At the Grand Palais I stood in a line along with a 
thousand excited Parisians to enter and experience an evening of flash mobs, cultural dancing, free gifts and all at no entry fee! How is this possible? Never have I seen anything like it! In line I could have lifted my feet and floated along with the crowd into this event. I'm not kidding!
Once inside I was given an umbrella and a T-shirt with a babies body on it! There really is no other way to describe the space other than a Grand Palace with a central dome and two vast wings that were completely open space, free from obstruction. The architecture was breathtaking with two staircases at the opposite end from the entrance. As you look up you're reduced to the ant you are. In that moment I lost and gained an equivalent amount of inspiration and desolation. Then my eyes reconnected with the presentations!
First of all there was 300 people at the main stage holding open umbrellas with the Baby T-shirt on, all participating in a follow my lead type of dance instruction.
Now when I said cultural dance I was referring to classes. Only the classes weren't taught to you live. There were 12 foot LCD screens lifted 5 feet from the ground with a repeating video with a master of each dance form helping you through the basics of each style. You could find anything from Ballet, Contemporary, Capoeira, Belly Dance, LA style(haha), African, Hip Hop, Buchaechum, Bollywood, etc.
Then on either corner of the space were stages where performances from all these style were performed by dance artists from France. An invigorating experience!
Paris Journal 2011 Part 1 Paris Journal 2011 Part 2 Paris Journal 2011 Part 3 Paris Journal 2011 Part 4 Paris Journal 2011 Part 5 Paris Journal 2011 Part 6 Paris Journal 2011 Part 7 Paris Journal 2011 Part 8 Paris Journal 2011 Part 9 Paris Journal 2011 Part 10 Paris Journal 2011 Part 11 Paris Journal 2011 Part 12 Paris Journal 2011 Part 13