Western dances are increasingly slipping into Chinese fitness routines. Chen Nan gets a feel for the moves, once taboo in China.
Belly dancing. Pole dancing. Salsa. Foreign dance styles are twirling into China with nimble steps, especially as fitness routines. Li Yulin's family worried he wouldn't get a good job when he started learning "indecent" Latin dance as a boy.
Since 2005, Yulin Latin has opened 10 Beijing studios with more than 800 children as members.
Li says he fell in love with dances that originated in Latin America.
"The electric moves. The passionate music. My parents disapproved. I had to learn in secret."
Now, Li teaches the moves to children, ages 4 to 12. The yearly costs at Yulin Latin are from 5,000 ($781) to 8,000 yuan.
"Kids come because their parents consider it exercise, social development and fun," Li says.
"We start by teaching simple moves to Latin music. Girls especially love the colorful dresses and shoes. They're easily drawn to it."
He came to Beijing from Henan province in 2004 to work in a Latin dance bar.
Chinese attitudes have shifted in the past few years.
The demand was fueled by Chinese winning international Latin dance competitions and the popularity of such TV programs as US shows So You Think You Can Dance and Let's Shake It in China.
Zhang Miao says she was surprised at how quickly her interest surged after her first belly-dancing class, a 50-minute session at Beijing's Payot Dance Studio with 11 other women.
"The class is thrilling-the music, the moves, the clothes," the 36-year-old says.
The Beijinger has been working out to lose weight and tone her body since becoming a mother 10 years ago. Zhang, who trades stocks from home, considers it a way of relaxing.
"I took a few Chinese folk-dance classes, but they're too hard," she says.
"It requires years of practice. But you can belly dance even if you've never danced before."
Western-style dances have muscled into Chinese fitness programs, especially those for white-collar women and young mothers, Payot Dance Studio's founder Sun Yushuo says.
More than 1,000 members have joined Payot's two studios in the capital, the first of which Sun opened nearly half a decade ago. With the monthly and yearly cards priced from 1,000 to 5,000 yuan, the studio offers seven types of classes, including jazz, Latin and ballet.
About 20 people came for the first lessons.
"But as Western culture-movies, music and fashion-influenced Chinese, and especially the youth, dance programs-hip-hop, salsa, Latin-have worked their ways into gyms that then developed dance studios," says Sun.
Sun graduated from Beijing Dance Academy with a major in traditional Chinese dance and choreography. He choreographed such government-sponsored galas as those for the 2010 Asian Games in Guangdong's provincial capital, Guangzhou, before opening his studio.
Wei Hong, a belly-dance teacher at Sun's studio since 2011, says she had to teach herself when she started in 2000 because there were no establishments offering training.
"I saw my body change," the 48-year-old says.
"I felt not only slimmer but also healthier and more confident. It was considered too sexy by many dance students then."
She learned from DVDs and books.
Sun points out many Western dances feature fast music and unconventional movements that distinguish them from the slow and conservative Chinese folk dances.
He says different personalities study different styles.
"Freer spirits choose belly dancing, Latin and jazz. Chinese folk dances are better for shy students."
Competition is fierce, Li says.
That ups the standards for instruction, cosmetics and onstage opportunities.
Li will lead 18 children to compete in a contest in Taiwan in late August.
"Some people dance to dance, others for exercise," Li says.
"But all who dance regularly form an emotional attachment to it."
