Dancing in Brisbane ...

On one of our last nights in Brisbane (from L-R) Naoko, Daniel, Emi, me, Kazuyo, and Mariko went out for dinner, drinks & dancing!! We had so much fun and really got a chance to see each other in a whole new light. :)

At dinner Kazuyo asked everyone, "What is your dream? What do you want to be doing in 10 years?" I really thought about it, for the first time in a long time, and my answer was so simple, "This". I want to travel to most amazing places with the most amazing people doing the most amazing work. I couldn't think of a better example to illustrate my point then all of us being right there at that exact moment reflecting on everything that we had done over the last 10 days.

After dinner we took water transportation, in the form of a City Cat water taxi, to downtown Brisbane. The whole idea of a 'water taxi' was completely foreign to me. There was a time table with multiple operating lines and plenty of stops and you had to buy a ticket to board and it was essentially the same set up as any other form of public transportation. I guess being from the great state of Iowa we don't exactly need to take water taxis up and down the Missouri from South Sioux to North Sioux.

Naoko, Emi, Mariko & Kazuyo waiting for our water chariot, I mean taxi:

I so wanted this boat to be our taxi, but for $1.50 I highly doubted this was the one:

And there it is, in all it's glory ... The City Cat water taxi:

It was pretty amazing honestly. We got this amazing view of the city at night & the bridge was all lit up (sickening) & all of the city lights & being on the water, which I love. What a great way to get around.

Brisbane at night:

Mariko & I:

The Three Amigos:

We got off at our stop and walked through the downtown area to where we knew there was salsa dancing. This whole dancing thing was Daniel's idea and I'll admit that I was a skeptic at first. I knew that Daniel and I would have a good time but everyone else that we had talked to in the group did not seem the slightest bit interested in salsa dancing. Japanese people don't really dance in general. I know they don't have high school dances and they don't dance at wedding receptions and everyone seemed to find it a little odd that we wanted to go out dancing for fun. But 4 brave souls followed Daniel's lead all the way to the bar.

Mariko, Emi & Kazuyo:

So we had lessons and got the basic moves down (& had another cocktail) and we were ready to go. Daniel was the most patient dancing instructor ever and slowly but surely everyone came out of their shells and broke out of their comfort zone and were dancing like crazy. It was unbelievable.

Daniel teaching Mariko how to move her feet ...

She never quite got it, but she had SO much fun:

Daniel & Kazuyo:

Look at how much fun they're having ...

And then next thing I knew Naoko was dancing in the middle of the circle,

which about made my jaw drop.

Kazuyo, Emi & I could not stop laughing ...

Our stomachs hurt and we had tears streaming down our faces.

I don't know if I've ever laughed so hard in my life.

The whole thing was just perfect. Hilarious and perfect. Of course I took a video but really all it is is me laughing for 4 minutes. It's of Mariko and she was the most skeptic out of everyone in the group when it came to the idea of going salsa dancing. She was also the last person I expected to join us because she is so serious and focused all the time. She's always working so hard and is the one that would remind us not to stay out too late and I always thought she was kind of a fun-hater (shh... don't tell her I said that) and then this whole salsa dancing in Brisbane just gave me a whole new perspective. I have seen her in a completely different light and I love it. I highly doubt you will find this as entertaining as everyone in our group did, but here it is for ya ....

Just Click Here!

That has almost brought us to the end of the entire trip. Just one more bittersweet blog to go.

much love

-tara-

xx