Article for Magazine

Backwards in High Heels – Another Dance Night with the Northern Angels – Emma Walkey

After the success of the inaugural dance evening in January organised by Lisa, the group of girls welcomed back June from Ireland, a qualified dance instructor for another entertaining evening at the Shang Hi Restaurant in Manchester.

With 19 girls attending in their prettiest party frocks and heels, June certainly had her hands full once more. Whilst there were quite a few of us attending for the second time, we also had a number of new faces – testimony to the fun we all had the first time.

Emma rarely gets out at weekends due to family circumstances and even forsook her rugby to attend, booking into a local hotel with Tina and Mandy, such was the attraction of the evening and the memory of the fun I had on the first occasion.

The Restaurant made available a special downstairs room which was equipped with sound, a dance floor and bar.

Once more, we paired off into partners, one playing the male role; I teamed up with Tina and a number of the girls renewed their previous partnerships. For the evening we were lucky to have join us a number of partners who fancied chancing their feet in the sequence dancing to come.

June started us off with the “social foxtrot” and having shown us the basic steps watched us massacre them! After a few re starts, it became apparent that there was a vast improvement testament to the fact that we didn’t have as many girls stopped on the dance floor scratching their heads or massaging bruised toes. June’s Irish banter and goodwill permeated the group and we were all moving around the dance floor generally in the right direction with broad grins on our faces.

We then moved onto A Yearning Saunter, which involved us getting to grips with our partners and moving around the room in an ordered manner, ladies backwards guided by their partners (not sure how many held driving licences!) Again, June took one of our unsuspecting group and demonstrated the new steps – easy really! We then demonstrated our interpretation of the steps.
With guidance from June on how to undertake a crossover with the immortal words “kill a wasp and now kill a fly!” we all attempted the intricate steps!
At this point I was reminded of the famous Morecombe & Wise sketch with Andre Previn where a piece of classical music was massacred with the immortal words “ all the right notes but not necessarily in the right order” and this best described my attempts in following in June’s footsteps – all the right steps but not necessarily in the right order!

Having worked up an appetite, we then had a break for our food. Trooping upstairs to the main restaurant, we took up our table and joined the Restaurant’s other customers at the buffet. Once again the food was plentiful and very tasty and we all ate our fill washed down with drinks from the bar and were well served by the wonderful staff.
Having sated our appetite, we all returned to the dance floor to re visit the barn dance to the tune “Bring It All Back” by S Club Seven. This involved synchronised spinning amongst other new steps and the ladies twirling!

I must admit both Tina and myself quite enjoyed this routine as 10 couples rotated around the floor almost all in step! trying to avoid kicking the couple in front or running them down in our eagerness. Even now some 24 hours afterwards I still have that tune in my head and a smile on my face as I remember the fun we had.

All too soon, the evening came to an end and we bade each other farewell with a number of us going on into the village and ending at Napoleon’s where unfortunately or should that be fortunately! we did not get a chance to use our newly acquired skills.

All in all a superb fun evening and I for one am looking forward to the next instalment. (am already looking for a new dress!) Well done Lisa for organising another superb evening and to June who really believes she can make dancers out of us all and without whom the evening would not have been possible.