Eight stories you want to know about square dance

To search Guang Chang Wu (Chinese for square dancing) on Baidu.com, you can get about 184 million pieces of news, 4,665 music, 777 dancing groups, and of course numerous comments either supporting and disapproving. Here are eight stories about square dance you don't want to miss.

A thousand square dancers in Xi'an swear to reduce noise

Dancers put "NO" posters on the speaker boxes as a gesture of their determination to keep a quiet and peaceful night for the residents nearby.

Almost 1,000 square dancers in Weiyang district in Xi'an, the capital city of Shaanxi province on Tuesday, promised they will only do square dancing between 7 am and 9 pm, and keep the music volume under 60 decibels, according to news.hexun.com.

Those dancers put "NO" posters on the speaker boxes as a gesture of their determination to keep a quiet and peaceful night for the residents nearby.



Grannies turn streets into strange dance floors

Women holding toy guns dance to a revolutionary song during their exercise at a square outside a shopping mall in Beijing, June 29, 2014. About 30 local residents formed the "Nanguan" art group that performs to revolutionary songs as part of their nighttime fitness activities. [Photo/CFP]

Women holding toy guns dance to a revolutionary song during their exercise at a square outside a shopping mall in Beijing, June 29, 2014.

About 30 local residents formed the "Nanguan" art group that performs to revolutionary songs as part of their nighttime fitness activities.



Shanghai residents 'support' square dancers

Residents dance in a public open space near the No 3 entrance of Siping Road station of Shanghai Metro Line 8 on 4 June. Provided to China Daily

A recent survey found that Shanghai residents have more tolerance for public square dancing, or guangchangwu, which has become a national controversy in recent years.

More than 1,000 respondents older than 13 took part in a survey on noise disturbances. The results showed that Shanghai residents judge noise from house decorating, vehicles and shopping mall loudspeakers as the most irritating, accounting for 35.1 percent, 16.2 percent and 12.3 percent of responses.

Let them dance to the right tune

Group dancing also takes place at Changle Park in Xi'an, capital of Southwest China's Shaanxi province, May 4, 2013. [Photo/CFP]

Physical activities, including dancing and exercise, have proved increasingly effective in reversing some of the effects of aging.

These activities are also an effective way of keeping people more aware, having better memory and even delaying some of the negative traits of diseases such as Alzheimer's and other forms of dementia which are becoming more frequent today as people live longer.

Tourists stopped while dancing in Taiwan's hotel

Two Chinese mainland tourists were stopped by hotel employees when they started square dancing to a pop song blaring from their own music player in the hotel lobby where they were staying.

According to one witness, after breakfast, an elderly couple started dancing to loud music, drawing attention from those around them. Some of the spectators even took photos and filmed the dancing couple.

Public weighs in on noise rule

More than 150 Russian tourists visiting Heihe city, Northeast China's Heilongjiang province, play square-dancing in one of the city's parks on June 25, 2014.[Photo/IC]

Xi'an, capital of Shaanxi province, is preparing to take measures to ban square-dancing between 10 pm and 7 am.

Violators will be fined up to 1,000 yuan ($160), according to the draft. Additionally, the organization that hosts the dancing will be fined up to 10,000 yuan.

Square dance on the expressway

Five Chinese dama began square dancing when their bus stopped for a long time due to traffic jam on Duwen Expressway. Their dancing attracted many spectators.

One netizen posted the photos of the dance on Weibo, China's Twitter-like micro-blogging site, and the performance has generated lots of discussion online. While some people commented that dancing is a good exercise, others said that it is too dangerous to dance on an expressway.

Square dance occurs in Moscow

Chinese senior citizens broke new dancing ground - Red Square in Moscow - with square dancing. The dancing caught the attention of local police, who went to the site to check out the activity, gmw.cn reported on Sunday.

Square dancing, a type of dance popular with the elderly in China, has been launched anywhere at anytime, such as at subway exits, in train carriages and even on the expressway. In April, several seniors were seen square dancing in the square of the Louvre Museum in Paris.