Instructor Peng Ya-ling asks everyone to imagine a handprint between their feet, and slowly bend down and place their right hand on it, then change to their left hand, and back to the right. Next she asks them to sit down, but not simply to plonk themselves down on the floor--instead they should think a bit and find the smoothest way for their body to move, for instance by slowly twisting their spine and sitting down in a corkscrew movement. Once they are sitting they continue with the same movement till they are lying on the floor, then clasp their hands across their chests and slowly roll to left and right. Finally they stand up again with the same kind of smooth movement.

This is still just the warm-up, but someone calls out: "That's incredibly comfortable," to which the instructor replies: "How can it feel comfy if you just do it any old how like that?!" But almost everyone sighs in unison: "It's terrific, we haven't had so much fun in ages!"

Everyone rushes to say: "Before, we used to exercise at home alone, but that way you never knew if you might hurt yourself. But now with a proper teacher we have tremendous fun every lesson, and we really look forward to coming to class." Some people also gesture with their hands and feet and say: "Now I can move my body, I can bend my knees, and my waist is much more supple."

In July of this year, a group of old people aged 60 and up began reporting punctually two days a week to Cloud Gate Dance Theater's practice hall. There, under the guidance of four instructors by turns, they sometimes dance about, and sometimes sing at the tops of their voices. Perhaps there's nothing so remarkable about grannies and granddads dancing, but they're not doing ordinary folk dances or ballroom dancing. So is this some kind of special "old folk's dance"?

Time has "weathered" old people's bodies into particular shapes. Thus the first aim of the lessons is to break down taboos and loosen existing burdens and limitations.

Old bodies in top form

"Dance groups aren't only for youngsters," says Peng Ya-ling, director of the Uhan-Shii Theater Group, who believes that elderly people's bodies are still full of potential waiting to be developed. This realization springs from her own direct observation. Two years ago she helped Tainan Cultural Foundation set up Taiwan's first old people's theater group, the Modern Form Theater Group, and became the group's first instructor. For the last two years she has watched how the old people's rich experience of life has been naturally expressed through their bodies. She says: "Their bodies began to speak"--in a tremendously attractive way. This was a great encouragement to her, and gave her the motivation to set up an old people's dance group. Compared with the performance-oriented theater group, the dance group places even more emphasis on awareness and exploration of the body, so the lessons started with games to loosen up the muscles and tendons, and then went on to gradually bring out spontaneous inner expression.

Thus Peng Ya-ling, who studied theater in Britain and runs the Square Round Theater, has set up two old people's groups in a row. "Perhaps I have a special affinity for old people," she says. "Ever since I was little I've loved being with old people, listening to the stories they tell." Apart from this emotional factor, she also feels that as she approaches middle age she is no longer content only to do so-called professional performance work with young people--she prefers to work with people with a richer experience of life. So aren't the silver-haired brigade the perfect choice?

Early this year Peng Ya-ling resigned her job with public television, and from March onwards began preparing to set up the Uhan-Shii Theater Group. She also invited some friends from the performing world--Chuo Ming, Chen Wei-cheng and Ku Ming-shen--to act as instructors. To raise funds, apart from getting a subsidy from the Council for Cultural Planning and Development, Peng Ya-ling is still working hard to drum up donations. Already around 60 to 70 people have registered to join the group, and because it has no precedent, many speak with Peng Ya-ling on the phone for a long time. But thus far the number of people coming to classes has stayed at only around 15, some of whom didn't join until later on. Does this mean that everyone who wants to join this dance group has to bring special qualifications?

"It makes you feel like a child again, and it's art, it's really fun." Everyone says the lessons are like a big kindergarten class.

A dream come true

"Perhaps we should say it's natural selection," says dance professional Ku Ming-shen. In the first lesson she gave the group she noticed that although these "very special" senior citizens describe themselves as old, they are not old at heart. "They have a strong sense of curiosity about the world around them, and are still enthusiastic about life."

The group members, who come from all over Taipei and even as far away as Chiaohsi in Ilan County, are mostly already grandmothers and grandfathers, and there are even two old fellows with great-grandsons. As chance would have it, in terms of the sexes and places of origin they are also evenly balanced: there are as many men as women, and those of Taiwanese and mainland Chinese origin are also in equal numbers.

Some of them were signed up for the class by their children, and some came on their own initiative, wanting to give it a try. The group has no lack of members who can sing or dance well, but most of them claim they are "tone deaf" or "have two left feet." But because the group's rules for admitting students stress that they need not have performing experience, they still joined without worries. And today stepping into Cloud Gate Dance Theater's practice hall is the fulfillment of a dream.

Take the oldest member of the group, 79-year-old "Big Brother" Wu Ming. He always loves to watch Cloud Gate Dance Theater performances, and so the fact that the old people's dance classes are held in Cloud Gate's practice hall held a particular attraction for him. A clergyman for much of his life, he retired from the church many years ago, but he has not been idle. He continued doing volunteer work until just a few months ago, when he gave it up because of illness.

Compared with Wu Ming, Chang Pai-hui is the "Little Sister" of the group. At only 45 she was not "qualified" to join, but she was accepted by the instructors as an exception. She puts it very cleverly: "Actually I'll be old myself in just a few more years, so I wanted to prepare myself in advance." A few years ago this full-time housewife joined the Shiny Shoes Children's Theater, in which she was the oldest participant. She had to grit her teeth and put in all her effort to train with her younger companions. Now, in the old people's dance group, "I've finally got the chance to be the youngest member." She felt duty-bound to assist the instructors by accepting the job of "class leader."

The "Big Sister" of the group, Hsueh Pin, retired from her job at a bank five years ago. "I couldn't get used to the feeling of being retired. I kept getting ill, and there was nobody around me I knew well." Doctors told her to take more exercise, but she says she is very lazy: just like a child, she won't do something unless she's forced to. She went off to study ballroom dancing, "but I was the oldest, and I felt embarrassed dancing there." But now, she says cheerfully, "it's never too strenuous, and I don't feel the least bit embarrassed."

Seventy-five-year-old Tsai Chin-hsing had heard people speak well of the old people's theater group in Tainan, and later he heard that Ms. Peng had come to Taipei to start a dance group. His daughter signed him up and he first went to watch, "to see what kind of people were going to class, and what kind of people were teaching. I didn't just go there muddle-headedly." After testing the water in this way he thought it was very good, so he joined. "Old people should get plenty of exercise, and this is different from the ordinary sort. It makes you feel like a child again, and it's art, it's really fun."

Chen Wei-cheng （first on left） feels even greater pressure when teaching old people, because one must pay attention to their physical limitations, and constantly keep watch and make adjustments.

Weathered shapes

So just what kind of dancing does the Uhan-Shii Theater Group do? And how does it differ from activities which are popular with old people, such as folk dancing and taijiquan?

"We instructors have one thing in common," says Peng Ya-ling. "We all have professional skills, but we can also apply the 'skill of making things seem to come naturally.'" In concrete terms, this means "making learning fun," by using games to get the participants' bodies moving. Because those involved here are old people, the years have "weathered" their bodies into particular shapes, and they certainly aren't in the habit of paying attention to the "feel" of their own bodies.

Thus the first step in the lessons is to break down taboos and loosen existing burdens and limitations. Each of the instructors has his or her own approach. They take the lessons in turns, some playing games, some singing children's songs, some doing exercises. Each of them is still experimenting to find the best ways to get on with the old people. Peng Ya-ling concentrates on movements of the cervical, thoracic and coccygeal vertebrae in order to "free up the spine and [acupuncture] channels." Chuo Ming's specialty is leading group-therapy-type development sessions in which people speak about their feelings. Chen Wei-cheng helps them explore the relationship between body and sound and body and space. Meanwhile Ku Ming-shen uses a "contact improvisation" dance style to understand the sensations of the body through contact between people, and then to express inner feelings through the body.

"This process of bringing people out can't be rushed, it can't be hurried, you have to wait for it," says Peng Ya-ling. "First you have to get them to relax, to trust this group, to trust these teachers, and to trust each other. Only then can you finally think about creativity and performance." Chen Wei-Cheng, a former member of the Cloud Gate Dance Theater, has similar ideas: "If you start off by categorizing the old people's dance group as a performance group, this may put them under too much pressure. It should be an activity which first calls up feelings which have lost their acuity, and begins to ignite hope and renew love in their bodies, to make them into instruments of expression."

Playing at "sculpture" in pairs, Hsueh Pin （left） who sang female roles in an amateur Peking Opera troupe in her youth, expertly spreads her hand in an orchid-flower pose.

Old people turn into children

After being used to instructing professional performers, Chen Wei-cheng admits that faced with this special group he feels even greater pressure, and proceeds with great caution. This is because with young people he was used to demanding movements of a high degree of difficulty, and pushing them to the limits of their physical strength. But here the teacher must constantly be watchful and make quick decisions and adjustments all the time, according to how the old people are coping. For instance, someone might have high blood pressure, and if they spin round once too often they will become giddy; or another might be prone to cramps in the calf muscles. Thus "sometimes you might prepare a whole set of movements which turn out to be unusable." In terms of personality, old people each have their own character, just like children. One can't force things on them. Thus one has to respect their individual qualities and tailor the lessons to their capabilities.

During every lesson the classroom is filled with laughter. The old people themselves say over and over again that they are a big kindergarten class. One moment they may be running against the wall, the next they may be crawling on the ground on all fours, doggy fashion. Once they played at pretending to be a percussion band, with each person clapping out different rhythms at different tempos. Then they changed their handclaps into strange sounds and added all kinds of different movements, to produce a living symphony orchestra. Someone was having so much fun that they cried out: "We're 70-year-olds playing like seven-year-old children!"

Another time they split into pairs, and each person took it in turns to loosen up their partner's joints. They started by massaging the fingers, then worked their way from the wrists up the arms to the shoulders, leading each limb in square and circular movements. As their hands and feet moved up and down, round and round, unconsciously they gradually began to dance where they stood. And because some of their joints were locked by their partners, their other joints moved in different ways from before. Sometimes they even startled themselves: "I never knew my body could move in those kinds of angles," someone burst out in joyous amazement.

During the break halfway through the session everyone sits down to eat snacks. This is an indispensable part of every lesson. The reason is that Peng Ya-ling fears that when the old people are exercising their blood sugar might fall too low, so she always half cajoles and half bullies them into eating biscuits. For these old folk it's as if they had returned to their kindergarten days. They tease each other and give each other nicknames, all of them puns on things to do with food. For instance, Yi Chin-tang is nicknamed yi jin tang--"a pound of sugar," while Yang Chi-tang has become liang jin tang--"two pounds of sugar," and Mei Li-chih is called meinaizi--"mayonnaise."

These old people grew up in an era when strict segregation of the sexes was the norm. The instructors have to set some "traps" to bring them close together during the games. See how expressively this "flower," made up of three people, blooms.

Speedy progress

In fact, many of the old people have worked all their lives in large organizations, in managerial positions, or as teachers, and they all have their own fixed image which they present to those around them. When they had just started coming to the dance group they all put on a reserved, solemn, "old-personly" appearance. To ask them to shake their arms and legs in front of strangers, let alone to twist their waists and wiggle their bottoms, not only required them to overcome physical limitations, but even more to break down some psychological barriers.

But in only two months of lessons they have changed remarkably quickly. At first they took great care over their appearance, with the men wearing suit-type trousers and some of the women even wearing close-fitting qipao dresses, with their hair combed up into elegant styles. But now they all know to bring loose, comfortable clothes to change into. They don't make up so heavily, and their hair is also styled less elaborately. Peng Ya-ling says: "I'd still like them to loosen up some more--I wish they wouldn't wear soft silk blouses or nylons, and during lessons they could take off their watches and jade bangles." But she's in no hurry: "I want to let all that come naturally."

Also the group members were brought up in an age when social mores demanded strict segregation of the sexes. Each time they are asked to form circles, line up or split into groups, they always quite naturally separate into distinct camps. The instructors see this, but they don't make any overt comments. Instead they secretly set some "traps" to bring the old people close to each other unwittingly in the course of the activities. For instance, by having them form two lines, men on one side and women on the other, and then roll slowly across the floor with their eyes closed until they bumped up against the others rolling from the other side, they gave them their "first contact," and after that it came more naturally.

Chuo Ming, one of the founders of the Lanling Experimental Theater, has helped Peng Ya-ling lead the Modern Form Theater Group in Tainan. He noticed that the old people in the southern group are somewhat different from those in the northern one. "At the moment [in the north] they're all good classmates, but not yet real friends, and after class they go home their own separate ways. But in Tainan everyone very quickly began visiting each other's homes, and even whole families made friends. Perhaps its because in the south, extended families are more common." Apart from this, in the north fewer old people are in the habit of taking exercise, so they have to get over their inhibitions concerning their bodies. In the south, on the other hand, old people are generally physically more mobile, but they are more conservative in their outlook, and the barrier which has to be breached is their shared attitude that "an old person should look and act like an old person."

Watching the old people's weathered faces as they concentrate on moving their bodies is very touching.

Letting their bodies speak

After a while, some more "artistic" activities began to make their appearance. For instance, to the sound of Chinese flute music they would walk from one end of the practice hall to the other, on the way changing themselves into a seed which pushes its way out of the ground, then sprouts and flowers; or into a prisoner in a deep dark dungeon who slowly crawls out to see the sunlight; or a condemned man walking to the execution ground, who is struck by a bullet and falls down, but continues to struggle forward clutching his wound.

At the beginning many people felt very self-conscious and would giggle with embarrassment, feeling that they could not act out imaginary situations as if they were real. The men especially would try to get it over with as quickly as possible. For instance, when escaping from the dungeon, after dragging themselves halfway across the floor they would get up and run to the other side to show they had successfully escaped. But others would gradually relax, and using the spine movements they had just learned, would twist and roll along, trying hard not to simply wave their arms about and give what Peng Ya-ling describes as a "cheap performance."

Another time they separated into pairs to do "sculpture": each pair would take turns, one person playing the artist and the other playing the work of art, to be sculpted as the artist pleased. First they started with the upper half of the body, and then when they had got steady on their feet, brought in the lower half. The idea was not simply to think of the body as composed of straight lines, but also of curves and arcs. Some people half reclined, some knelt or sat, and creative shapes began to appear.

"In fact the ones who got the greatest benefit were we teachers ourselves," reveals Peng Ya-ling. "They were afraid their bodies wouldn't be mobile enough, but in fact once they began to move, their outlines were enchanting, and I was secretly admiring all of them." Chuo Ming also says that it was deeply touching to look at their faces on which time has left its mark, as they moved their bodies with great concentration.

The Uhan-Shii Theater Group has taken its first tentative steps, but sti ll needs time and space to polish its skills. Its director Peng Ya-ling （front） says: "Give them time, they'll get better and better.".

Performing on stage?

But going on this way, what kind of dance will they finally end up with?

Hsueh Pin's father-in-law was the great Peking Opera star Zhou Xinfang, and in her youth she herself used to sing leading female roles in amateur Peking Opera performances, and travelled around with her work unit's opera troupe entertaining the forces. When asked whether she would like to perform on stage, Hsueh Pin says frankly, "No, old people's movements aren't that graceful--who would want to watch us?" When we complemented her on the Peking Opera style which is still apparent in her movements, we were surprised that she was taken aback, and said she hoped she could let go of the past and find new styles. "Peking Opera is also a type of dance, but surely it's different from this modern dance?" she said, wanting to go and check with the instructor.

Peng Ya-ling says: "Give them time, they'll get better and better. For instance, the people who are now still standing in the corner saying nothing may end up being those with most flair, the most able to express themselves."

In October she will be taking a group to Britain under the name of the Uhan-Shii Theater Group to take part in the European Reminiscence Theatre and Arts Festival, to be held to mark the 50th anniversary of the end of World WarII. Old people's theater groups from nine other countries will also be taking part. But apart from Uhan-Shii Theater Group member Tsai Chin-hsing, those who will be going are all old professional artists like Taiwanese opera performer Hei Mao-yun and folk singers Wu Tien-luo and Li Ping-hui, along with Li Hsiu, who performs so well in the Modern Form Theater Group. Peng Ya-ling says the old people in the dance group still have to "slowly build up their skills." But perhaps after a year or so they will begin to sparkle, and then one can think about how to show people what they can do. Ku Ming-shen also feels that at the moment the Uhan-Shii Theater Group is still taking its first tentative steps, and needs adequate time and space to polish its skills. She hopes that everyone doesn't adopt a fast-food mentality and ask for results too quickly, and so drown their potential.

Perhaps one way in which the existence of the Uhan-Shii Theater Group is significant is that in today's aging society it can help people take more notice of old people's presence, and also provide an outlet for their creativity, instead of letting them silently disappear into the back alleys and corners to be forgotten by society. Wu Ming, for instance, comes here to dance not because he wants to go on stage and "show off," but because "movement is good for my spine." But if they really do go on stage, "perhaps we can let other old people see that there are things we can do, that we can escape from boredom and depression."

[Picture Caption]

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Are dance groups only for young people? The Uhan-Shii Theater Group aims to develop senior citizens' latent sense of movement, and provide an outlet for their creativity.

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Time has "weathered" old people's bodies into particular shapes. Thus the first aim of the lessons is to break down taboos and loosen existing burdens and limitations.

p.39

"It makes you feel like a child again, and it's art, it's really fun." Everyone says the lessons are like a big kindergarten class.

p.40

Chen Wei-cheng (first on left) feels even greater pressure when teaching old people, because one must pay attention to their physical limitations, and constantly keep watch and make adjustments.

p.41

Playing at "sculpture" in pairs, Hsueh Pin (left) who sang female roles in an amateur Peking Opera troupe in her youth, expertly spreads her hand in an orchid-flower pose.

p.41

These old people grew up in an era when strict segregation of the sexes was the norm. The instructors have to set some "traps" to bring them close together during the games. See how expressively this "flower," made up of three people, blooms.

p.41

Watching the old people's weathered faces as they concentrate on moving their bodies is very touching.

p.42

The Uhan-Shii Theater Group has taken its first tentative steps, but still needs time and space to polish its skills. Its director Peng Ya-ling (front) says: "Give them time, they'll get better and better."