Sophie's Dancelog

Yesterday I drove to Haifa to attend Yardena’s workshop. Not knowing the city I got lost and ended up 10 minutes late. Luckily I wasn’t the last one to arrive, Israel switched back to daylight saving time and most of the group was late. Yardena greeted me warmly, asked for my name and invited me to come in.
The spacious studio was well lit by the afternoon sun and you could see the sea gleaming further down below Mt. Carmel. Yardena insisted that we take off the dance shoes and the socks, so we could stay connected to the ground. I decided to warm up while we were waiting for the rest of the group and other girls followed me. Yardena seemed very pleased, nodding in agreement until the girls in the back of the room started chattering. To my content Yardena made it clear that dance is the highest degree of concentration and that she would not tolerate any disturbance. In the meanwhile the rest of the girls had arrived and the class began.

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I just finished watching ‘Cigarah was kas’ with Samia Gamal. It is a remarkable movie, not only because of Samia’s delightful dancing, but because of the precision with which it portrays the controversy regarding the way dancers are perceived in Egyptian society. Continue Reading »

Introduction
The video starts with an introductory description of Turkish Oriental Style. Artemis points out the similarities and the differences between the Turkish Oriental and the Egyptian Oriental Styles, using excerpts from the “Bellydance!” and the “Second Awards of Belly Dance” to illustrate her observations. Continue Reading »

The best advice I could give you would be: “Don’t do it!”
Weekend workshops are very demanding both physically and mentally. Unless you were blessed with eidetic memory or all the workshops were taped and you can afford to buy the videos, there is no chance you are going to retain even half the material being taught.
So give yourself a break and take as much as one workshop a day and you would most certainly thank me for being able to walk the next day.
If you keep reading this blather, it means that you are as much a stubborn maniac as I am, and you might find the info under the cut valuable. Continue Reading »