Cairo, the 10th October, 2009

“ The bothering FACTOR…plus belly laughs from great funny books”


- Do you think Oriental Dance will eventually die in Egypt? – Asked me my dear friend who didn´t seem aware of the question´s difficulty over an early breakfast (too early for these hard questions!)

- Well, it all depends on Politics. – I answered briefly hoping for her to get my point and quit the subject.
She looked at me as if waiting for a development and I couldn´t escape.

- In any country where most people are still illiterate and the cultural level is about as high as temperatures in North Pole, people´s mentality are shaped by what the Governments and life´s hardships tells them is RIGHT and WRONG.
This is the case in Egypt. Muslim Brotherhood, as opposed to Hosny Mubarak dominant party, has been the most powerful force in the country for over several decades. They had the sources (money, money, money injected by who knows whom) to build a charity strategy that overwhelmed poor people
( the massive voting quote, the most ignorant part of population and also the ones who need more help) and have convinced them – slowly but surely – that an extreme Islamic view of society would solve all their problems and provide essential answers to the main philosophical questions of our time.
Dear ignorance.

Mosques and hospitals have been build by these “underground” soldiers of extremist Islam. Schools, all kinds of charitable activities and a strong religious propaganda that blames “secular” Governments for all the faults, depravation and misery in Egypt.
I would suggest these propagandists a looksie at Saudi Arabia and the incredible results of an extremist religious government ( corruption, depravation, prostitution, ignorance, under the table orgies and general promiscuity ). An example to follow, for sure.

Oriental Dance is in the antipodes of all what religious extremists consider “hallal” or according to God´s will and approved actions.
So I guess Oriental Dance situation in this country is totally connected by the political power ruling the country. Let´s pray these guys never come to full power, otherwise dancers and all artists are “screwed”!


(AT THIS POINT, MY FRIEND WAS ALREADY REGRETTING HAVING ASKED ME THIS HARD QUESTION IN THE FIRST PLACE AS SHE SEEMED TO HAVE LANDED IN AN UNITED NATIONS 24HOUR CONFERENCE WITH ME)


- But why do you think Oriental Dance bothers so much and is seen in such a negative way until today?” – She still asked me waiting for more of my UN conference and thus testing my theory that great women, as her, can often be celebrated masochists.
- Well… Oriental Dance brings to the world a very uncomfortable and misunderstood concept: the Sacred Sexuality of Women.

I never considered it as a sexually charged dance for many reasons.
I´ve been a dancer from the age of 4 years old and all my life I´ve dealt with my body in a very practical, creative and healthy way. Plus I have learnt this dance from incredible masters who taught me BEAUTY much beyond any sexual or emotional fault we may carry.
There´s also a deep feeling of knowledge about this art right there inside me where ALL is LIGHT and INTELLIGENCE.
I JUST KNOW THIS IS A HIGH ART, I just know it (as I know God exists without having to prove it).

- Oriental Dance puts in evidence an eternal power of creation and destruction coming from women´s body and its deepest sources and fountains. It´s a Sacred Sexuality, a concept that Hindu culture has tried to cultivate over the centuries but the world never quite accepted or understood.
People cannot explain exactly why they feel seduced/repulsed/fascinated/disturbed/amazed/CONFUSED by Oriental Dance but they react to it and look upon it with a careful, strange look as if they were admiring a wild, dangerous animal that allures them (like a dancing Medusa) but can bite them at any given moment.
Something not understood and not to be trusted.

- This is the Dance of the Eternal Orgasm…permanent ecstasy, celebration of Life in all its colours. It´s just TOO much to take. It´s an ART built upon TOTALITY –of breath, feelings, soul, LIFE – and that concept is just way to advanced for people to fully accept it.

At this point, I had an appointment and had to leave. There it stood my friend, finishing her already cold cappuccino. My friend stood there, disappointed by my sudden departure and asking for more (beautiful, sweet masochist, masochist, masochist).



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Sudden and happy subject change: BOOKS that will give you belly laughs:

“Funny in Farsi” and “Laughing without an Accent”, both books by the same author, Firoozeeh Dumas

Ohh…what would the world be without music and laughter (both so similar in their natures and secondary effects)?!
I am a compulsive joker (all my family and close people know that often painful and irritating truth). It´s a genetic matter (from my father´s side) and it seems that I got a big, fat, strong willed gene to go along the way surviving to everything with constant jokes and laughing holding my hand. I carry this paternal curse of constant joke making as a throne I am not able to renounce to.
Thanks God (sorry to all the dear people who have to endure my constant joking on them, on me and everything that moves).

So these two books from Firoozeeh Dumas are MUST picks to anyone who enjoys the cultural differences and their funniest bits. I just LOVE a lady with a sense of humour and this author is part of my club. Love her!
Proving, once more, that differences between religions, cultures and mentalities are not to be taken so seriously because what unite us is stronger and more important than what separate us.