It is one of those unfortunate facts of life that we are sometimes forced to do things we really don't want to do. Often we learn to accept this, and tell ourselves that it is good for us to do these things, but when it comes down to it we still don't want to do them.

For me, dancing has been one of those things, and to make matters worse it's one of the ones that I can't really see being good for me at all. I'm in grade eight at school, the first year of high school here in Australia. At my school, there are many different elective subjects you can choose to study, but in year eight you try them all out, to get a taste for them. There are many that I liked: drama, web design, music and metalwork to name a few. And then there are the ones I didn't like: sewing, Italian and above all, dance.

This isn't ballroom dancing or anything like that, which I've done before and even quite enjoyed. This is that funky kind of hip-hop dancing, which is very fast and quite difficult. One of the reasons I don't like dance is simply that I'm not very good at it — in fact, I'm hopeless. I feel really stupid when I'm running around doing all the fancy leaps and turns, which is strange because I've been known to enjoy making a fool of myself on stage many times before. Somehow, this is different, maybe because I'm not being any silly character. It is actually me truly trying to dance and looking ridiculous.

One of the other reasons is the teacher of the dance classes. From the very first lesson, when we were given a talk about chewing gum, I could tell we just weren't on the same wavelength. Her punishment for the one crime all teachers seem to despise more than any other was quite an original one. She would stick the gum on the tip of your nose for the rest of the lesson, until 'the acid from your own saliva will start burning your nose, and it will burn and burn and burn until it really hurts', to use her own words. Somebody asked her if that was some form of abuse, and she said it wasn't because we'd been warned. When I asked her if she was saying that if she bashed us up but told us she was going to do it beforehand it wouldn't be abuse, I got a very loud yelling at, for what really seemed to me a reasonable question. After that she just didn't really like me, but wasn't too bad as she didn't act unfairly towards me or anyone else in anyway.

There is only really one more reason I didn't enjoy dance, and that is because it simply wasn't my thing to go prancing about like a dressage horse. Regardless of whether I'm good at it or not, I just don't like it. There are two parts of the dance assignment: the first is a performance on the last lesson of dance tomorrow, to the rest of my year group. I'm not really looking forward to it, although my small group is doing a quite funny, very disco dance to 'Staying Alive' by the Bee Gees. It is a funny thing that nearly the only time I've ever got nervous before performing is when I have to dance.

The other part of the assessment is a short report on a dance production coming to Western Australia where I live. I've written quite humorously (in my opinion) on a corny-sounding Indian show coming soon. Whether my teacher will appreciate the way in which my report is written is yet to be confirmed.

I really can't wait until tomorrow, after I've handed in the report and done the dance. I'll have a feeling of relief inside me, and I'll know that I won't have to dread the daily dance lessons anymore.

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