Tonga's Best Dance Crew

Need I really say more? Yes, I suppose so. A few weeks ago, I witnessed the televised, on one of Tonga's three channels, Tonga's Best Dance Crew finals. I actually attended all of the episodes live in Queen Salote Hall. The hip-hop dance crew competition was based on the oh-so-popular America's Best Dance Crew but add a little crunk and some ta'ulunga flavor. It was obvious by most crews attire that they were attempted to emmulate the winners of America's Best Dance Crew, the Jabawokies (in case you were not a sesson follower) because they pretty consistantly wore white gloves and sometimes masks. The show was a riot, full of stage-hogging, show-stealing, chair- throwin' school rivalery fights and some rappers from New Zealand that kinda looked like Snoop Dogg and weren't very good. I was genuinely impressed by the dancing, God knows I can't crunk, ever, but I was severly disappointed by the pantomiming portions of the mixes. There were very few female dancers so I was thrilled when one group came out with three. The girls weren't all that skilled but up there doing something so I am all about the ladies but then their mix breaks off into this pieced together sound effects thing that seemed to be popular. There was the sound of a baby crying, so one of the female dancers pretended to be the baby, while another girl held her in her arms as her mother. A male dancer stood over them, center stage, with a bottle looking distressed to the sound of a shot gun cocking and then pantomimed shooting the baby and slapping the faux-mother. Then they started dancing again. Everyone just laughed and laughed. I sat with my jaw on the floor. Sigh to the lightening of domestic violence. Luckily that crew didn't receive enough votes to make it to the next level.