Jamila weeklong, here I come

It's finally in the works. My registration is in, and I am going to the Jamila weeklong next month. Booking flights and hotel next, along with Renee who will be a TA that week so we are traveling together. I love these bonding travels with Renee, where we get to dig into our passion for dance together and share in it on a deeper level than the day-to-day grind of teaching and running a troupe.

The workshop itself? As soon as the first one was announced, I knew it was just an absolute "must do" for me. While I don't agree with the claim that Jamila was a "tribal dancer" as we understand it today, her influence is completely and inarguably inseparable from the evolution of tribal as we know it--her aesthetics and fusion of cultures was the inspiration for tribal and fusions of our day--and I am eager to dig into those roots and see how it influences my dancing today. It was that kind of "faux-kloric" dancing that got me excited about bellydance in the first place (studying with Aleili, from old school Yaleil) and I am excited to explore those roots in greater depth!

A little bit about Masha I hadn't read before after the jump.

Interesting note from a Gilded Serpent Article by Najia


Masha Archer"Masha Archer, one of Jamilla Salimpour's ex-dancers, always had a booth at the Alameda Flea Market. She had become a teacher of Belly dance and had a very large San Francisco dance troupe. Masha was friendly with me, and she could be dramatic and intimidating! She was decidedly artistic, and had split away from Jamilla Salimpour's group. She had her own dream and followed her dream. She and her husband sold exotic and ethnic jewelry at the Alameda Flea Market. They held large dance parties at their house. Although, she invited me to come to her parties, I never went because I knew it wasn't my kind of scene, and probably, I would not have fit in with her other guests."

"I saw Masha recently at a museum opening in San Francisco. She looked fabulous and even remembered me! Her hair was dark and slicked back like a Flamenco dancer. She was wearing large hair ornaments and her make-up was flawless. The artistic scene had won her over, and she went into fashion design; she had a real flair for it. If you saw her troupe, you witnessed something like Fat Chance, except that it was more elaborate. It was an original. There was enough Afghani jewelry on those women to sink a battleship! Fat Chance Belly Dance seems more limited in concept and almost dispassionate.

Masha had a social organization like Jamilla's. However, it seemed to me that Masha had a sexual-revolution outlook on life then. I heard rumors that her parties on Minna Street, San Francisco, were very "free-spirited." When dancers performed, they'd look intently into each other's eyes, and we'd laugh because it made it seem that there might be an orgy-happening soon. Belly dance was more sexual in nature back then; that was precisely why a lot of us took it up in the first place! Many dancers, musicians, and performers of the time were famous for their mantra: Smoke a joint, dance, then, go make love, not war. There were no serious thoughts about disease as is necessary now."