About Odoriko

Hey guys! Welcome to Dancing to the Rhythm of KPOP! I will use this blog to document my progress learning new KPOP dances. I will include what dances I did on a particular day, what I learned of a new dance, and videos of progress and full covers, as well as  my own reviews of the dances I am learning.

Who is Samantha Odoriko?

I am 21 years old from New Jersey currently going to school in South Carolina to get my bachelor's degree in nursing. Since this requires a lot of time and focus I am not able to dance nearly as much as I'd like, so posts will likely be few and far between for a while. I will graduate in May and am looking to move back to NJ. Once I get settled I will be taking dance classes again. Aside from working on KPOP dances, I want to learn more in jazz, tap, hip hop, and ballet.

Why Odoriko?

One day I wanted to know what "dancer" means in Japanese, due to my newfound interest in Japanese culture, so I looked to Google Translate and "odoriko" was one of the words that came up. I don't know how true this is or how often it is used, but I have seen it in a few other places, and I liked the way it looks and sounds so I started using it as my dance and cosplay nickname.

How I got started

I first started dancing when I was 5 years old and I fell in love with it. My favorite style is and always was jazz, but I really enjoy tap as well. I did not like ballet very much, mainly because I didn't like the way my feet felt after class. Because of money I was only able to take one class a week, so I mostly stuck with jazz, but I took tap and hip hop for two years each. I also danced in my high school's musicals all four years. I stopped dancing at my studio after 11 years because the girls I had been with for a while were leaving and I didn't know what would happen to me, since I was not on the competition team so I could not do solos. It was a hard decision to make that I sometimes regret. However it did make the last two musicals easier, not having to leave rehearsals early or skip dance to stay at rehearsals. As a pretty cool coincidence, our choreographer for the musicals used to teach at my studio. She has her own studio now, and when I'm out of school and settled I am going to see if she would be willing to take me on as a student.

I first got into KPOP in the spring of 2010. I was reading through some forums on cosplay.com and came across the dance video for SNSD's "Gee" and I was amazed at what I saw. Soon I was playing "Gee" and "Sorry Sorry" on repeat, knew the lyrics and dance to "Gee" by May, knew the names of all 24 members of both groups by November, and became an ELF on November 5th.

My dance list was short in the beginning, but it has gotten very long with the introduction to new songs and groups. You can view it here. It may seem impossible but I want to learn as much as I can! I use learnkpopdance.com a lot and they are very helpful. I also hope to attend classes held by I LOVE DANCE in Manhattan. They teach KPOP dances, and I could use the help!

At first I just picked and chose which dance I was going to do, but then I got the bright idea to pick at random, so I wrote them all down on little strips of paper, put them in a cup, and when I'm ready for a new one I pick a strip. The first dance I chose with this method? Lucifer. Of course DX But I still like this method, so this is how I will chose dances from now on.

Some of my other interests include anime/manga, cosplay, gaming, reading, writing, baking, traveling, and just hanging out. I also run odorikocosplay.blogspot.com, where I blog about cosplay. Please check it out!

My Fellow Dancers

You may see these guys in some of my videos: S, N, L, TD

Comments

Constructive criticism is appreciated! Please let me know if I am doing any part of a dance wrong! I will post the video/s that I used to learn the dance, as sometimes dances have minor differences from video to performance and from performance to performance, but if there is anything major that I am doing wrong please let me know! However, comments such as "You suck/You can't dance/You're ugly/You need to lose weight/etc" are NOT appreciated. I don't dance for you, I dance for me. "You suck/You can't dance" do not help me determine what I need to do to make my dancing better. "You need to lose weight" is not helpful in the least. I already know I need to lose weight, so you wouldn't be telling me anything new. You don't have to think I'm amazing, but you don't need to be rude. I already know I'm not amazing.

So if you've continued this far, thanks for reading everything! I hope you enjoy my blog!