At 21 years old, I attended ballet classes in Clapham, a Russian ballet school that has now closed. I would go three times a week and did so for a while (I can’t remember now, maybe a few weeks). I then decided to join a course at Morley College, as it worked out cheaper. It was an improvers’ class, and let’s just say I overestimated my ability. I remember it like it was yesterday. I was HUMBLED!

The teacher was doing a rond de jambe, and I carelessly swept my feet around, mainly to mark the step and show I was paying attention, but I wasn’t doing it properly. He must’ve looked at me and three other students and said, ‘Right, I’m going to split you into two groups.’ Pretty much those that can, and those that cannot. I was in the latter group! That was the first day, and I never attended the rest of the course! I was embarrassed. Not to mention, when I filled in a form at the start of class, I ticked a box that pretty much said I am confident in my abilities. I would never underestimate just how hard ballet is again!

I would attend ballet here and there for many years after this, but each time, I was so upset that my turnout wasn’t as ‘turned out’ as my classmates… “You can improve!” I’d say to myself, and then when I’d see a beginner, like me, with a 140-degree turnout just out of the gate, meanwhile, mine was less than 90 degrees, I’d get discouraged. Not to mention how inflexible I was.

Several times, I would stop doing ballet and say to myself, ‘Let me do yoga.’ I remembered seeing how flexible Madonna got from it, and she was older than I was at the time. I thought, if I’m flexible, then ballet will be easier, i.e., things like grand battement, developpé, and arabesque.

I would lie on my stomach with my knees to the side and feet hovering off the bed. I would say to myself, “I’ll do this every day.” I didn’t.

I found an online school that offers RAD syllabus classes. I subscribed to RAD grade 3, grade 4, and grade 5. I started yesterday and today. As for grade 5 at 6:30, I was too darn tired to wake up, so I skipped it!

I actually enjoyed the classes. Oh yes, in February 2022, I actually found an online school located in Manchester, England, that offered private lessons in RAD graded classes. I remember being so excited because I had wanted to do exams for a while.

During our first class, she told me she couldn’t actually enter me for exams. For some reason, what she said didn’t register with me because I had always thought it would be like music exams; you just enter yourself. Later, I would discover that a RAD-registered teacher needs to enter you for ballet exams.

I continued these classes for about three months, ending in June (some weeks she was either ill or having technical issues). Classes ended because my dad was coming over from Uganda, and he was set to stay with me in my living room.

But anyway, what I wanted to say was that grade 3 was a throwback to what I had learnt four years prior. Grade 4 was completely new. I was completely lost during the centre section. The other two students have been learning the syllabus since September, so my teacher didn’t really go through some things from scratch; ok, maybe once for my benefit, but not in detail, which I guess I can’t expect because it would be unfair to the students that know them already. What I do have, however, is the past few weeks’ lessons online that I can go through to catch up.

Nonetheless, it’s the 6th of November 2025, and I just finished my first ballet classes in almost two years!

My last classes were with the European Dance Academy and with Danceworks Absolute Beginners Ballet Course. The former course was Level 1, as I was and am still a beginner. I actually danced for four hours every Saturday for twelve weeks in January 2024 to April 2024! The Danceworks course was on a Thursday for eight weeks

I believe there were about seven other students in the four-hour course and about eighteen in the Danceworks course. One dropped out of the four-hour course, though, after like two or three classes.

So for the four-hour course, we would do contemporary for an hour, followed by jazz. We’d have a 15 min break, then do ballet and then hiphop.

We actually recorded the routine, each of us individually. But I won’t upload it! We learnt two different choreographies that took six weeks each. One thing I regret is not attending the last hiphop class where we would’ve recorded what I had learned in the five week previously. I just remember feeling exhausted during the 15-minute break, so I went home. It was a sexy dance to Partition by Beyoncé. I remember having to do jumping jacks at the start of the class. That was part of the reason why I went home, not to mention there was a part in the choreography where we would have to go from standing and swivel into sitting. I couldn’t do it! We definitely would’ve practised it, but as I said, I was exhausted!

As for the Danceworks course, it was good. He literally treated us like absolute beginners! That didn’t describe me at the time, as I’d say I’d done at least 75 hours’ worth of ballet throughout the years (a lot from the Russian Ballet School and a lot from Ballet Fusion, which I was subscribed to from January 2022 for years, even though several months would pass without me doing a class, and if I did do a class during the later months of the subscription, it would be floor barre.

But now I’m back at it, and it’s the same old story: “I’m going to stick with it this time,” (boy, have I said that before). But hey, only time will tell. If you’re reading this in the far future, how am I doing (based on “current” posts)?

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