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Thursday, September 6, 2007
... posted by tball @ 7:45 PM
I was going through my music folder to see what I can add to my mp3 player and came across some Uke music. I hadn't heard Burlaky in ages so I downloaded them into my mp3. Later as I went for a walk I found myself listening to them. They were an awesome band. At the same time as I was listening I was remembering how basically they had played at almost every Zabava I had gone to. For all you people who are not Uke - a zabava is basically a dance where they play ukrainian music with a couple of sets of some english songs. At these dances you basically dance polkas, waltzes and tangos - the kind of dancing you see at weddings.
I remember being so excited on going to my first zabava, but that slowly disappeared once my father told me that I would have to be home at 11:oopm. I remember the zabava started at 9:00 and most people didn't show up before 10:00. So my first zabava experience was a total let down - with my father walking in to the church hall and telling me in front of all my friends from Plast it was time to go home. How embarrasing was that!!! Oh yeh these Zabava's were either at the church hall or at the SUM building (Uke community center). One thing that really stands out in my memories of these Zabavas was that if you did not have a boyfriend or did not belong to the popular girls click you ended up sitting at the table and watching everyone else dancing. You see most of these dances are danced as a couple. So if you didn't have a boyfriend you basically waited at the table or around the dance floor for a guy to ask you to dance. When the english songs would play then everyone was on the dance floor - old and young. I don't know how many times I remember sitting at the table waiting for a guy to come up and ask me to dance. On the odd occasion that I would ask a guy to dance he was either on his way to the bar or on his way to ask another girl to dance - which they would tell you to your face ( some of these guys really had no manners or respect for a girls feelings). After a while I just stopped going - tables would be reserved - and basically made up of couples...so basically I was sorta the outsider because I had no boyfriend and there would be no room for me at these tables. The friends that I thought were my friends seem to have a habit of always forgetting to include me at their tables - so eventually you kinda get the hint...I ended up discovering Bouzouki nights and alot of these Bouzouki nights ended up falling at the same nights as these zabava's (greeks and Uke people seem to celebrate many of the same holidays) so I ended up going there instead and truthfully have a better time than at a zabava. The only thing that I missed from the zabavas was the music but when Burlaky came out with their cd's well you know... At a Bouzouki night you didn't have to be coupled of you could dance all night long if you wanted to. Some of their music had the same beat as uke music and I enjoyed their music. They even had a dance that resembled the Arkan. All their dances were basically danced in a circle with people holding hands and dancing away - girls, guys, old or young. They had some slow dances where a girl would dance around a guy - a kinda couple dance - but if you were not a couple you could still dance it, since a guy would be doing his dance step and the single girls would dance around him. It was kinda cool - all the greek parents would tell me that I was a natural at their dances, I had picked up the steps so fast. I felt more at home with the greek community than I did with the Ukrainian community. I used to say that when I would have my wedding I would have a Greek band playing so that everyone could dance. I remember going to the greek New Year's dance and having the best time ever compared to a zabava...Some of the best bouzouki nights were at Club Dome on Sunday nights - with DJ George Papadakos. They were crazy!!!! They would play regular club music till midnight and at midnight they would start with the "Zorba Dance" (the one that did the arkan steps) it would start slow then pick up speed that you would literally be dancing like crazy by the end of the song or people would give up because the beat would be way too fast. Then you would dance till 3:00am...Many good memories from these bouzouki nights compared to the zabavas, which hold no special place for me. They brought me more heartbreak and sadness than anything else.
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