Dancing and jogging, China's elderly swarm onto public spaces

A middle-aged man leads about 200 elderly women in an enthusiastic dance at a square in Wukesong, in Haidian district of Beijing. The dancers show up every day, rain or shine. Photo: Li Hao/GT

As Chinese society ages, an unexpected danger now lurks on the streets. Not criminals nor disease, the danger is actually the rising tension between the growing numbers of middle-aged and elderly people dancing in squares, and other members of the public, who are both competing for the same public space in what has become a fierce battle of wills.

Whenever Zhang Tianyu walks past the square next to his apartment compound at night, he can always hear thumping music. Zhang, a senior college student, lives in what is considered a fairly small town in China, with just 120,000 people. It is neither a nightclub nor a rowdy bar that is making the noise.

It is the hundreds of middle aged women who congregate at the square each day to dance in strict formations.

The issue bothered him so much he stopped eating at restaurants around the square and instead gets food to take away. He feels angry whenever he hears the sound of pop music coming from the low-quality speakers in the square.

Zhang is not alone. There have been conflicts caused by such dance groups around the country. Many have battled the dancers using a variety of methods, some civilized and some much less so. In one case, enraged locals dumped excrement on them from a nearby building, in another case, a separate set of loudspeakers were set up to blast other music at the baffled dancers.

The Chinese dama (middle-aged and elderly women) have in recent years become famous for these dances in public squares, known as guangchangwu, and also for other forms of exercise such as power walking. But most of the time they aren't presented in a good light.

Despite a flurry of media reports about the dancers and how they are occupying space in cities with loud music, few have considered the health aspects of this trend, instead opting to focus on the clashes with local residents. But as the nation's population ages, these kinds of conflicts are only going to increase as elderly residents continue to look for public forms of exercise.

Phenomenon on the rise

Ding Shouzhen and Jia Xixiang, a retired couple, have been leading dances at Tuanjiehu Park in Chaoyang district for about three years. Every night at precisely 7:30 pm they arrive at the park with a tall stereo and start playing the music.

Fifty-three-year-old Ding and Jia are dance leads for about 200 people. Back then they had just started learning the dance steps. But the lead dancer became sick and Ding and Jia took the lead.

There's more responsibility and effort in this dancing than people might think, Ding told the Global Times. She said that in order to lead dances, she has to constantly look up videos online to learn new moves.

For the last few days, the square dancing team has been dancing to the catchy tune of "Little Apple," a song by the Chopsticks Brothers that went viral on the Internet last month among young people. Passersby stop and take photos of them, some exclaiming, "These dama are so fashionable!"

There are more and more dancing elderly women because the need for exercise is on the rise, Qiu Jianxin, a sociology professor at the Nanjing University of Aeronautics and Astronautics, told the Global Times.

"Now that elderly people have satisfied their material needs, they are demanding to satisfy their emotional needs as well," he said. "Guangchangwu gives them a sense of belonging and provides opportunities to socialize."

Ding said that even though she doesn't know the name of everybody dancing in the team, she does recognize some faces, who have been dancing with her all these years. Besides, exercising in the open has brought unexpected health benefits.

She said that she and her husband used to have trouble falling asleep every night and needed to take pills. But ever since they started dancing every night, their health has improved and they have been able to sleep more easily.

Compared with other means of exercise, dancing is not only cheap but easy to follow, Ding said.