Sichuan Dance Debuts in Romania

Under a proposal from the Embassy of the People’s Republic of China to Romania， the Sichuan Dance Exchange Troupe attended the 32nd Intemational Folk Dance Festival from August 9 t0 17. The 14-member troupe was organized by Sichuan Provincial People’s Association for Friendship with Foreign Countries.

The festival was hosted by Arges Province. The event is committed to preserving and developing folk art in-volving dance， encouraging cultural ex-changes and promoting friendship be-tween peoples all over the world. It has become one of the most well-known intemational art festivals in Romania

This time， dance troupes of more than 10 countries and regions， includ-ing Romania， France， Serbia， Geor-gia， South Korea， Turkey， Argentina，Latvia， China and Guam， gave perfor-mances.

The Sichuan Dance Exchange Troupe mainly comprises dance teach-ers and outstanding performers from the Sichuan Art Vocational College.They performed Tea House， Red Dress，Qiao Hua Dan (Pretty Actress)， Zha Xi De Le (Blessings and Good Luck)， and Bai Hua Zheng Yan (All Flowers Con-tend in Beauty)， all characterized by Sichuan traditional styles that had won first prizes in provincial and national contests many times.

Deeply impressed， the audiences responded with warm applause and even a standing ovation. Dancers from other countries and members of the or-ganizing committee and judge panel re-peatedly gave the performers thumps-up approval.

Thanks to the arrangement by the organizing committee， troupes of all participating countries had the opportu-nity to visit cities in Arges Province to give more performances， including Pi-testi， Campulung Muscel， Topoloveni， Mioveni and Curtea de Arges. They traveled to one city each day， practiced in the morning， paraded in the after-noon and performed in the evening.

The various activities provided an opportunity for the dancers to exchange ideas on their performance skills.

The Sichuan Troupe finished fifth in the final ranking. The Governor of Arges Province especially went to the Chinese dancers’dressing room to ex-press his thanks and congratulations.He said: “The Sichuan delegation has given marvelous performances and we all enjoy them. Thank you all. Your performances were all a huge success with great results. Congratulations.”

Mr. Katalin Auxerre， General Manager of the Organizing Conunittee，also congratulated the Sichuan delega-tion on their successful debut. He com-mented: “Your dancing is quite profes-sional， with perfect stage effects， high degree of difficulty and high artistic values. Numerous factors were taken into consideration in scoring， such as national characteristics， performance scale， audience participation， and in- teraction. And each delegation has a member on the judging panel. Consid-ering all these factors， it is not easy to achieve such a good result with such a small troupe， given that the committee allowed for up t0 35 performers”.

He added: “Hope to see you in the next Dance Festival and may you achieve even greater results!”

Chinese Ambassador to Romania Xu Feihong and his wife and another two people drove more than a hundred kilometers from the Romanian capital of Bucharest to Pitesti specially to at-tend the closing ceremony. The ambas-sador accompanied the Arges govemor to meet all the members of the Sichuan delegation and expressed congratula-tions to them.

He said:“Your performances have been marvelous and of high artis-tic standard. You have won much ap-plause， presented an excellent image of China， and promoted mutual friend-ship. You have not only gained great honor but also now have unforgettable memories. I know you have already been invited back to the next Dance Festival”.