WoW! Has it been that long ago? 12 YEARS! Dat means the EARTH had rotated around the SUN 12 times. It was way back in 1999 that I met Joe (Pepe) Martel, the man who had a vision to promote Ballroom Dancing by way of his DANCING IN THE DARK publication.....you know da blue mini-zine that was distributed FREE to anyone who was on the dancing canoe (just taking a little idiom from the gov). And believe it or not..Pepe is still on that proverbial canoe to promote Ballroom Dancing. Man! that takes a lot of energy and dedication especially for Joe who now makes his home west of the great divide in Nanakuli and uses Da Bus and da bicycle for transportation to get more further West and sometimes crossing the great divide to Waikiki. Okay, it hasn't been smooth sailing for Pepe at times.. he has had lots of pat on the back and other times some criticisms and barbs thrown at him, too but he's weatherd them all like letting water running down a duck's back....and if you neva like read his mini-zine, dat's okay too. When I joined his staff of contributing editors, Pepe already had Roger Izumigawa and Ruth Morgan on board who were excellent authors of dancing news. It was a wonderful ride associating with those two writers and "da boss" Pepe who gave us a free hand to express our thoughts in "Dancing In The Dark"....no pressure. The only and one simple rule we had to follow was "no bang heads with the other contributing editors". After a few years, Roger and Ruth decided to retire and Geoffrey Fells came on board as a guest author for the mini-zine. Geoffrey is an experienced writer and he came on like gangbuster with a lot of fire in his articles....you know da kine that can scorch da okole if the dancers didn't perform the right stuff in exhibition dancing or competition dancing. I don't know fo' sure if the critique lighted some burning white coal fire under da okole of da dancers. One thing is fo' sure, it was constructive with good intentions from a well-known and professional judge who knows the ins and outs of competitive dancing. In 2009, computers and cyberspace seemed to be the way to go. So the "blue mini-zine" of Dancing In The Dark gave way to Weblogs a year later but the name continued on in cyberspace publication. The Weblog "Dancing In The Dark" exchanged hands twice between Pepe and me and finally was laid to rest in Pepe's hands. I went independent with "That's Dancing" and "The Dance Connection". Geoffrey went independent shortly after with his Dance News of The Pacific. So what's up with the history lesson, Frank? Just wanted to give recognition to "da man" Pepe Martel who started me on this long journey which have become my hobby and interest to provide some news of our dancing community...that is if I'm available to attend those events. Joe (Pepe) Martel is still active in blogging, so no forget to catch up with the news of dance activities in any of his blogs by clicking on the links on the side bar when you pau reading mine. Pepe has got more guest writers and contributing editors now that covers the social media and a bit about the history of dance, so he's got more coverage than anybody now fo'sure. Continue the long journey, Amigo. Felicitaciones y Buena suerte!
