Otara dancers create a different world

An Otara gang with a difference has broken into the top ranks of the international hip hop dance world.

Eleven young men, who practise in an upstairs room in a light industrial block in Otara, have come home from the world hip hop championships in Los Angeles as the eighth-best team in the world.

Their "gang", which they named "Dziah", is based less than 2.5km from Norrie Smith Ave, where a gang fight last Sunday led to the death of an Otara man.

But Dziah dancer and tutor Shua Martin, 23, says: "We are oblivious to that world. We are in a different world. Our aim for Dziah is to encourage people out of that scene."

Fellow dancer Allister Salaivao, 20, a backup dancer on TV3's Sing Like a Superstar, says: "Any one of us from this group could easily have been in a gang."

Instead, they are practising six nights a week, three-and-a-half hours a night, for upcoming gigs at Auckland's Guy Fawkes night at Alexandra Park on November 5 and a dance and drama show called The Lost Boys, with female colleagues Dcyphr at Manukau's Telstra Clear Pacific Events Centre on November 19.

"It's training but it's fun," says Joshua Williams, 19, an engineering student who sings as well as dances.

Billie Paea, a personal fitness trainer, and at 24 the oldest in the group, says he and Salaivao and another friend, Antoine (Ants) Parseth, now 19, formed the group in 2002 when he and Salaivao were studying at the Excel performing arts school in New Lynn - the school that produced the first New Zealand Idol, Ben Lummis. Parseth was then still at Aorere College in Papatoetoe.

In its first year, and again in 2003, Dziah won the New Zealand hip hop championships.

Last year it won a national competition to perform at a Mt Smart concert with American hip hop star Missy Elliott.

This year they raised $40,000 at a series of packed-out concerts within two months, and went to Los Angeles for the world hip hop champs in August. There were 27 national teams and Martin says the boys from Otara "didn't know what to expect".

"So I think we did real well against some amazing talent.

"We try to get youth inspired to try to get into something they like to do. We are trying to get them off the street and using dance as a tool to connect with them."

* Dziah at fireworks spectacular, Alexandra Park, November 5, gates open 4.30 pm. Ticketek prices: Adult $10, child $5, family $25. For more information visit www.lionsfireworks.co.nz (see link below).
* The Lost Boys, TelstraClear Pacific Events Centre, November 19, 8 pm. Adult $30, child $20. www.ticketdirect.co.nz (link below).