Morocco bellydance workshop

[juldea]

Holy shit. I forgot how much that woman can kick my ass.

Morocco is this New York bitch of a bellydancer who just so happens to be one of the foremost experts in raqs sharqi (the real name for it, she won't even use the term "bellydance") and knows fucking everything. Also, mezmerizing dancer. Also happened to celebrate her 65th birthday today. You would never guess it, watching her dance. I'd seen her once before, like 4-5 years ago, and she still leaves me breathless.

So I (and two dozen others) learned a full choreography from her today. Learning from her is hard. She goes fast and she expects you to get it. The teaching method is:

Teach step 1. Do step 1 three times with music.
Teach step 2. Do steps 1 and 2 three times with music.
Teach step 3. Do steps 1-3 three times with music.
Teach step 4. Do steps 1-4 three times with music.
....
Teach step 15 (final). Do entire routine three times through with music.

Do you comprehend how fucking much dancing that is? A "step" isn't just "eight counts of shimmy," it's a full combo of moves. And however many moves the song is broken into, you dance for 3*(timeofmove1-x)! long. I'm trying to get across to you people that my muscles are about to give out and I'm exhausted, but oh boy would I not give it up for the world.

I sense going to bed early tonight.

Comments

[juldea.livejournal.com]

Oh duh, yes you are right. *facepalm* Dunno why I thought a factorial was addition. Brainfart. :)

Sadly the step lengths follow no discernable pattern other than what made sense to the instructor at the time; there are in general similar lengths until later in the choreography, where "do the same thing as those three steps earlier" becomes one step. And you can't just decide to convert that into three separate steps, because the repeat time is shorter with them combined than separated.