My Favorite Swing Follows Part II
In "My Favorite Swing Follows", I gave a quick Top 10 list of my favorite follows at that time.

Interestingly, over time two follows consistently remain on my "Lindy Crush" list and that is Sheri and Debbie Gitt. The rest of the list will rotate every now and then. Okay, just something interesting I noticed.

This time I ended up focusing on follows who may be a bit lesser known. They are fabulous to dance with so keep an eye out for them.

In the previous article I discussed what I thought made a good follow. The short of it is strong connection, creativity, playfulness, and most importantly a big smile to let me know they're having fun (I have such a precious ego!). With that in mind, it's not a big surprise Sheri and Debbie are my two favorite people to dance with.

On with today's list (in no particular order)

Top 5 More Recent Favorite Follows of Swing

1. Mara Jennings (FL):
Mara teaches with her partner Joel Green out in Daytona, Florida. I first saw Mara Jennings at Camp Hollywood/National Jitterbug Championships 2004 where she and Joel won the Amateur Lindy contest with some very clean dancing. We didn't meet though until the last day of CH/NJC. The next time I saw her was at Beantown 2005 and that's when I got to know her a bit more and dance with her. And that's when I found how fabulous a social dancer she was (and is!). Since then, anytime I see her I always try to get in at least a handful of dances with her (most recently Swingin New England 2005). She has great creativity (influenced by other ballroom dances it seems), great connection (slow to medium tempo) and best of all she looks like she is always having the best time no matter whom she is dancing with. Definitely one of my new favorites!

Sukkid and Mara

Joel and Mara

2. Jee-Sun Lee (Korea):
Jee-Sun is a teacher based in Korea. A few months ago (August 2005-ish), two friends of ours, Dan Young and Min-Q Kim, had written me and Sheri to let us know that she would be coming to Los Angeles and if we could host her. One of them also said that Jee-Sun was Korea's best follow so I was quite intrigued. On her way to Los Angeles she made a stop at ALHC 2005 and won 3rd in Classic, 2nd in Advanced J&J, and 1st in Pro-Am! Yes, I became VERY intrigued and when we finally met and danced she instantly became one of my favorites! Personality wise, she is the type that has fun all the time both on and off the dance floor. The best way to describe her is she is a live-action anime character with all the expressions and bubbliness that goes along with that. Basically, it's hard to NOT have fun when she's around. Add to this her great connection (slow to medium-fast) and playfulness and it's not a surprise that just about all the leads at LindyGroove were falling over themselves trying to get to her for a dance. I'm looking forward to dancing with her again, hopefully at CH/NJC 2006!

Jee-Sun, Sheri, and Sun-Hee

Andy and Jee-Sun

3. Heather Eide (CA):
Heather is a dancer and DJ out here in Southern California (woohoo for a local!). Her dancing has improved leaps and bounds the last four or five months in all aspects. She has always been very cheerful and happy to dance with, but her creativity, playfulness, and connection has increased tremendously in recent months, and at all tempos! Most recently I danced with her at the 24 Hour Cancer Dance-A-Thon and it was one of my favorite dances! Looking forward to seeing her compete in 2006.

Jeremy and Heather

Heather just chillin'

4. Tiffiny Wine (CO):
Tiffiny and her partner Dan are growing a heck of a scene out in Denver, CO. I first met Tiffiny at Swingout Northwest 2003. We didn't talk or dance much socially but were in the advanced plus workshop track together so I did get a bit of dancing in with her. Though she seemed quite shy at the time, she gave a very memorable performance at the talent show night as Virgnie Jensen in the teacher skit! Since then, we bump into each other in Southern California quite a bit and usually get a few dances together. We also somehow draw each other a lot in Jack and Jills. To sum up, every dance I've had with her has always been fun for me. She has a great smile and is very playful. I've also noticed that each time I dance with her she keeps getting better. It really didn't hit me until I danced with her recently at the 24 Hour Cancer Dance-A-Thon and had one of my favorite dances of the night. I'm looking forward to dancing with her again as well as seeing her and her partner Dan compete (recently they've also been tearing up the competition scene together).

Tiffiny Wine

Dan and Tiff

5. Kavita Kaul (England):
All the follows listed thus far are coincidentally follows I have danced with recently. Breaking that trend is Kavita who is just awesome fun! Not sure how else to describe her. I've met up with her the last two Beantowns not to mention she comes to visit So.Cal at least once a year also. Sometimes it's hard to dance with her because she's a) laughing too hard, and b) causing me to laugh too hard as well. Nevertheless, she is also very stylish and very fun (slow to medium tempos) and in general I don't see how anyone could dance with her and not be having fun. Plus there's the great english accent. Even cuss words sound better coming from her mouth .

Jenny, Kavita, and Nathalie

Kavita dancing/laughing with Ben

There's my list. Hope you enjoyed it!