Wir sind bei der Gymnaestrada 2023 in Amsterdam 4 mal aufgetreten, unter Anderem beim „Deutschen Abend“, hier einige Impressionen. Die Videos gibts >hier<
Die Fédération Internationale de Gymnastique (FIG) schreibt über uns:
Another crowd-pleasing group performing in Amsterdam is the Munich Wheelchair Dance Group. It is a club created in 1973 at the Technical University of Munich whose founder, Dr Gertrude Krompholz, spread the word far and wide about wheelchair Gymnastics – to some 50 countries, to be precise.
This is a mixed-ability group of “wheelies and footies”, to use the terminology of Fibi Rabe, a relative newbie in the club. The 41-year-old has been in a wheelchair for two years and is in her first year with the group.
Unlike in other areas of life, she cannot speak too highly of the inclusiveness she finds at the club. “It is amazing to see how they include everyone. They make sure all the performances are doable but equally they don’t downgrade it to a level where it doesn’t look good anymore.”
Rabe is sitting beside her coach, Margit Quell, who, at 75, is a veteran of international sporting events having taken part in six Paralympics. Quell’s first World Gymnaestrada was in Berlin in 1975 when she stayed in the grounds of the Olympic Stadium. “We had our breakfasts near the Olympic flame,” she smiles.
As with Ana from Campinas and her mother Jucilene, the Munich Wheelchair Dance Group has its own stories of families coming together to share the experience thanks to the possibilities afforded by mixed-ability participation. “My 18-year-old granddaughter Amira wants to join the group now,” says Quell who tells of a “wheelie” at the club whose daughters want to dance in chairs too to understand better their father’s perspective.
As for Rabe, she says she now finds the same joy in dancing as a “wheelie” that she got from her days of Latin dancing on her feet.
“The expression within a dance, within a performing group, within a formation, is absolutely the same. It is the same experience of being coached, of giggling in the background, so I am very happy to have a group.”