Tales from the Caravan...
Show: Hafla at the Tasty World in downtown Athens, December 4, 2004
Click here for (gallery)
Well, this was a great experience and quite an
idea...one that we will
perhaps emulate in the future. What a blast! I had
never been to a hafla
before so I didn't really know what vibe to expect,
but everyone I met was
genuinely nice. We were scheduled to perform at
6:30 p.m. so after a meal at
the Globe (btw...the curried chicken salad sandwich
is yummy) we rushed back
for our usual 2 hour costuming session. I played
hairdresser for Jeannie
and Mari, putting all of our hair into anime buns
with yarn falls (thanks
for the falls Jeannie!) Now at the Globe while we
were eating I could feel
my throat getting a little scratchy...hmmm, I
thought, could have been the
cold night air last night at First Friday. But now
back at the club there
was no denying it, I was getting sick. Bah! Just my
luck. I made it through
our show and most of the performers, but suggested
we head home around 10pm
since I was starting to crash. I guess the
pineapple juice in my girlie
drink wasn't enough to kill it. After the Hafla,
and a few photo opps
(i.e.-Uga riding), everyone wanted to stop by the
Varsity to get ice cream
and assorted goodies. I had pecan praline ice cream
and coffee. This was
enough to confuse the nerves in my throat so I
couldn't feel the soreness
anymore. I say we need to have a Hafla in Augusta
just so that I can enjoy
it! Ah, I'm such an aries.
Namaste,
Ame
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Mari here with a view on our very first road show!!
Wow! What an experience. I'd have to say this was one of the nicest
bellydance experiences I've ever had.
After getting turned around a bit, we got into town, checked out the
location and helped set up a bit. We were starving so we then went to go get
a bite to eat before getting ready for the show. I had a 15 bean soup at the
globe. I didn't know that many kinds of beans existed! the sultan's ham
croquette sandwich looked pretty tasty too.
We ended up dressing in the restroom of the venue (Tasty World). Why do
people build women's restrooms with no hooks?!? We were very creative in
finding ways to hang up our outfits as we layered them on. This was my first
time wearing hair falls and I LOVE them! I wore my royal blue outfit.
Jeannie was in Golden yellow. Ame was in fiery red.
We were the second number to perform which is great because we were able to
watch everyone else afterwards. The first number was amazing if for no other reason than
for the sheer mechanics of it. There were 20 dancers on a very small stage
all at once! They danced to a nice remix of "I Put a Spell on You." The first soloist (a
beauty in purple) I believe had some very nice ab-work and stage presence, made all
the more amazing when a fellow audience member told us she was 6 months
pregnant! As Jeannie said, "you go with the belly rolls girl, I mean baby
rolls!" There weren't very many tribal dancers other than ourselves. I
believe we were the only group that did Tribal Group Improv. An impressive
tribal soloist came on with blonde dreads; we refer to her as a Brice-ite in
honor of Rachel Brice. Thats good company to be in! :D After that the
dancers started to run together for me. I really wish
we had had some sort of flyers or program. There was a soloist who danced with
fire. Her moves were expressive and her hand work was impressive. Her music
was a sort of new age prayer. Not something I would choose to dance to, but
interesting. After her there was a very cool tribal troupe. I believe their
name was "Dance of the Fates"? It seemed to be all choreography. They wore
bright almost Flamenco inspired tribal outfits. I have seen all of the
individual dancers before as cabaret soloists and a group at different
Atlanta workshops, so it was interesting to see them in this new light. They
started off with pretty skirt work, then moved into 3 solos where each of
them highlighted a prop (sword, zill, fire), and then ended up with more
choreographed skirt work. All in all it was a very polished show and I was
impressed. Ame was really feeling ill after that, so we ended up having to
head out after this number and didn't catch the last few people.
We danced our veil number to Arabian Nights, a duet to We Are Siamese, and
Improv to our I Dream of Jeannie suite. I was very touched by the comments
we got and the reaction from the crowd. We were told that our piece was very
theatrical and you could see the story behind it. Most people were also very
surprised to hear that the last two numbers were Improvised. In a way I wish
that would've been announced, but at the same time the fact that people
couldn't tell the Improv from the choreography is a testament to our hard
work on group Improv.
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Alchemy: Transforming the ordinary into the sublime
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