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That beating drum: Romance blossoms on dragon boats

The act of 20 people paddling a 48-foot dragon boat to the beat of a drum has the power to unite — and can even plant the seeds of romance.

 

The act of 20 people paddling a 48-foot dragon boat to the beat of a drum has the power to unite — and can even plant the seeds of romance.

Jonathan Cheng, 31, had moved to Victoria from Calgary and was looking for friends and a new hobby when he joined the FGPC Rebel Alliance dragon boat team in 2015.

Rachel Demott, 32, formed the co-ed team as a way to encourage younger people to join the sport.

Cheng would see Demott walking to practice and offer her a lift. Their courtship took some prodding from teammates, who organized a day trip to Mystic Beach.

“They kind of manoeuvred us into position,” Cheng said. “And at the end of the trip I thought: ‘I really like this girl.’ ”

Cheng finally worked up the courage to ask Demott out for dinner on Canada Day 2015. He proposed this past May.

“If we hadn’t done our own team, we never would have met, so we’re really fortunate that way,” Demott said.

The couple shared their love story after the team’s first race — which it won, during the 23rd annual Canada Dry Dragon Boat Festival in the Inner Harbour. More than 80 teams and about 1,600 participants from across Canada and the U.S. are involved in the festival.

Each team seemed to have its own warm-up ritual, from meditation to stretching to pep talks.

The Rip City Paddlers from Portland, Oregon, stood in formation outside the Paddlers Village, placing one hand on the shoulder of the person in front of them and the other on the shoulder of the person beside them. They took deep breaths as coach Dinah Gilbert spoke words of encouragement.

“We just found having a bit of a meditation helps us get connected to each other,” Gilbert said. “Because we have to do the same thing at the same time out there and have total control over that. So if we can tap into each other’s energy, it helps us achieve that.”

Erin Ragan, who was diagnosed with stage two breast cancer in 2011, said she gets a sense of empowerment from being part of the Island Breaststrokers team.

“One of the things that’s great about this team is we don’t dwell on the fact that we’ve had breast cancer,” said the 65-year-old mother and grandmother. “We don’t sit around talking about breast cancer, and I think people really like that about the team. Because by the time you’re finished going through treatment, you want to leave it behind you and this allows us to do that.”

Roman Matieschyn, who coaches the MS Warriors, a team made up of people living with multiple sclerosis, said paddling allows people to forget their disease.

Some paddlers, who use wheelchairs or scooters, are lifted into the boat by their teammates.

“But once they are in the boat, they’re a paddler. They don’t have a disease, they’re a paddler. It just provides them that opportunity to just be like everybody else,” said Matieschyn, whose wife had MS.

The festival wraps up Sunday at 3 p.m. with an awards ceremony at Ship Point. The event raises money for the B.C. Cancer Foundation, which $700,000 raised over the past decade.

kderosa@timescolonist.com