About Us

Fat City Swing is Fraser Valley’s youngest and hippest swingin' hot spot! Fat City Swing combines approachable and un-intimidating swing dance lessons with quality live entertainment and bring it to you every Friday of the month. Our friendly instructors will provide the confidence to have even the most shy, withdrawn, pine-riding wallflower scratching and clawing to be the first on the dance floor. Fat City also offers ongoing workshops in all forms of swing dancing namely Lindy Hop, Balboa, Charleston, Shag, and the Shim Sham with some of the finest dance instructors in Western Canada. A night in Fat City promises to be a toe-tappin’, knee-slappin’, finger snappin’, earthquakin’, booty-shakin’ rollickin’ good time to be had by all, so make Fat City your Friday night destination. Social dancing is a great way to meet new people, have fun, stay in shape, while learning how to dance. What’s holding you back?

Thursday, October 9, 2008

Groovy Indeed

As a kid growing up in Lahore, I was oblivious to names like Frankie Manning and Jean Veloz. (David Hasselhoff and Pamela Anderson . . . a different story altogether)! In fact, unless you’re a swing dancer, most people are oblivious to these names weather you live in Langley, New York, or Los Angeles. Who are they? Grandparents of Lindy Hop. What’s Lindy Hop? Check Wikipedia.

I had never pictured myself as a beer drinkin’, wine swirlin’, Bruleé bakin’, Lindy Hoppin’ immigrant. But here I am, twelve years off the boat doing exactly that! Rock Steppin’ to Benny Goodman is one thing, coming face to face with history makers is another. Within my brief dancing career, I’ve had the honour and privilege of meeting both Frankie Manning and Jean Veloz not once, but twice! And, as if that wasn’t enough, just a couple of weeks ago, thanks to the efforts of a local organizer, I had the honour of hosting Jean Veloz at Fat City, right here in Langley, BC.

Though I couldn’t dance with Frankie, being a lead and all, I did manage to lead the queen of Lindy Hop into a few Swing Outs! I bet you I’m the only Pakistani that can lay claim to that. And if you consider the 172, 800,000 people that live in that country, that’s quite the achievement. Let me put it to you this way, the chances of winning Loto 6/49 jackpot is 1:13,983,816. So dancing with Jean was like winning the jackpot eleven times and then once more! Very groovy indeed!

The Mayor

P.S. Follow the link below to see an article about Jean at Fat City in one of our local papers and while you’re at it, go to YouTube, type Jean Veloz and see the magnificent clips and stories of this 84 year young Swing legend.

http://www.canada.com/langleyadvance/news/living/story.html?id=196ee05d-3e2b-459b-b695-46fe916375ab

Posted by at No comments:
Labels: , , , , ,
Subscribe to: Posts (Atom)