She then added that many of her private lesson customers, from Dubai to London, are aspiring debs—with lessons geared towards this goal. “We teach ballroom dancing, and we help them pick out different elements of their wardrobe when they’re interviewing for these competitive balls,” she explained. I breathed a sigh of relief when she said this. Becoming a modern-day debutante, it turns out, is an esoteric commitment that almost everyone—not just a daughter of the Chinese Cultural Revolution—finds confusing.

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