Month: July 2005

Cairo is busting out all over. The city is swollen from the heat and the intense overpopulation and at night, all the veins and arteries burst and bleed out makeshift sidewalk cafes and pedestrians toe to bumper in traffic. All the merchants are squirted out of their tiny shops and their merchandise is spread out […]

I know I have been here for 8 nights but it really feels like 1001 as the 6th Oriental Dance Festival comes to a close. My feet are ravaged. I am sleepwalking through class, as are most people here. The dance classes are three hour punishing affairs, and the shows last well into the early […]

I am going crazy from the heat. It is like being locked inside a Bikram Yoga Studio for 8 days with no way out. I can’t sleep at night, but I can’t really sleep during the day either, with the heavy schedule of classes and impromptu excursions into Cairo that I am loathe to miss, […]

Can you tell I am in love with Tarik, and Morroco? And boy is she proud of her student. All her students. She says that she sees their bodies become free under her tutelage. Shoulders hunched forward from years of wanting to cram down into ourselves, so that we could be less of a burden […]

A major part of the excitement in coming to Cairo to the Ahlan Wahsahlan Festival is getting to meet one of my big dance idols in the flesh. Morocco, aka Carolina Varga Dinicu, has been dancing for 45 years, but if you look at her, it’s hard to believe she’s even been alive for 45 […]

Mena House Hotel Cairo, Egypt It is my first official day in Cairo. I am here for the Ahlan Wa Sahlan Festival, a huge convention for dancers from all over the world held in the shadow of the great Pyramids. When I checked into the Mena House Hotel, I couldn’t believe my eyes. I exclaimed, […]