We were late. But after running up the stairs, we found room 206. The heavy steel door was locked, so we peeked through its small gridded window. It had already started. A crowd of students gathered in the back half of the room, gazing at the girls on the stage in front of them. Their bodies were wrapped in metallic blue fabric from their left arm to their right leg. Their motions—flawless. I was watching a sea of creatures in harmony; all figures following the same moves—dancing as if they were one body. The crowd watched in awe. From the small window in the door, I watched in awe. I was witnessing the performance of the best contemporary dance group at UC Berkeley: Thrive. The longing in eyes of the spectators was obvious; they yearned to be one of them. I scanned the dancers’ faces in the crowd and felt their intense desire like they were hungry animals eyeing their prey.

The performance was over, so I snuck in to the back of the room with my teammates. We only missed the first one; there were two more. Preview nights such as this one consist of performances by only the best dance groups on campus. Next in the line up was a group named The Velociraptors, a hip-hop team, also known as V-raps. But unlike other dance groups, V-raps does not host auditions for other dancers to join; instead, they scout for the best hip-hop dancers and invite them to join. A friend had told me this right before their performance, so I had high expectations. The dancers walked on stage confidently in their black skinny jeans and matching black t-shirts. Their expressions were intense. The bass dropped and the dancers hit their feet against the floor with enough force to generate an earthquake. Long beats were presented with a smooth milking sensation. And shorts beats were hit with precision, a flexed moment in time. They would alternate: milk… HIT, milk… HIT, milk… HIT. Music was brought to life: a gray scale image in the music alone was suddenly painted in beautiful bright colors through the swift and sharp movements of the dancers. A simple song had become three-dimensional right before my eyes. Every dancer appeared exactly the same, all doing the same choreography, but each with enough distinct style to differentiate individual dancers. V-raps exceeded all of my expectations.

For those who are familiar with dance, the distinction between contemporary dance and hip-hop is clear. Contemporary dance is more about technique, making sure your toes are pointed with fully extended arms and legs. All movements are performed with grace and beauty, nothing harsh. But hip-hop dance is all about freestyle. The individual moves themselves do not speak for unity of an entire piece. It is the idea of unity by means of a group performing as one unit that appeals to the hip-hop community. Hip-hop teams like to create illusions, and the larger the group of people, the more impressive the illusion. V-raps did exactly that.

Last up to perform was a team from the dance group AFX: AFX Competitive. AFX is a hip-hop dance group that contains multiple teams. I was just lucky enough to be accepted onto one of them. Although I am not on the AFX Competitive team, this more advanced team is one that I look up to. Different from the uniformity of the V-raps costumes, the AFX competitive team dancers wore outfits that were slightly different from each other. The team members brought out several props to the back and sides of the stage. Half of the dancers were wearing white half-masks, adding to an illusion they intended to create. The music turned on, and I heard a voice, a deep voice that seemed to introduce a magic show. The magician was in the middle, and he revealed himself through what seemed like thin air. The surrounding dancers were puppets, and the magician was their puppet master. The uniformity of the masks created the illusion of manufactured dolls—they were all the same. The puppeteer controlled all of the dancers, as if he were pulling the strings attached to their limbs. This illusion of a magic show was executed perfectly.

Before dancing at Berkeley, I thought that dancing was arbitrary—just random moves people put together to look cool. But that’s not true. After joining AFX, I realized that through dancing, we can tell a story. Choreography is largely based on the lyrics of the song, and the emotions felt by it. Anger, love, guilt, sadness, sassiness, and happiness are emotions that we can portray through actions and motions, not just facial expressions. The music and the dancer become one entity—you experience sensations you’ve never felt before, and make your body do things you never thought it could. Dancing is a way to express yourself, your emotions, and your inner thoughts. Every time I see such incredible performances, I am overwhelmed by their passion for dance. Passion and desire consumed the entire room; it was contagious. At the end of the night, I felt the inspiration induced in the audience. There was a fire in me, in all of us, to be like the dancers we saw on stage. Next time, it’ll be me on stage performing. And I’ll be my team that inspires the next generation of future dancers.