With colored lights bouncing off the walls, students moving to
the loud music on the dance floor and platforms, and sweat dripping
off the brows of weary dancers, Ackerman Grand Ballroom was
transformed into a 26-hour fund-raising dance party by hundreds of
enthusiastic Dance Marathon participants this weekend.
From 11 a.m. Saturday to 1 p.m. Sunday, the culmination of 10
months of preparation resulted in nearly 500 dancers staying on
their feet in the fourth-annual Dance Marathon. All the proceeds of
the event ““ totalling $197,251.42 ““ will go to the
Elizabeth Glaser Pediatric AIDS Foundation.
“I’ve never been to anything like this in my
life,” said Jake Glaser, who was infected with HIV at birth
from his mother Elizabeth Glaser.
Due to this year’s increase in participation, Dance
Marathon moved from last year’s Covel Grand Horizon Room to
the Ackerman Grand Ballroom with the theme “Time to Take a
Stand.”
Though it cost more to move the event, Ackerman was able to
accommodate more people. For several hours Saturday night, the room
was filled to capacity with at least 1,000 individuals.
“(The large turnout) means we were really
successful,” said Shelly Leary, the Dance Marathon public
relations chairwoman. “We moved here from Covel, and maybe
we’ll need to move to Pauley (Pavilion) next year.”
Dancers pledged to raise a minimum of $200 each to benefit the
foundation in the months leading up to the event, in addition to
donations from hundreds of other volunteers.
“People have high energy and high hopes and even though
their feet are going to hurt for a few days, it’s all worth
it,” said Susan Ma, a dancer and second-year marathon
participant.
A mixture of volunteers and Student Health Advocates from
on-campus housing aided dancers throughout the course of the event.
Aside from some swollen knees, cramped feet, minor cuts and lost
voices, there were no serious injuries, said Pooja Patel, a
first-year undeclared student and volunteer at the medical
table.
Dancers still found the event to be a challenge ““ and
painful at times ““ despite the lack of major injuries.
“It’s harder than I thought it would be. My feet are
killing me,” said Jessica Chan, a second-year microbiology,
immunology and molecular genetics student and first-time Dance
Marathon participant.
But other students said the pain was worth it.
“(Dance Marathon) is one of the most fulfilling things
I’ve ever done. It was better than anything I could’ve
ever done,” said Dan Kasuga, a UCLA alumnus who flew to Los
Angeles for the weekend to participate in Dance Marathon for the
first time.
The types of participants in the event were broken up into five
groups ““ dancers, moralers, volunteers, committee members and
guests.
To help support the dancers for the duration of the 26-hour
event, moralers would arrive for three-hour shifts to help pump up
and motivate the dancers.
Each three-hour shift had a different theme which related to the
overall theme of the event, including “Dance House
Rock,” “Saturday Night Fever” and “A Knight
for the Cure.”
During each morale shift, participants would dress up and the
decor of the room would be altered to reflect the current theme.
Dancers and moralers learned a “morale dance” to the
song “Footloose” which they would perform as a group
every time a new morale shift began.
Many sponsors donated to the event, including Apple Computer,
which gave computer equipment that allowed students to enroll in
their classes during the event and facilitated the first live
broadcast of the event on the Dance Marathon Web site.
While students were dancing, other activities were taking place
in Ackerman, such as a silent auction and a letter-writing to Dumba
Mwesige, a 10-year-old Ugandan child. His family was randomly
selected by the Dance Marathon Committee to receive $30 a month to
help pay for educational materials such as books, as well as food
and water. It is unknown whether Mwesige is infected with HIV, but
he lives in a community that is affected by the disease.
Also, friends of dancers had the opportunity to make
“dancer grams” that were delivered to the
dancers’ boxes where they kept their belongings while they
danced.
Throughout the event, several special guests made appearances,
including celebrities and speakers from the foundation.
Movie actors Camille Anderson from the upcoming film “The
Wedding Crashers” and Terry Lewis from “Starsky and
Hutch” helped to teach dancers the Electric Slide line
dance.
They then judged the competition to find the person who
performed the dance the best. Other celebrity appearances included
Tina Majorino, who played Deb in “Napoleon Dynamite,”
and Kim Webster from “The West Wing” TV show.
To help encourage and inspire students to continue dancing and
remain involved with the event in the future, many speakers from
the foundation spoke to the crowd including Jake Glaser and Sherry
Lewis, an AIDS activist.