Schools
Local Dragon Dancer to Compete in China
Bakhtiyar Baidaralin is a Cranston resident and student at Bryant University who will be competing at the World Dragon and Lion Dance competition in Shanghai, China, next week.
Bakhtiyar Baidaralin is a Cranston resident and Bryant University student who'll leaving for a place far from the city on Saturday to help bring a dragon to life.
Baidaralin is one of seven members of the Bryant University Dragon Dance Team who will be competing in the World Dragon and Lion Dance Competition in Shanghai, China.
The competition runs from Sept. 23 to 25 and the two-year-old Bryant team is the only group from North America to compete in the tournament.
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The 15-member team uses athleticsim and artistry to bring a 54-foot long length of fabric to life behind a decorative dragon head.
The group departs on Saturday and will spend three days at China University of Geosciences in Whuan, where they'll meet up with an eighth teammate studying in China and a ninth who teaches English there.
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They'll practice with coach Kai Hu, a professor at CUG who helped start the Bryant team during a faculty exchange program two years ago.
It is believed that the country's only unveristy-sponsored dragon dance team resides at Bryant.
“Most dragon dance teams in the United States are sponsored by Chinese-American cultural organizations,” said Kongli Liu, assistant director for academic programs at the University's US-China Institute and the team's assistant coach. "We know of no other American college or university that sponsors its own. Bryant students have embraced this opportunity to experience Chinese culture and enhance cultural diversity on campus."
Here's the team's roster:
- Alicia Kennedy ’12 of Burlington, Conn.
- Samir Kothari ’12 of Mumbai, India
- Marcia Chong ’12 of Milford, Conn.
- Varishensagar Shah ’12 of Ahmedabad, India
- Margaret Wong ’12 of Fremont, Calif.
- Bakhtiyar Baidaralin ’12 of Cranston, R.I.
- Fan Zhou ’12 of Tianjin, China
- Anmei Zheng ’13 of Riverside, Conn.
- Christopher Neale ’10 of Wuhan
Hu is a physical education teacher, Kung Fu master and is a board member of the World Dragon and Lion Dance Competition. Her own CUG dragon dance team has finished first in a previous tournament.
The Bryant Dragon Dance Team has performed around Rhode Island since Oct. 2009.
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