Dancing with a Star

In Point Roberts, it is now time be be putting away our tents and banners as we look back on the final festival of the 2009 gala season.  The Music and Seafood Festival this past weekend managed a mostly sunny day and stellar performances from both the seafood and the musicians, not to mention a dancer.  Insofar as I am up on the Sunshine Coast and not in Point Roberts, I know this only from reports of friends who had the good sense to stay and participate.

Only a few weeks ago, we had the Music and Arts Festival, and it would appear from these reports that a festival that provides one food for the soul (music) and one food for the body  (the seafood) has the edge on a festival that provides only foods for the soul.  The big feature, say the reporters, was a klezmer band from Bellingham (it is possible that that is the funniest phrase I’m likely to hear this week).  I mean, if you were going to look for a klezmer band, would Bellingham be your first thought?  But Millie and the Menschn, classically trained musicians from Bellingham, also do the klezmer.

And to add to the phenomenon, Ms. B. Hooping Allure dances, at least some of the time, to the klezmer music and she always dances with what appears to be a stainless steel hoola hoop.  I am truly sorry to have missed this. You can see her perform on her website, but I daresay the combination of the dance and the Seafood and Music Festival either before or after the 20 minute downpour must have been amazingly fun.

But it has given me a new idea for a community project that could secondarily contribute to Point Roberts’  economic development.  Ms. Allure, I am told by yet other friends, gives dance classes and she is a great teacher.  So, how about we hire her to come to Point Roberts to teach us to do hoola hoop exercise/dance?  We could all go down to the beach of a morning—say Tuesdays and Thursdays so as not to compete with the Wacky Walkers--like the elderly Chinese practicing Tai Chi in Taiwan parks, and do our hoola hooping en masse.  Given the space requirements, we’d need to be in Lighthouse Park, I suppose.  Or maybe in a great line all around the edge of the peninsula.  (That would make for a great new ‘coastal photo’ project, Ed.)

  Just how long before the National Geographic and the Discovery Channel would be knocking at our doors, begging to interview us and take our pictures?  And then, the tourism to follow.  Well, the mind boggles.  And if Ms. Allure’s general physical condition is any testimony to hula hooping, we could all be looking forward to newer and much smaller-sized wardrobes.

(Thanks to George Wright for the photos!  And to whomever provided the blue skies!)