Hungry or not, late or otherwise, as she got to talking about her mission and about helping me, Sophiline began to open up more and more, as though she had been waiting for this moment for a long time and just hadn't had anywhere to put the words that had clearly been rankling in her head.
The point of the whole rant -- if I may call it that -- was respect.
Ms. Sophiline Shapiro is a destination. People admire her, respect her, and recommend her to people. To reporters, researchers, and choreographers, who then come and talk to her. She knows, and is proud of it -- as well she should be. She is a gracious host, and takes time to talk to the people coming to see for themselves, people like me.
And yet. According to her, they come, they learn, they get inspired, and when they are successful, they no longer know her. If she is invited to the work they present, she's greeted with a cool thank you for coming. Even researchers -- they come to interview her, say they have been so inspired, and yet in the published work she's a source, and no more. One she said, didn't tell her they were doing a presentation in Phnom Penh and gave her no thanks in it, even though this particular researcher had apparently spent a long time interviewing Sophiline and her dancers.
Of course she is proud, and of course it's her own point of view, and of course the others might be surprised to hear her say it. But it doesn't make it any less of a problem. Excuse me, she said, if I'm a little skittish about these kinds of things, but I get hurt a lot.
It is not enough to just be inspired, but pay respect to the sources. From where she is coming from, it makes perfect sense. Even now, she said, I try to honor my teachers. Every day she burns incense in the theater to recognize them and pay her respects. Indeed, at the front of the stage is the pot of incense, hundreds of sticks now burned to the end.
I let her talk, listening deeply to her words, thinking what a magnificent woman. Proud and passionate, and wanting simply to be acknowledged for the force she is. As we all know so well, sometimes it's not enough to know yourself. Sometimes you just need to be told.
I've split this series into three parts because I wanted to make sure I got everything she said. I was -- like apparently so many others before me -- so inspired by her sheer presence, but more so by her passion. How the dance is part of her bones, how she believes in it so fiercely that she turns away any attempts to make it 'western' and 'commercial' and is making beautiful work. Her elegance, and finally her honesty.
I am here to learn. Though I had nothing to do with them, in this case I do carry the weight of those who came before me and, unwittingly or not, left without lighting their metaphorical incense to this fantastic woman. So I'll say it now and again and often, to her and to you and after I've left Cambodia and wherever this mad adventure takes me, and if I don't, slap me around a bit:
Ms. Sophiline Cheam Shapiro, you inspire me, and I would consider myself deeply blessed to have the same elegance and influence as you.
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