Why did Asim start dancing, anyway?

I just finished the Ava Fleming Profession’s Retreat in Asheville, NC. Yes, it was awesome, and we’ll see if I can manage to write more about it, soon.

I also performed at a show in my hometown, for the very first time. That’s write-worthy, as well,esp. as I got to see the amazing Donna Mejia perform again. *sigh*

One thing I did want to get down was this homework I wrote from the retreat, on why I started dancing. I thought it’d be of interest to my readers:

     I started because I was bored, and wanted to move. I was a teen kid in the Southern US, and my Mother has focused me like a laser on the academic front literally, as my early interest in Track was pushed back for Academic Team. I really ached for some movement, and figured dance was it.

    Of course, the problem was that, in part, I didn’t know a damned thing about dance. I never learned dance as a kid, and none of my family did anything but social dances. But I was stubborn, and started checking books out the library this was before the advent of widely-available video tapes exploring dance. I worked through books on Native American dance, as part of my interest in my Native American culture heritage. I poked at ballet, tap (as much as you can do without the right shoes)!, modern, all via poking through books and the occasional PBS dance show.

    But I think Belly Dance was kind of embedded in my mind. I had seen it first, I think, via watching the show Vega$, where the opening credits had a snip of a dancer. And it was just that second of hips shaking, something exotic and even, dare I say t, a bit erotic, that hooked me as a kid. Add to that a dimly-remembered dancer on an episode of PM Magazine that cemented the idea that belly dance would be an awesome form to take up, fun, and breaking new ground for me.

    Of course, it never occurred to me that it was supposed to be “for women only”. Even reading my first book, Serena Technique of Belly Dancing, it didn’t hit me at all that there was a reason she only talked about women, only showed costumes for women. It wasn’t important, and I was certain that men had to be part of it. So I started studying it, and studying it over and over, for about half a year, poking at it after it. Study happened in the interstitial time between coming home, and my mother arriving  from work, since I knew, somehow, she’d not approve.

    But I did, I reveled in the sense of my body, so different that what I was used to form being a tall, gangly teen. I adored the sense of Otherness, of an exotic alternate reality just parallel to my mundane life. If lifted me up, to play with this, and made me feel really, honestly like a different person, my own person, for the first time in my life.

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Dreaming of Dance.

I rarely remember my dreams.

Last night, I had my first dream of dancing — that I recall. The feeling of being on stage, the whirlwind of activity — even the questions of can I teach, and where? all those infused, colored, made that dream into something I can’t let go of in the AM.

It’s been so long. It’s been Too Long. Both here, and in Real Life.

Time to me to come back, don’t you think?

Boogie Nights

Sorry I’ve been so quiet. I’m been moving so much, and working on so many projects, that I’ve just barely had time to work on the main stuff.
Anyway, I though you’d guys like this:

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Thanks to Mahira for getting such a nice shot of me!

That’s me dancing with some new friends at Juilana’s, an Arabic Club in Chicago.
The Dina workshop was an…intense weekend. I’m still trying to process through it.

More later, perhaps, but one short thing — I need to think more about it, but I feel I’m finally (finally!) beginning to grasp why so many Arabic dancers think we Westerners are such stuffed shirts in our dancing…

Saudi Dance Videos

I’ve been meaning to post this for a few days, now — I ran into a comment on a journal packed to the gills with cool Saudi dance videos, and informatio on where the videos come from within the country. In other words, these purport to be The Real Things.

I’ve not had a chance to watch more than a handful, but I confess to be enamored of what the commenter calls “Bedwani, and it is famouse in the same area [Al Harbi tribe areas along the coast]“:

Speed Kills. That’s why I like it so much. :)

But to be a bit more serious for a moment, this ability to just pull up videos and show all manner of dancers and dances is AMAZING. As alluded to in the Iran post, there’s something powerful bout our abilities to communicate. Just as the so-called “Red Phone” (neither red, nor a phone) may have helped cool off tensions in the Cold War that might have sparked it hot, so too might these videos help people finally grasp that many of the long held stereotypes about dance in the Middle East (only done by women, hated by “Fundamentalists”, etc.) aren’t as true as they thought.

Will dancers today grasp the ability to see into so-called “folkloric” dance in ways that prior generations have struggled to capture and learn? I wonder, if not, how such could be achieved…

Iran Is Burning.

I’m surprised that so few dancers have spoken or even (from what I can tell) Twitted about the explosive and amazing events in Iran in the last few days. With images like this:

It’s hard to imagine anything more powerful, more reflective of the real and complex Iran many dancers know and love.
If you’re not aware of the situation, simply put, Iran has always had a veneer of democracy over the veto power of the Supreme Leader of Iran and “his crew”. With the placing of our favorite whipping boy Ahmadinejad into power in a clumsy attempt to roll back a free election,the interior tensions of the country are now exposed for the world to see…and for people to bleed and die over.
Protesters rock the streets, and are beaten by police, with reports of deaths everywhere — as Neil Gaiman (who’s been very active in reporting events) put it:


If you go to the @persiankiwi page and read it through it’s like an apocalyptic novel played out in tweets. Also follow him #iranelection .

At first, many of the police who got hurt were actually being saved by protesters, not willing to even sit back and allow their fellow Iranians to come to harm:

Now, the regime have brought in Arabs, Lebanese “cops” (Hezbollah? Hmmm…interesting), and the protesters aren’t so fond of hired guns.

All this, the possibility of another Tiananmen Square, or even another Iranian Revolution, and it’s just now seriously breaking in the news, after 2 days of relative silence in the mainstream. Twitter has been the chronicler of this revolution, and has now proven, beyond any doubt, it’s place amongst the dizzying array of discussion and communications options. Twitter isn’t just reporting or reflecting the news — it is, today and yesterday,t he only place to Get The News.

And the students, who use these services like the back of their hands, are the targets for the worst of the violence. The regime knows where the backbone for the fight comes from, and want to break it early.

My prayer and hope is that the regime will know the force of Justice, and the hand of Mercy in it’s application. But if I chose between Mercy for the regime, and Mercy for the people it’s already killing, that’s not a choice.

It’s tempting to look at these events through the lens of being an American. But that 2nd picture above says it all. The Iranians aren’t doing this for us. Maybe Obama’s speech kicked the apple cart over, and maybe not. Either way, they work to make their own lives better. To engender, and fight for, their own freedoms, and that of their friends and lovers and fellow countrypeople. They fight to have a country that will likely be Islamic, but not ruled with an Iron Cross of “Islam”.
And in doing so, these people, so well slandered and misrepresented in America, show us Americans what the values we claim to hold so high are really about, and what sacrifices people must make to gainsay them. It’s sad that the 1st Leg of the Axis of Evil does best at reflecting the values of the Guiding Light of the Free World.

What Not To Say To Asim — Ever.

I posted this in my personal journal, but I also think that, as I’m growing as a dancer, and starting to crawl back from hiatus, saying this more publicly might be of use in future conversations. Apologies for the double-post, those who see it twice.

========================================

OK. I’m going to post this, because it’s come up in a couple of places,
of late. And when I do, I’m going to get an array of people wanting to
post all manner of comments/emails that are…flustered, to say the
least.
So let me say this — PLEASE. DON’T. I’m not posting for
apologies or sympathy. I’m posting so you’re aware of this, and can
move to shift your awareness in the future. I’m not blaming anyone for
doing this, especially given how little training we all get in this
area, and I’m not angry or pissed. Moreover, those kinds of responses
from folks just serve to make me much, much more unconformable than
saying this does, which is part of why I’ve been so silent on this
issue.

But Point Blank, I really don’t want to hear about me
being your Fantasy Sex Object. I don’t need to hear another line about
how male dancers are desirable, or sexy, or hawt. Not only myself, but
other male dancers, often don’t need our egos — or anything else –
stroked in that fashion. And if you think that’s over-reacting –
tough, because that line is way past played out, now. That Joke Isn’t
Funny Anymore.

I’ll be real damn honest — it was people doing that, reacting to me like I’m not even human,
but rather a pin-up with extra mobility, that helped me decide to take
what was supposed to be a short hiatus…and ended up Longer. If
there’s any blame, it’s in that — you wanted that sexy guy to keep
wiggling, and in this case he wiggled right out of the dance, and into
a 100 extra pounds he’s currently struggling to take off.

I
enjoy being admired to some extent. I’m a dancer, and I enjoy being on
display! I’m human, I’m male, and I have a (huge!) ego. Oh, also: Leo,
if you’re into that sort of thing. Although sometimes I rant about it,
it’s true that I enjoy the admiration. It’s true that I even like it
when someone chats me up because they like my dancing (although that
comes with it’s own issues…). But “chat me up” should not involve the
Sledgehammer of Libido!

Because admiration can be taken too far.
I can tell you stories about dirty thongs in bad places, and sexual
harassment at SCA events, and all manner of stupid and disturbing
events. I can tell you how it feels, the gut-clenching anxiety of
hearing yet another reference to me that sounds like something you’d
say about a stripper. And I kept my public mouth shut, for a variety of
reasons. But it did affect me, and does to this day. And yes, it makes
me that much more invested in seeing that ALL forms of harassment in
the groups I’m involved with go away.

Oh, and to forestall
another round of questions (because, really, folks, this is common
sense!) — if you have to ask if Saying X is OK, the answer is “were
the genders reversed, would it be OK to say it to a Lady? Or would it
be the first step towards Sexual Harassment?”

I’m not asking you
to not admire me, if I deserve it. That would be silly! I’m asking you
to think before you speak to me, or where I can hear. Just. Think.

And,
again — please don’t be posting all manner of apologies or
frustrations or even “I’m angry for you.” Just…work on it, and if
someone else does it to anyone, male or female, where you can speak to ‘em on it, please do so.

Thanks.

ITS Costuming Thoughts



Karneval der Kulturen 2009, originally uploaded by henrikbln.

I’m usually somewhat frustrated with the current state of what we’ll call ITS costuming. It always seems that there’s a connection with Gothic concepts that frustrates me. I like seeing new, fun, and most of all flattering — if we’re going to dispense with the relative rigidity of ATS, why stay so painfully monochromatic?

For some reason, the costuming from the Tribal-style dancers pictured in this set attracts my eye. There’s a sense of, well, fashion with their works that appeals; too often, I feel like dancers are just re-working other ideas, and/or doing “just enough” to work on one’s general body, instead of actually working to see what works on one’s frame decisively.
Both the redhead and blonde’s outfits are not just flattering, but present some interesting ideas — take a closer look at her bra, and note how she allows the red to show (or, matches the red) through w/o the usual black color of the bra underneath. It’s a “cleaner” look for “overlaying” bras, and I like it a great deal.

Anyway. Just some thoughts.

(Extra Edit; I know many of you out there are doing kick-ass work in this area. This is something I’ve been seeing in some places, though, and wanted to address when I saw this pic in may dance pictures feed.)