DDz Family

‘Cos no matter who you are, or where you are from, your dance crew will always be family

Dance DerivativeZ: To many of us, dance was a territory unventured; it was a place that was full of wonder yet at the same time full of uncertainties. It was a place that had high barrier to entry to most of us. But thanks DDz, for accepting us into the dance scene unconditionally. It was a small group of people so newly formed that I had no reason to call it a family at first. The seniors then were helpful and crazy and trying their best to make us feel at home. But of course, it takes two hands to clap. And I am glad that those from my batch who stayed - Priscilla Teh, Au Cheuk Yee, Tiffany Koh, Chow Wong Chong, Leung Chi Kwan, Howard Lok, Enyan Emmie Max Koh, Lee Kern Choong, Lawrence Kam, Soh Mei Yu and Chua Hui Shan - (and kudos to those who stayed till the very end! + Tay Kang Sheng and Lim Aunn Ning) helped to make DDz so fun crazy and warm that it became a place that I/we are proud to call a family. To a lot of us, DDz is really a very special place.

As a university student, it was supposed to be “studies first, fifth rows second”. But I don’t know since when was it that it had become “dance first, studies second” for me. I spent a lot more time on dance than necessary, and I guess some of us would agree that we had been using this phrase a little bit too often: “Sorry I have dance..” Sometimes I wonder if I have actually put my priorities on the wrong thing? In any case, when people go around hashtagging #TGIF, I told myself #TGIW. Dance and sessions with DDz had become almost the only thing that I looked forward to every week. Until recently, I finally started to say #TGIF because sessions were shifted to both Wednesdays and Fridays. I can’t believe how someone who was so not used to making friends and hanging around with people would actually feel excited for the sessions just because the person get to see the people that he has grown so comfortable with. Be it alumni, juniors or freshies. And I guess it is this comfort that allows us to dance better. It is amazing how dance and DDz brought all these awesomely amazing people together.

To the graduating batch: 3.5 years, we have grown and improved, not an improvement expected for people who have already danced for 3 years, but we have grown nonetheless. Remember how every time when we revisited our previous performances or choreos, we always cringed and screamed “omg looked so cui so uglyyyyy”? How we just wanted to look away and watch someone else who could do better? And how we secretly or openly thought to ourselves that if we were to do the same choreos again now how would we look like? Just by comparing our current selves and those in our previous videos, we could tell how much we have progressed in this journey. And I would say that the growth is not just restricted to dance alone. We learnt to think for others, think for the members, think for the club; we learnt to be humble and help others, because we know that regardless of how far we have gone there are always be people who are better than us （一山還有一山高）, and also because we have been in the shoes of those who just started dancing and we know how it felt like to have the opportunity to do something that you have always wanted to do; we learnt to be open-minded, exploring different genres of dance, because we know that dance is dance and should not be restricted to just hip hop alone; and perhaps some of us also started to learn what dance truly means for us (ok at least this is a recent realization and enlightenment for myself, personal note haha). 

To the rest of the family: Different batches have different directions that they want the club to move forwards, and I am quite sure that it has no difference this year. But regardless of what direction the club is taking, in the end it always boils down to one thing that is in common for every batch. And this is what kept us together and why we started in the first place. I don’t want to mention here because I think this should be something that y’all figure out yourselves haha you might not have right now but I hope you do eventually (sorry I had to 賣 a bit of 關子 here). ANYWAYS, thanks for all the supper jio; thanks for being accepting; thanks for being open-minded; thanks for being crazy, thick-skinned and fun; thanks for the hard work in throwing faces; thanks for pushing hard and never give up; thanks for being willing to get out of your comfort zone; thanks for proving that nothing stops you from your passion if your passion is indeed strong; thanks for showing the excitement in what you do, regardless of teaching or learning; thanks for enlightening me what dance truly is about; thanks for looking out for each other; thanks for being patient; thanks for coming down and/or holding all the extra sessions; thanks for being humble, willing to learn and willing to share; thanks for being happy to share; thanks for teaching me that when someone is willing to learn, it would be stupid to not help; thanks for tanking all my nonsense and sometimes angst; thanks for taking it seriously when I sought help from you; and lastly, thanks for giving me, and the alumni, a reason to come back after we graduate.

Not forgetting our instructors!

Melissa Ng: Thanks for taking care of us all the new bloods when we first started! That day in Dover was probably the first day of dancing for some of us and you were the reason (or at least part of it) that most of us stayed. We learnt so much from you, all the bounces, all the isolations, all the hit draaaaaag, etc etc all the foundations. I looked forward to every session and missed the time when you actually joined us for supper at 34! Without your guidance from the start, I honestly don’t know where most of us would be at this moment. Truly our 啓蒙老師! Thanks for believing in the club and believing in the new bloods so that our tradition of no membership fees and no audition could be carried on till today. And thanks for believing in me regarding the captaincy haha :) 

Marcus Leong: Thanks for always being so inspirational every single time! Every session with you just makes me feel like there is something more that can be achieved and I want to achieve that! Thanks for solidifying our basics; thanks for pushing us further than we thought we could manage; thanks for teaching us that it is more important to dance for others and not just yourselves; thanks for showing us the right attitude; andddd many other things whether they are told directly or indirectly! Let’s save some space because I think if I am listing them out it is gonna take another page of this haha. But most importantly, thanks for believing in the club’s motto that anybody can dance and always having faith in the dancers :)

We started small, known only to the SUTDents as the only dance club in SUTD. And slowly, we made a name for ourselves during Marina Regatta 2015, our first ever competition. Perhaps our entrance to the local dance scene was not that impactful yet (it was indeed not), but nonetheless it was our first step into getting ourselves known. And this year we made a name yet again on a bigger stage, s24’16! True that there is still gonna be a long way to go before we can truly be fighting on the same level as other teams, but, quote from someone, “... you don’t have to be the best dancer to touch people’s hearts, you don’t need the perfect technique to be recognised, and if we are always waiting to be good enough before we step out there then we probably never will ...” and “... while dance skills and technique require time to build, the purpose foundation will determine where the club would be years to come ...” This time, we shone a little bit more brightly on stage, not because of our techniques, but because our aim to make a person’s night, mission accomplished! This event marked the start of SUTD DDz in the local dance scene, and I am very glad and feel very lucky that I was part of this team :)

And within DDz, we started to move on from state zero within the recent years. We started on choreographing. We did our solo choreographies for TMB “audition”, some of us even did another piece of choreography for choregraphers’ “audition”. On top of that, we even did a few items for the concert as well as for other performances such as the Open House performance. And more opportunities for choreographing to come! And recently, we started on the attempt to freestyle. Most of us started off learning to follow choreographies and freestyling is really really hard for us to get comfortable with. Nonetheless, time to get out of our comfort zone. Every batch brings new things to the club and I am genuinely curious to see how DDz will be in the years to come :)

After writing so much, I think I will probably still be seeing y’all after I am back from Taiwan haha so peace out!