trivial in the big world
important in my world
__
When our Egyptian folklore dance troupe came in 3rd in a Canadian belly dance competition.
We were the top ranked Egyptian folklore troupe that year. Quite a shock.
We entered to challenge ourselves, not to compete. We seemed really out of place. The other troupes had been performing together for years. One of the troupes performed a piece they’d been performing for years. The competition was the first time our whole troupe had been on stage together in our costumes, performing that piece. Our troupe had formed about a year earlier. Everyone else was in pretty pastel, sparkly two piece costumes. We were in black full length dresses with black head coverings. The other dancers were pretty much young/pretty/trim. We were a very mixed age/size/look group.
We danced the hell out of our piece and flung our tahtib (dancing canes) around and smiled.
When we were announced as first runners-up, the whole place went silent and then went nuts.
Our studio thought so little of our chances they hadn’t sent our coach or chaperone or a photographer to the event.
It gave all of us a lot of confidence in our individual skills and bonded us as a group. Several of the women went on to teach dance. My focus was on developing my skills and I moved to a more technique-oriented studio a couple of years later. We’ve all (but one) gone on to choreograph our own work.
All of that is crazy to me. A dance trophy at 50+. Performing my own solo choreography? Performing to live music with Juno-winning musicians? Swimming a mile of back stroke(it ties in)?
(wow – I didn’t expect to type that much)