Exam: 1st gold bar

Well, *I* was talking my first gold bar; Nicole was just doing silver.

Unusually, the exam was scheduled for 6pm. I arrived at 5, Nicole a little while later. Lots of kids around, at least initially. We did eventually get to do some practise though. I was quite surprised to see Nicole looking uncharacteristically agitated. She said she was so nervous she felt sick. Damn, and I thought she was so fearless…

Personally, I felt surprisingly unconcerned. At least, I did until Nicole arrived — and then I felt concerned about her rather than actually “scared” as such. I tried to offer my support, but she didn’t seem interested. I guess if you’re nervous, there’s not really a lot that anybody except you can do about it. At one point, we danced through our routine, and she just stopped half way through and said she couldn’t go on.

Eventually we did dance it through a few times. Now I’m utterly knackered — probably not a good thing right before the exam. You always want to hit the point where you’re warmed up, but not worn out. Fortunately, this happened so long before the exam that I had time to recover myself.

At last the time came, and we all shuffled downstairs. We actually got to do a stroll, all together, while the examiner shuffled his paperwork. It was nice to get to loosen up together before the serious stuff begins. The examiner looks like one scary bloke; bald guy with thick-rimmed black glasses and a Roman nose. He seemed pleasant enough in conversation, but he still looks pretty severe.

I’m not sure why, but Nicole and I both had the impression that we’d be fairly near the beginning. Actually no. Nicole seemed to be getting quite stressed about having to wait so long. But eventually we got up and did our dance. Nicole did a fantastic performance of looking euphorically happy. We made a big show of making eye contact with the examiner — who was looking at his paperwork at that moment! And for once, I managed to dance the whole routine without forgetting what comes next at any point.

We danced to Tutti Frutti (as did almost everybody else — which became a bit tedious after a while). We danced our routine through one and a half times before the music stopped. There was a ripple of applause, and we sat down again. When it was Pete & Cheryll’s turn to dance, we actually moved seats so the damned pole wasn’t blocking our view. Damn, those guys worked hard. They’re such performers though. Christ only knows what level they were taking…

Well anyway. That’s the best performance of that routine that I think I’ve ever done, Nicole did great too. I’m certain she passed her Silver. I’m not sure whether I got my gold bar. Then again, I’ve passed every previous exam by a wide margin, so I guess I just worry too much or something.

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