2 February 2011

Julia has been coaxing us to try out Charlize's ballet class for ages and we finally relented. Emily seems very keen on dancing about at the moment, and likes Angelina Ballerina, so I thought she would get a lot out of it. Julia assured me that there was no future in it for her as she will be too tall for it one day, so maybe I can get her to switch to martial arts down the line!


At the start of the 45 minute class, Emily was very nervous and kept looking beseechingly at me to join her in the warming up circle, which I eventually did. There were two other girls trying out a trial class, plus about half a dozen regulars, all of a similar age to Emily. I explained to her why it was necessary to do the seated stretching exercises, as I think she was surprised not to just begin dancing about the studio and was impatient with sitting. When the teacher got them skipping, Emily could only do it on one leg so she looked a bit comical. I am very one-sided so she obviously takes after me.



I was quite pleased with her behaviour in the class; most of the other kids broke ranks repeatedly and did not attend to what Rosie was trying to teach them but Emily was very compliant. I think that she enjoyed the lesson once she relaxed into it, and was talking about what colour tutu she could have on the way home (we borrowed one of Charlize's but it was too small), so looks like this is a fixture from now on.


Shinmoedake, a volcano on Kyushu, continues to erupt magnificently. So far the fallout (pardon the awful pun) has only been heavy ash coverage, the odd projectile rock and a few cancelled trains and planes, plus tremor damage. But who knows whether this is the beginning or the end of this phase of activity? We are booked to go to Nagasaki in Kyushu in a month's time but will be far enough away to be unaffected.