With Sombreros: AWO Ballet Entertains Visitors at Europa-Park

(eap) Germany’s Europa-Park invited the AWO Tanzgruppe (a welfare organization dance ballet) from Mannheim to perform on the Europa-Park stage “Teatro Popular” yesterday, 1 May. Thus, on Labour Day, the 14 elderly ladies of the ballet group (aged 60 to 82) entertained the audience in Germany’s largest theme park with their show dances on the theme of “Voyage around the world with the dream cruise ship”. During their performance, the dancers wore colourful, partly self-tailored costumes, inspired by Egyptian, Japanese and Mexican styles, amongst others. Songs and rhythms from all over the world could be heard.

Originally, the dance group’s performance for the German Horticultural Show in Mannheim had been prepared in months of work – but surprisingly, those responsible for the BUGA cancelled the ordered performance because of alleged cultural stereotypes of the costumes, which led to a public dispute in the media...

“The discourse about the planned performances of the AWO Ballet at the Federal Garden Show was incomprehensible to me from the beginning. So the idea was quickly born to offer the ladies a stage here at Europa-Park with their original programme. In keeping with our values of openness and tolerance, we were able to experience a diverse and entertaining show today. We and the group are very pleased with the extremely positive feedback we have received from the audience in the last few days and also today,” says Europa-Park owner Roland Mack about the successful performance of the AWO Dance Ballet from Mannheim, who express their view of the world through performing arts. ■