Wheelchair dancing becoming popular in Ukraine

The Kyiv Post in the Ukraine reports on Ilona Sluhovyna and many of her friends who participate in a Kyiv dance club that pairs her, and others like her, with able-bodied dance partners.

Sluhovyna began dancing six years ago and was paired with Oleksandr Ivanov, a professional dancer.

The partners dance so well that they are now in training for the 2008 International Paralympic Committee’s Wheelchair Dance Sport World Championships, to be held from Oct. 24 to Oct. 27 in Minsk, Belarus.

“Sitting in my wheelchair I can dance all the world dances, including five European – slow waltz, Viennese waltz, tango, slow foxtrot, quickstep – and five Latin American – samba, cha cha, rumba, pasodoble, jive,” Sluhovyna said. “Probably the most important is the soul of the dancer."

“When I am dancing I am really the happiest person in the world,” she says.

(Note to Media dis&dat readers: The article has a nice picture of Sluhovyna dancing but I couldn't save it in a viewable format.)