Australian Irish Dancing Photography Live Commentary: June 2012

Feis update and end of day for LiveCam and LiveCommentary

The 13 Years & Over teams will be on stage soon, but as noted in an earlier post, due to a rugby commitment (!), ChaosCentral will not be covering these this afternoon.

But we will be back, bright-eyed and bushy-tailed (just remembered, possums are disliked over here - oops!) tomorrow morning.

Results - Under 8 Years and 16 Years & Over

Presentations!!

Followed by 13 Years and Over 4, 6 & 8 Hand dances :)

Set dances are finished

And we are having a short break before the 13 Years and Over Traditional set dances...those of you not watching LiveCam just missed a traditional two-hand choreography with broom, danced by Vince Mortimer :)

The traditional set dancers are now on stage.

This morning's results :)

Faster than me trying to type them in by hand :)

Oops again...

The last post should have been made almost an hour ago....we were distracted by pretty crystals on dresses and forgot to press the "publish" button :(

In other feis news, the 16 Years & Over set dances are almost complete, next will be the 13 Years and over traditional set dances (18 competitors) followed by presentations and afternoon tea. ChaosCentral is hanging out for scones, jam and cream....good thing the family is in the US and won't be reading this - until after I have them!

Feis update

ChaosCentral has, on your behalf, been sampling the delights of the canteen and can recommend the savoury scones and tea!

Back in the dancing world, the widely-spread age groups are dancing the reel, almost finished now and then moving on to set dances. Just to add to our confusion, although the two age groups competing are the 8 Years & Under and the 16 Years & Over, the Killarney Cup is open to dancers aged 13 Years and over....the 13-15 Years aren't competing today apart from team dances.

Marshalling for the 16 Years & Over sets

I have no idea either…..?

Casual, replacement, stand-in, short-term, contract…..but itinerant? Not sure I like or understand the inferrence :)

16 Years & Over ready to go!

And the Under 8 Years too :)

Under 8 Years are on stage now

16 Years and Over are getting ready….

Feis update

Lunchtime - dancing and LiveCommentary back at about 1330 :)

Only three more set dancers....

Then on to presentations! Temperature is getting a little cool in here, but the hardy Cantaburians seem to think it is OK - brrrrrrrrrrr. After presentations, ChaosCentral will be off to get hot food in an attempt to warm up and store away some energy for tonight's entertainment.

Close followers of ChaosCentral will be aware of the vast sporting knowledge and understanding that we bring to all events; none, to be precise. After the feis ends today, we are being hosted at a rugby match, Crusaders v Hurricanes, at the (re)built stadium in Christchurch. They take their sport seriously down here, as we found last year when visiting during the Rugby World Cup. They have a fully rebuilt and renovated operating stadium, but a trashed city centre - that is sporing dedication.

As the last dancer leaves the stage, we are readying for presentations!

Feis update

Just having a short break before the final set dances.....presentations and lunch will follow.

Technology update
LiveCam is coming to you at a much higher resolution that in Australia. We are using a TelecomNZ SIM and can stream at full resolution, whereas in Australia, due to the crappy OPTUS network, we can only stream at low resolution and even then it drops out frequently. And that is in the middle of major cities at different locations. Clearly the NZ 3G network is much more usable than the Australian one....

Feis update

Looks like we are running early!! 8 and Under 10 Years set dances are now on stage, traditional sets at the moment and 10 and Under 12 Years soon after. Presentations and lunch will follow :) Stay tuned.

Feis scenes

The hall is full of happy people

Getting ready

This is the way to enjoy a feis!!!

Some of the workers!!

Waiting in marshalling...

Something you don't see every day...

A dancer in the slip jig section had a shoe problem and removed the shoe - OK, ChaosCentral is used to that in Australia. But then rather than moving to their starting position on the stage and waiting/hoping to re-dance, the dancer held the shoe and continued dancing with one shoe on and one off - and danced very nicely too!

Feis update...

We are now starting class 656 - Slip Jig 10 and Under 12 Years, with 19 competitors in the section.

Gourmet food update

This weather certainly encourages the consumption of hot food, and there are plenty of hame made delights available at the canteen run by the O'Neill School.

Although there isn't a chocolate crackle in sight, the mini pies and sausage rolls are excellent. Later in the day we will report on the curried kumera soup :)

Interesting notes.....

The Irish Dancing this weekend is but one part of a larger programme of activities held under the banner of the Christchurch Competitions Society. There is also music, drama, reciting, singing and other forms of dancing, including Highland Dancing. And the first few sections of the Highland Dancing competitions are....Irish reels, jigs and hornpipes! Thank goodness we don't have Irish Dancing with swords :)

The dancers at this feis are on stage doing their hard shoe rounds and they all sound fantastic. Not only because they are good dancers, but because they are dancing on a wooden floor *without* tarquet - as we used to in Australia.....the sound is dramatically different from what is heard in Australian competitions as every little touch of the stage makes a sound.