First, the incriminating evidence…

Those are why I’m sore. Very, very sore. Those videos are just of Friday, and I only took pictures for a few minutes. The rest was hours spent shakin’ my groove thang and being generally ridiculous. We did this both Friday AND Saturday nights. Until nigh upon 2 a.m. Or so.

(Joy learned that Joy needs to get her backside dancing again. It feels SO good to feel SO sore. Need to start moving more. Hey. That’s a rhyme.)

All this dancing was after spending the days wandering around Rakkasah shopping, and stopping to sit and watch performance after performance. I saw so many wonderful dancers and groups, I can’t remember all of them…

Highlights… lets’ see… These are in no particular order… just as they come to mind…

Got to see Suhaila’s repertoire ensemble dancers doing the Unmata sword choreography, and they rocked it… of course. (Including her daughter, Isabella, who is only… what, 9 or 10?)

I saw Sabiba, who I always enjoy watching. She has an incredible mix of drama, showmanship and absolutely precise technique that is awe inspiring to me.

Finally, finally, finally got a chance to see Oreet again. So fantastic. I love her style.

Kaeshi Chi is so cool and smooth, but totally fierce, all at the same time. I love it when someone brings something unique to the mix.

Alfredo! Wow… to see a man dancing with a sword like a man! Fabulous!

Tanjora, of course, doing 3 of their numbers from the recent Rogue show. Jackie nailed her veil… and appreciative people kept telling her how cool, talented, beautiful she is throughout the weekend. (It also happened to be her birthday on Saturday, and how cool is that to have so many people admire you on your birthday weekend?) She deserves the kudos. She really is a fantastic dancer already, and she has so much ahead of her! I hope she never stops.

Jim Boz… he looks fantastic, and had the crowd eating out of his hands, as always.

Willow and the Sangha Dance Theatre put on a fun show, beautiful dancing, nice theme.

Fahtiem… as always, just gorgeous, so poised, so perfect and such an honor and pleasure to watch. Some day… SOME day I will figure out that side to side belly roll…

Heidi Alexander and the Naughty Knickers with Ava Fleming. What an adorable themed “can-can” show, that made the proper blend of fun, funny, and REAL bellydance. WITH absolutely flawless dancing.

Then seeing Suhaila Salimpour take the stage and absolutely OWN the room as she did… I’ve never seen that. A real Egyptian style set with her absolutely magnificent live band… the gorgeous duet of her taksim and violin… her absolute comfort on the stage, just dancing and dancing and dancing, the waves of love pouring from her audience and the way she reflected it back. Then she stepped into the wings and her tiny daughter absolutely filled the stage. The Salimpours really do represent American bellydance royalty; 3 generations of accomplished dancers. Like them or not, they are a huge influence on the direction the dance takes in this country. In my opinion, they have been good stewards of the responsibility of being so well-known and looked up to.

I know there were many other dancers and groups that I saw. Some I liked, some I loved, some weren’t what I like. That’s the way it always works at these festivals. Not everyone is going to like or appreciate everything they see.

The one thing I wish I had NOT missed was Nubian Moon Daughters from New York. I’m told they brought people to tears with the absolute truth and beauty of their dance. They did say they will have a DVD soon. I can only hope.

So there was the dancing, but there was also the SHOPPING. And I did do some of that. Not as much as I’d have liked, but I have a few treasures, and some raw materials for a costume that I’ve been working on for EVER so long.

Then there was the music. Pangia played, of course, and Helm… and I’ve definitely become a fan of Djinn. In fact, even if you aren’t really into the whole bellydance style music thing, you might find you like the music of Djinn. Because it’s just that groovy, man. (How can it not be groovy with a human beat box, a hurdy gurdy, and traditional instruments all mixed together?)

It was a good weekend, not least because I got to spend it with some really wonderful women that I consider to be very dear friends. We were a kooky bunch.

But I’m sore. Foot sore. Body sore.

Oh, life is just a whirl of excitement. I’ve been too busy to blog.

Thursday, the evil VD day… was a lovely evening of wonderful conversation, fantastic food, and good friends. That will be blogged later, and added to Fresnocentric.com. Suffice it to say, though, that it was probably the best Feb. 14th I’ve had in 23 years.

Friday was the podling’s birthday. She’s a teen now. I’m skeered.

Not really. She’s a fabulous kid, a wonderful person, an intelligent young lady, and just plain fun to be around. Thursday afternoon I had taken her to one of her favorite stores in the Tower District to pick her gift, since I’d rather give her a present she actually LIKES than give her something she doesn’t value. She got some lovely silver drop earrings with gemstones. On Friday night my parents joined us and her dad to have dinner at TGI Fridays and go see Spiderwick. It was entertaining, but she was deeply disappointed with the way the books were translated to the screen. She had found the books to be diverting and magical. She refers to the movie as “Two hours of a troll blustering around and breaking things.”

Saturday was a day of hanging out, being at home, relaxing. Kinda nice.

Saturday evening I had picked up a gig to go dance for a birthday party at a local nightclub/hookah bar. A friend of mine couldn’t do the gig, so she called me and asked if I would do it. The pay was less than I would normally ask, but I didn’t have anything going on, and didn’t mind doing it.

THAT was interesting. I had danced there when the place first opened as a restaurant. The clientele was nice, the food was great. Then they switched over to a more nightclub/bar atmosphere, but I’d gone there a few times to see friends dance, and it still seemed a fun and classy atmosphere despite the fact that the food took a nosedive.

This time, I walked in and saw four girls on pedestals set up on the dance floor… in cheezy beaded/coined costumes… um… wiggling. They weren’t really dancing. Sometimes they gyrated. Mostly it was wiggling. Maybe it was because there wasn’t a whole lot of room on the little platforms on which they stood. Still… I couldn’t help but think, “Wow… the atmosphere of THIS place has changed. And not for the better.”

But I was there to do a job. I found the young lady that hired me and introduced myself. She asked if I would wait for a half hour to an hour later to perform than the performance time stated on the contract. I told her I would be happy to do that, but that there would be a $20 charge for every 15 minutes past the original agreed upon performance time. Her exact words were, “You’re going to CHARGE me?!” I smiled and said, “It’s in the contract you signed.” She decided she would not wait, and was going to pay me right away. She wrote a check and I proceeded to wait.

And wait. She was still having guests arrive, so I decided to be flexible about time and not charge her for the first 15 minutes past performance time.

I probably waited 20 minutes past the original performance time before she told me it was a good time for my set. Great! I gave my cd to the DJ, explained how long it was, and prepared to do a 16 1/2 minute set of Isis wings, cane, belly beads, a drum, and some fun songs to get birthday girl and guests out dancing. I had planned this set because I was told she had specifically requested “interesting” dancing, especially props.

Before I went on, I clearly explained to her that the first 3 songs were prop dances, and then I would invite people out to dance and have fun on the fourth song.

The music started, I wafted in dramatically with wings, and that seemed to go over well… once the pedestal girls realized that if they didn’t get down OFF the pedestals they might get smacked with the wings. As the music changed over to the second song, I went to drop the wings and pick up my cane… when the birthday girl and her party decided to swarm the dance floor. I struggled not to hit people with the cane as I attempted to do my number, but then decided to just chuck the cane and let them do their thing.

It was clear at that point that a bellydancer was hired not to actually perform, but just be atmosphere and background.

That’s cool. It’s her party. So, I remained on the floor and danced with the group, pictures were taken, it seemed like people were having fun. Though no one was tipping. I got the distinct impression that these people were unfamiliar with the idea.

When my music was up I gracefully exited the floor, gathered my things, put on my coverup and prepared to leave when one of the girls came over, gave me a hug, thanked me for being able to come out on such short notice and pressed some bills into my hand, saying “This is for you.” It’s not the first time people have waited until after the fact to offer a gratuity. I thanked her and said I hoped everyone had a good time, then left.

The next morning, when I counted the ‘tip’ she had given me, it was sizable, but not the largest tip I had ever received. The fact that it was the same amount as the fee for dancing didn’t seem TOO unusual. In the past I have had my original fee more than doubled by tips received after the fact.

I reported back to my friend about the gig, what had happened, how it went, since it was her agency that the booking had gone through.

Two days later, my friend called me to say that the girl had called and said I had been paid twice. When told that I had thought it was a gratuity she said “Who would tip THAT much?” Apparently this girl has no idea what bellydancers really get paid. She said she’d stop payment on her check. My friend said the check had already been deposited. So… now we have to send this very confused young lady a check for her mistake. Then she apparently went on to complain that I hadn’t done much. Well, of course I didn’t. My friend replied that I had prepared a set of more than 15 minutes with several prop portions but was not able to do them because the party took over the dance floor before I had a chance to do more than one of them.

Note to self: Do not dance at this particular establishment again. Given that they have ‘fake bellydancers’ on pedestals wiggling, it seems the clientele don’t understand what a real dance performance entails, and don’t know how to respond appropriately. I did not feel comfortable walking in because of the atmosphere. It made me feel sad that these girls were tarted up in barely-there coins and beads to wiggle on display, and I honestly did not want to be associated with that in any way. Given that feeling, it would be a waste of my time to dance there again, especially for the low compensation for my trouble.

It’s just so sad. I remember how nice the owners were back when we started, and I remember how much I enjoyed dancing there and being around those people.

I can’t really blame them. You have to do what makes money, and I guess sex sells. At least it’s not a strip bar…

Sunday I got to take the podling to spend her birthday money on some new clothes (as was her grandmother’s intention). It was fun, except for the part where one of her friends called her and wanted her to come to the park. In the middle of our shopping trip. She got grumpy when I told her that was not going to be possible. Other than that, much retail therapy was accomplished, and she found a few cosmic bargains, getting pants IN HER TEENY LITTLE MINISCULE SIZE for $7 on clearance. You go podling.

Now… I have to gear up for the next weekend, which is a bellydance showcase on Saturday (that I still need to advertise and get the word out about), and Ananka’s tech rehearsal on Sunday… though… I may or may NOT be singing for them now, because the sound equipment issue is still up in the air.

Whee…