Dancing his way through Mr. East this year is David Aningalan (’14), also known as Mr. Twinkle Toes. A senior participating in the 27^th annual Mr. East pageant, Mr. Twinkle Toes is known as a dancer at East and hopes to leave that legacy of his here by participating in this year’s show.

“I’m not pursuing dancing [as a career] but no matter what, I’ll always be a dancer at heart,” Mr. Twinkle Toes said.

In addition to being a dancer, Mr. Twinkle Toes is a wrestler for the East wrestling team. In fact, he says one of his biggest accomplishments at East was winning a match in districts his freshman year which was his first year as a wrestler. He also used to participate in mixed martial arts, and although he plans to go back to doing MMA someday, for now he just enjoys heading to the gym for a good workout.

Aside from wrestling, MMA and working out, most people do not know that Mr. Twinkle Toes has an artistic side.

“I’m really into drawing and writing. It’s something I do at night when I’m bored and I’m just listening to music… I just have a really artistic side of me that I don’t really show,” Mr. Twinkle Toes said.

Mr. Twinkle Toes has had his mind set on participating in Mr. East since his freshman year when he saw Mr. Chiddy Chiddy Chang Chang, also a dancer, take first place in the 2011 pageant.

“I remember I was sitting in the back—not even in a seat—just on the ledge so I had perfect view. And [Mr. Chiddy Chiddy Chang Chang] won so it kind of inspired me to do Mr. East because when he was dancing on stage, it was crazy because I thought that that could be me one day,” Mr. Twinkle Toes said.

The legacy followed him the next year, his sophomore year, when contestant Dan Fabi or Mr. Fabtastic asked Mr. Twinkle Toes to dance for part of his talent act. It didn’t stop there because then the following year, another contestant, Aaron Gomez who was known as Mr. Pretty Little Gomez, asked him to be a dancer in the talent part of his act. It was pretty much inevitable for Mr. Twinkle Toes to participate as his own contestant in Mr. East his senior year.

“I expect everyone to be really, really hyped up. By the time I get off stage, after my act, I just want to see everyone be like ‘That makes me feel like dancing’. I almost want to somewhat inspire people through dancing,” said Mr. Twinkle Toes.