Who knew that Irish dancing (the
Michael Flatley version) would be so popular in Central Asia? There
is an Irish dancing group call Altyn Batyr, which is rather famous in
these parts. It is based in Karaganda, a city a few hours to the
southeast of Astana.
One of the group's dancers teaches
Irish dancing in Astana, which I found out through the school's
administrative assistant, who was taking lessons there. Excited, I
signed up.
I pay 10,000 tenge a month (about $60
or so), and we have two lessons a week at 90 minutes each lesson. I
have learned that Irish dancing is not something you can pick up
quickly – it's July now, and I started attending in October, and
I'm not yet good enough to show anyone! – but it's also fun and
good exercise (so much jumping!)
My British friend joined also, which
was lucky for me because the administrative assistant stopped going
and my Russian just isn't good enough to get by. Almost good enough,
but not quite there.
We struggled getting hard Irish dance
shoes and ended up ordering them from the UK.
Through class we learned that members
of the Altyn Batyr group would perform at O'hara's Irish restaurant in
town on Sunday, 16 March, the day before St. Patrick's Day. We
informed others and reserved a table. Yes, it was 10 pm on a school
night, but – Irish dancing!!
We were served free green beer when we
arrived, but that beer was not good (it probably was Efes, a popular
beer here that resembles Budweiser), so I ordered a Guiness.
This restaurant is quite fancy and
quite expensive, but for an evening that including live Irish
dancing, it was reasonable (especially since I didn't eat).
The Irish dancing was spectacular! It
was hard to get a good spot to watch, since this was a restaurant and not a
concert hall, but I managed to find a spot in the crowd from where I
could tiptoe and watch. They performed several small pieces,
interspersed with breaks. They really were amazing! I've watched
Michael Flatley's shows on DVD plenty of times, plus I once saw “Lord
of the Dance” performed in Atlanta, Georgia—by a group that
wasn't very good. This group was so much better. And, being a
Michael Flatley fan, I recognized almost all of their dances. It
might have been nice if they'd done some non-Flatley Irish dancing
(yes, the Irish did dance before he came along!), but it was still
great!
At one point, our dance instructor
introduced us to one of the dancers (I think the main dancer), who
was so excited to meet me (a foreigner!) but seemed to mistake me for
Irish, and asked if I felt at home here. I just smiled politely and
said I was American, not Irish. But I doubt this bar very closely
resembles Ireland!
Overall, a wonderful evening and I hope
it will happen again next year!
A British friend stopped by this
restaurant the next day – 17 March – and he was unable to
convince the wait staff there that it was St. Patrick's Day. They
were quite sure that the previous day, 16 March, had been St.
Patrick's Day.
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