to this day.

But it was almost summer and I didn’t know there were ballet classes in summer. I used to tag along to my mom’s office and my mom’s boss, Tita Doreen, invited me to join the annual CCP Summer Dance Workshop. Of course, I said yes. I knew the CCP and I still remembered the dancer in the red dress. 

On the first day of class, I got scolded, or my mom did. I wasn’t wearing the required uniform and my hair had too many bangles. In that class, I met my first ballet friend, Gia Cuerpo. When we started practicing our dance for the recital, our costume wasn’t red at all – it was green. They said our class would be the ninja turtles in a program called “Under the Sea, Up in the Sky.” On the day of the recital, my family was there, plus so many relatives and friends. Of course Tita Doreen was there. It was just too overwhelming – the stage, the people in different costumes, the noise, the picture taking.

Many of us in that class stayed with the CCP Dance School after the summer workshop. But over the years, many moved on. Many would also come back only during summers. But Gia and I stayed on. 

Every summer was different – different production, different memories. But it’s always fun. With our big bags and water jugs, we stay there almost the whole day, going up and down the CCP. Every floor is a place of discovery. The guards would sometimes chase us for being too noisy. We hang out in the hallways, near the registrar’s office, at the foot of the stairs leading up to the Main Theater. It was our big playground. We’d eat in the buffeteria or cross the street to Harbour Square. We also love Tita Amor’s home-cooked lunches, tacos and barbecues. 

I remember each summer for the dancing roles assigned to our class. I was one of the court children in “Swan Lake,” a tarsier in a “A Forest Tale,” a folk dancer in “Ang Pilya,” a water strider in “Starzan Jenis” and one of the evil ones in “A Garden Tale.”

On my second summer at CCP, I met one of my closest friends in ballet, Acushla Obusan, who also became my classmate in school that year. The summers were most memorable with Acushla because we’d go to the lectures together. There would be classes in make-up, dance history, food and nutrition for dancers, preventing injuries, choreography and music. From Acushla, I learned a lot about fashion and make up, too. 

That summer, I also enrolled in a class called Children’s Contemporary and Modern Movement (CCCM). Since then I’d enroll in modern dance classes and there were different dancing roles, too. Last summer, we were dolphins. The year before that we wore dresses with the color of sunset as we danced a tribute to Mother Earth. As I grew older, the CCCM class became the Elementary Modern class. There were hip-hop classes, too.

All CCP Dance School students are encouraged to audition for a scholarship grant because the school gives overwhelming support to promising ballet students who eventually become company members.

I first joined the scholarship audition when I was nine years old. I didn’t make it. I auditioned many times more in the next three years and I didn’t make it then either. It was a very big lesson in humility.

Then exactly on my 13th birthday, I passed. It opened my eyes to the world of ballet – that it wasn’t just the fun; you need to work very hard for a goal.

I learned other things – diets and exercise, dance wear, crunches and fitness training, pride in the Filipino dancer, and above all, humility. From our dance school director, Teacher Victor Ursabia, I learned the importance of being a humble and disciplined dancer, and the importance of training to excel. From our principal, Teacher Rubylee Gomez, I learned about professionalism – coming to class each day and being punctual. Best of all, I learned that the lady dancer in the red dress that I admired very much as a kid was none other than one of my dance teachers, Rhea Dumdum-Bautista.

It isn’t always easy. I need to juggle school activities with ballet schedules. I can’t join my friends in mall outings or movies or parties held on weekends and summer outings. I can’t join too many extra curricular activities in school. I need to manage my time very well so I can get good grades despite ballet classes and rehearsals. I always need to show my parents that my studies will not suffer. But I enjoy it very much.

I’m 14 now and will be celebrating my 15th birthday this summer. My friends and I are looking forward to another summer dance workshop. We know that there’ll be new teachers, new friends, new dances and new memories. The workshop is only five to six weeks, but the memories are for life!

Join the author at the 44th CCP Summer Dance Workshop from April 2 to May 5 at the CCP. Contact the CCP Dance School/Ballet Philippines at tel 551-0221 or visit www.ballet.ph.