The South Asian Students Assoication, more commonly known as SASA, hosts an enormously popular show during spring quarter each year. One of the main players in this year’s upcoming show is our Campus Celeb, Tracy Zhang.
Tracy is a second year Economics and Political Science double major from California. If you were lucky enough to see the show last year then you will have already seen her perform in 3 of the incredible acts. This year Tracy is a choreographer for SASA as well as a member of UChicago Bhangra. You may be led to believe that she has a wealth of background in these areas of dance, but this could not be more wrong. Last year, as she puts it, “I got dragged to a promotional study break fall of first year without really knowing what I was getting into and almost forced to sign up for a bunch of acts. I ended up going to all the act tryouts and really enjoying it”. After this experience Tracy fell in love with these styles of dance, which she says are “both fun to learn and to perform”. She enjoyed last year so much that she is now co-directing 2 of the acts for this year’s show and participating in Maya’s showpiece, which is another dance RSO on campus.
All this dancing will be keeping her busy, with her rehearsing between 10-15 hours a week this quarter. UChicago Bhangra is around 6 hours of practice a week and SASA acts range from 1-2 hours each, usually during the evenings and weekends. However you can be assured that she will be having fun, as Tracy not only enjoys the dancing aspect, but also loves the people that she has met through SASA. She told me “It’s been so much fun to learn so much about a different culture with people who love to share what they know and laugh with (not at!) you about your mispronunciations.”
So make sure you don’t miss out on this year’s show at the end of the first week of spring quarter, as tickets sell out fast! And if the dancers inspire you to try something new, throw yourself into it like Tracy and you may just fall in love.