So this weekend was amazing! Brett, Espiga, Boi, Doug, Rebecca, and I took a trip to SLC for Salt Lake Capoeira's 7th Batizado. The 6+ hour car trip (had to make a stop through Pocky) blew chunks, but the time we got to spend with other capoeiristas and mestres more than made up for it!
Thursday we got to SLC about 5:15PM, workshops started at ~5:30. As beginners we worked on Au de Frente, Macaco, and some sequences with Professor Omi, Mestre Fran, and other instructors that I don't remember their names.. That lasted till about 8PM, then we had a roda. It was amazing! Watching Mestres and advanced students do backflips, headstands, handstand with a twist, and other complicated movements was astounding. The potential of capoeira really shows in those players and mestres. The roda went non-stop for about an hour and half, and then they switched to Brazillian Samba. First time I had ever seen it and it was so fun to watch. How the different dancers cut in on each other and made jokes about it was comical. It really was a treat for someone like me. After that everyone went to dinner, I didn't get to the place I was staying till almost 2AM!!!
Friday started with a Brazillian barbeque with food that was jaw dropping good. All homemade by our hostess (Christiana) and her family. Some of the more advanced players were practicing flips on a trampoline and were discussing the differences between the difficulty of a front versus a back flip. It's kind of shocking to realize that you really can flip backwards a lot easier than forwards. It just seems illogical, but the momentum is easier to build and your body will naturally pull your through a back flip while you sight the landing. A forward flip need a lot of momentum built up and is completely blind. Anyway, after the barbeque was more training with Contra-mestre Ninja and Professor Mutto Tempo. We did sequences from Meia Lua de Compasso that incorportated all the moves we had worked on the day before. It was tiring, but learning new things is always amazing. Most of the capoeiristas that I spoke with were suprised by their abilities to continiously train for so long.
Saturday was batizado. Workshops started at 9:30AM and went till ~1PM when we broke for lunch. Mestre Fran and Mestre Amen (from the movie Only the Strong) both spoke to the Capoeiristas, their words were astounding and thoughtful. Mestre Fran talked about how Capoeira is so rooted in the past of Brazil, and how the world seems to be losing that past as the old Mestres die. "Everyone wants to teach, no one wants to learn anymore." Mestre Amen talked about the dedication that a Capoeirista needed to really become all that he could. I could have listened to both of them speak forever.
Speaking of lunch, I never would have thought peas, corn, and potato sticks would taste good on a chicken sandwich, but it's actually very delicious. The Mestre's Roda after lunch was just breathtaking. Found out Mestre Fran was 65 and the man is so nimble and sly I wouldn't have figured he was a day over 50!
The only sad thing is that I didn't get to shoot as much video as I had hoped, the battery wasn't holding a charge very well, so I only got 5 minutes the first night before the camera died. And my digi-cam didn't capture movement as well as I had hoped. I'm going to pull all the video tonight though and see what I can do with it. I'm hoping that Salt Lake Capoeira puts out a DVD...
I really want to thank Boise Capoeira for inviting our group to the batizado with them. It really was a great experience that I hope to have many more times. One of them being my batizado. Someday.
Labels: Capoeira
¶ 12:50 PM
