Good-Bye Zadiraks

An interesting thing has come to my attention. While belly dance is popular in Berlin, the scene lacks a sense of community. In San Francisco, almost everyone supports one another. Teachers encourage you to study with other teachers, company directors are fine with their members being in more than one company, and dancers come to each other’s shows, even if they are not affiliated with the same people.
In Berlin, belly dance (or oriental dance as it is called here), is highly competitive. Teachers vie for students and discourage dancers from taking classes from anyone but them, dancers refuse to help one another get gigs because they don’t want to risk being outdone, and company directors want dancers to only be in one company. Within dance companies and classes themselves, there is a sense of family and camaraderie, but straying outside your circle can result in exile.
The company I am in, however, is a gem. Zadiraks is led by Zadiel Sasmaz and he wants his students to train with other teachers, dance with other dancers, and support shows from other companies. He understands that it only harms the belly dance community as a whole if we work against one another. I know there are other belly dancers in Berlin who follow Zadiel’s ethics and I applaud them for it, but there are too many dancers who take a cut-throat approach to the business.
A fellow Zadiraks dancer told me how she was in a company for several years and got kicked out when her instructor heard that she wanted to audition for Zadiraks. I’ve witnessed one teacher yelling at another teacher because he was ending his rent contract with her in order to rent a larger studio space. She basically gave him an ultimatum, saying that if he rented with another studio, then he would be her competition. Yikes.
All of this makes me thankful to be in Zadiraks, and sad to say good-bye. Zadiel performed at Maroosh restaurant last Friday and he organized a little farewell party there for me with his two companies, Zadiraks and Velvet Snake. Maroosh has quite the Oriental vibe with images of hieroglyphics on the walls, a giant cat statue, and Middle-Eastern clientele. It was awesome to see Zadiel perform in a restaurant atmosphere. The reactions from the diners were hilarious. The women looked like they were getting their jollies while the men looked mortified, avoiding eye contact with Zadiel at all costs. I wanted to tell them that it was okay to look- watching a guy dance does not make you a homosexual!
At least my boyfriend appreciated Zadiel’s performance. He’s open-minded that way. Plus, Zadiel redefines belly dance by taking the stereotype of the “sexy woman” out of the equation, which allows you to focus on the technique of the dance. Zadiel is graceful, innovative, and a perfectionist when it comes to technique. He truly makes the art form high class.
I’m glad I got to see Zadiel perform one last time before I leave for California, and it was so nice of my fellow dancers to come out to say good-bye. I’ll be returning to Berlin in the late spring, and looking forward to dancing with all the wonderful Zadiraks dancers once again.

Don't Stick out your Butt!

One of the most important rules of belly dance is that you never, ever stick out your butt. There are two reasons for this. The first is the obvious, that it looks amateur, trashy and stripper-like. Don’t get me wrong, I myself love looking at cute asses, but there is a time and a place to be shaking your ass in someone’s face.
The second reason is that sticking out your butt is bad posture and it compresses your lower (lumbar) spine. Fortunately, my teachers have always emphasized the importance of good belly dance posture (knees bent, pelvis tucked, chest up, and shoulders back). Unfortunately, the class sizes were so large when I first started belly dancing that the teachers were unable to go around and check everyone’s posture.
I’m going to tell you one of my dirty secrets: I have terrible belly dance posture. For some reason, my butt keeps wanting to stick out. My poor posture is the one thing that every single teacher has commented on “Jasmine, tuck your pelvis! Pull in that butt!” Oh, the shame.
And while it all sounds rather funny, my poor posture resulted in a back injury that I’ve been dealing with for almost three years. The straw that broke the camel’s back was a hiking accident, but the chiropractor told me that if my spine hadn’t already been compressed and subluxated, I would have been fine.
The hiking accident is a peculiar one to describe. I injured my back falling down a giant tree stump. Let me explain. I was in the Sierras, with my boyfriend and some friends. The redwoods in the Sierras are massive. Four of us standing finger tip to finger tip didn’t even come close to getting our arms around one of those trees. A long time ago, many of the redwoods were logged. Tree stumps twenty feet high can be found throughout the Sierras. And I had the brilliant idea to climb one. I made it to the top and was feeling pretty cool, until I realized I wasn’t sure how to get down. Of course, my attempt to get down totally sucked and I ended up sliding down and twisting my back in the process.
The result was five compressed disks, three pinched nerves, a subluxated spine, and a tilted sacrum. Forget dancing for the next six months, I could barely walk!
Short of surgery, there isn’t any permanent treatment for my injury. Chiropractic, massage, and other therapies have to be repeated every month or so- and these treatments can be expensive. Basically, I just deal. But as a belly dancer, who has a habit of sticking out my butt, I keep putting pressure on my lumbar spine while I’m dancing.
Lately, the pain has gotten pretty bad because I have been performing and training so much. Worse, a compressed lumbar hinders my flexibility, making my dance moves not as suave as they should be. I’ve decided that enough is enough. Starting today, I am going to practice my belly dance posture as much as I can, whether I’m doing the dishes or waiting in line, I vow to keep my pelvis tucked and my butt in.

Smoking Hookahs at Sandfuersten

There’s something about smoking a hookah that becomes increasingly addictive. All those anti-tobacco activists may get mad at me for promoting this, but hookah smoking is becoming one of my favourite pastimes. Especially when it involves hot belly dancers.
Last night, Wilson Gil and I went down to our favorite hookah bar- or shisha bar as they call it here- with our two new friends, Olga and Karim. Wilson has this brilliant idea for a travel show and Karim has offered to shoot the pilot.
What better place to showcase the unique glimpses that traveling gives you than in a hookah bar in a Turkish neighborhood in a German city? Sandfuersten is particularly interesting, too, as the entire floor is made up of sand. I’m not sure where they got the sand from, but I like to think that it was imported from some faraway desert. The belly dancer, however, was definitely not an import. Laura and I dance together in the same company, Zadiraks, and she is German born and raised. And is a Turkish cabaret belly dancer. Don’t you just love how the cultural boundaries cross?
Karim shot some great footage of Laura dancing in her red velvet and sequined costume, shimmying up a sand storm and eliciting smiles from all the happy, shisha-smoking customers. Wilson had talked me into dancing a set with her, too, but I felt that it was a little awkward. I’m a tribal belly dancer and this whole Oriental/Cabaret style is new to me. I kept getting distracted by the way Laura was moving her arms. I know that may sounds silly, but arms are an important part of belly dance (but I guess “arm dance” just didn’t have as nice a ring to it), and tribal style arms are much different than Turkish cabaret style arms. So, I ended up feeling a bit like a chicken, with my arms sticking out awkwardly as I tried to mimic Laura’s. My friends told me I looked great, but that’s just because they were focusing on the belly part of the dance.
We also got some cool footage of Wilson having a bad “shisha” trip. You can’t actually get high from smoking shisha, but it’s fun to make people think that you can. And we learned something last night. It’s poor etiquette to not use your own cap for your hookah. Of course, this brought up some rather phallic images. So, remember, practice safe hookah smoking and be sure to come prepared. It never hurts to keep an extra cap in your wallet- who knows, you might need the extra protection.

Belly Dance Tips in a New City

The belly dance scene, in any city, is not always the easiest scene to locate, especially if you do not speak the language. Just a few tips that I've gleamed from trial and error:

-find out what "belly dance" is called in that city (ex: oriental, raqs sharqi, etc.)
-research your teachers/venues/schools ahead of time
-use a translation page (www.freetranslation.com) to translate websites that are in a foreign language
-ask dancers you already know if they can recommend a teacher/venue/school
-use facebook, myspace, etc. to make connections quickly
-if you want to teach, check out fitness centers and dance schools, or try to collaborate with an instructor that is already established in the city
-audition for dance companies, productions, etc.! Doesn't hurt!
-ask around about what the going rate is for a class/show (you don't want to undercut the dancers who are already working in the city- that's a way to make enemies)
-go to performances (it's a great way to see if you can get a performance at the venue)
-go to classes (great way to meet fellow dancers)
-utilize craigslist (www.craigslist.org)
-make business cards so you always have something to give someone when they want your contact information
-find a booker (they often act as a translator, too)
-work with local musicians (sometimes it's easier to get a show if you have a band backing you up)

I'm sure I'm forgetting a few things, but I think that's a pretty good list for starters!
Good luck.