The glitz, glamour, and flourescent lights

Cambodia is poor, you say?

It is. This is true. But there are also people here who are rich, filthy rich, with Lexus cars and slick iPhones (often more than one), throwing down hundreds on bottles of whiskey at ritzy nightclubs. I don't know where they get their money. Corruption money? Business? I couldn't tell you.

I'm not entirely sure if the glitz and glamour people -- such as the stars who come through CTN - are filthy rich. I do know they are all dripping with fancy electronics, stylists and entourages following them around with the latest (mostly Korean) fashions, carefully painted faces. The image is everything.

The world of glitz and glamour in Cambodia (and of course it's not exclusive to here, it's just where I've experienced it) lives apart. It has its own places, attitudes, fashions, crowds. I kind of flit in and out of it, with my job at CTN and the people I've met. Case in point -- this past weekend, I was asked to perform at the launch party for the 100th issue of Ladies Magazine, apparently the number one lifestyle magazine around.

The event took place in the "Fashion TV Lounge," in Naga World, the only casino. The Casino itself is glitzy, but the lounge is even sleeker, all mirrors and colored lights, TV screens and modern white tables. A host of girls in Little Black Dresses ferrying  bottles of vodka around. This:

Walking in, there was a stop for the paparazzi, flashing lights, the backdrop with all the sponsor names (and mine, for that matter -- the gig was free, the publicity was my payment). People arrived fashionably late (an hour and a half or so), boys in bedazzled blazers with no shirt underneath and enough hair gel to hold up the leaning tower of Pisa, girls in sky-high heels and fancy dresses, everyone walking in with their eyes swiveling to see who's there.

Honestly? The whole charade leaves me a little cold. It has for awhile, at CTN, watching the stars strut in and primp and fuss, then go lip-sync or, sometimes even worse, actually "sing." The dance groups do the same thing, the boys spending far more time on their outfits and makeup than warming up or, probably, rehearsing.

I think it's because I can't help but feeling that the whole thing is just a cover, a pretend world of silver and gold. It's like this: when it was time to warm up, I was led past the gilded toilet doors to the staff only door, and inside, it looks like this:

Here, the illusion is shattered. The lights are harsh, the tile stark. The girls limp and mutter about their feet as they go off for more alcohol. As they step through the door with now-full shot glasses, they change. They smile. Nobody knows their feet hurt.

Like me. I didn't really want to be there. I was tired, a little sick, extraordinarily stiff due to the return to ballet after a summer off, and chiefly concerned with returning home to finish my book. But I am a professional. So I did my makeup, stretched my aching muscles, and then stepped onstage and danced like there was no tomorrow. No one knew the difference.

I think that's what I mean about the glitz and the glamour leaving me cold, because as far as I can tell, it's a world meant to cover and hide blemishes, where image is all important, and if it cracks for one minute, you're lost. I don't mind playing dress up, playing in the spotlight, sure. But I want to know what's beyond the mirrors and pancake makeup, what matters at the end of the day if all the prettiness and money vanishes.

Who are you, when you leave the glitz behind, and step into the flourescent lights.

Out of budget: Working with Cambodian dancers

Disclaimer: The following is reflective of my reality and does not necessarily apply to all Cambodian contemporary dancers.

I've noticed something recently. Actually, I noticed it at the end of last year, but have only been able to articulate it recently.

When I was in Malaysia for the festival, I was talking with the choreographer of the Korean group and asking him how he got started. He said that he had just gathered a group of friends to start training every day, and then found a producer along the way to hunt for gigs, and now whenever they perform, he pays the dancers. Otherwise, he doesn't. He said, "why don't you do that in Cambodia?"

The thing is, according to my experience, such a thing would be completely impossible in Cambodia, as I have yet to meet a dancer who will voluntarily go through training/rehearsals without a firm guarantee of a performance or payment. They might agree to something in theory -- such as my dancers did in the fall before our performance in October -- but in reality their commitment to such a thing is very minimal and I always felt like I spent more energy getting dancers into the studio than actually creating.

Don't get me wrong: as an artist, I absolutely agree that art should be valued and that the idea that artists love what they do so there's no need to pay them is both disturbing and dangerous.

However, I also believe that being an artist also includes a practice of training and self-development, a practice of questioning oneself and abilities. You can't just slap the title of "Dancer" on yourself and leave it at that -- there is always more to learn, always room to improve. The second I decide that I'm a good choreographer and that's that, I stop learning -- and I stop being an artist.

It feels to me as though the Cambodian contemporary dancers have looked out to other countries and seen artists being paid, and as such are demanding the same (which is perfectly legitimate by the way), but have missed the other side of the coin -- the endless hours of doing things for free, or paying to do them, to become better artists and dancers.

For example: my dance partner and student, Dara, recently told me that he would not join the festival in Malaysia in November (a very big festival with lots of groups and fantastic exposure) for less than $200. I had already offered 50-100 and all expenses paid.  His reasoning was that it was his second time. There was no thought in his head -- at least, as far as I can tell -- about what he might gain from the festival. Only the money. Regardless of the fact that 99% of the dancers in Sibu -- and probably that again for the next one in November -- have several years worth of training on him.

Yes, I'm angry about it -- I'm trying desperately to be reasonable about it, and questioning if I'm the one being ridiculous here. But Dara was really the last dancer here I really wanted to work with, and I'm out of options.  I am a young choreographer -- it's going to be a while before people pay me enough so I can pay dancers at the rates Dara is asking. The dancers here are out of my budget, and the disinterest in experience and professional development is the chief factor in making me want to leave. Even Cambodian Living Arts, which remains one of the coolest organizations I've ever worked for, recently nixed an idea for a second choreographic development workshop because of the "lack of hard skills" offered in the workshop goals.

Yes -- I want to leave. There is nobody left I can afford to work with, and I know that there are many other places full of dancers who are hungry to learn, hungry to gain experience, and willing to board a train without seeing the destination. Those are the people I want to find -- not the people who simply hold out their hands and say, "Okay, but how much are you paying?"

I'm not getting on a plane tomorrow. But my focus has shifted, and over the course of the next six months or more, I will be looking to move onto a place where I can grow as an artist, surrounded by other people with the same vision. At this point, I don't see it in Phnom Penh.

#100DaysofDance -- go check it!

Right.

So something got into my head, and I decided to start this project, called #100daysofdance (v. Cambodia).

Basically it goes like this: I love dance, and I live in Cambodia. In fact, I live in Cambodia because of dance. So I decided to marry the two, and out came this idea to take one dancing picture a day, tell a short story about why I took it, who's in it, etc, and do this for 100 days.

I got so excited about it, I made a whole new blog to accommodate it: 100daysofdance.blogspot.com.

Check it out, share it, enjoy it! This blog will go dormant while this project is happening (more so than usual that is), but be sure to check back when the 100 days are up!

Cheers.

Why am I here?: The ups and downs of life in Cambodia

I suppose it would happen in any country, to anyone living anywhere, abroad or otherwise -- though perhaps especially for expatriates like me. Every few months, you start to wonder what you're doing here, because the things you think you want morph, the things you think you came for vanish, and in between there is a whole lot of gray to deal with.

It's not as though there are not opportunities in Cambodia -- in fact, there are so many that I'm working close to 50-60 hours per week between three jobs and my extra projects, which include a number of performances to dance in and create.

But it just doesn't look like I thought. Most of my recent frustration has come from my attempts to start "Pandaemonium Dance", which I had pictured as intense training and rehearsal with a number of dedicated dancers, building up to a variety of performances. I spent a long time worrying about the fact that I have no paid opportunities yet and not wanting to waste the dancers' time, and yet thinking they would be there to build the thing up with me.

Except, as artists do everywhere in the world, that's not the case. As the producer/creator, you are always the one who cares the most, and the others are there because it is one opportunity among many and they don't want to miss anything, so they do everything 50% instead of throwing 200% into one thing to build it and see it through.

What does that mean? It means that every week, some dancers are missing because they have other shows, other rehearsals. Saying they are free to rehearse at a certain time -- which they all did -- does not, I've discovered, mean they actually are. That time is not "blocked out" of the schedule as it is with mine, and if something else arrives, well, they try to do everything and if they can't, they say yes to the new one and send me text messages apologizing profusely for not coming.

That's all well and good, but they still aren't coming.

It's frustrating because of course I want it to be as essential to them as it is to me. When I say I'm doing something, I do, and come to every single rehearsal unless I absolutely cannot -- and if another thing comes up, I say I can't do it, I'm already working on something else.

But that is not the case with everyone and everywhere, and in the past few days, I've had to go back to that old question -- what do I want?

Every time in Cambodia when I think my mission is to "help" or to "teach" and that my knowledge is somehow invaluable or essential, I get lost and I have to realize that it is not. These artists are busy. They are good. And they will find their way -- or not -- regardless of what I do. I am not the Doctor or the Know-All, End-All.

It's a sobering thought, but the only way out is to go back to that simple question. What do I want out of being here? Why am I still here, a year and change down the road, and why shouldn't I just leave, as I consider doing every few months? If all these things I want, in life, love, career and etc, seem so very far away, where can I go to find them?

I actually still don't know the answer to those questions and probably never will, but I do know that for whatever reason, I'm not ready to leave this place yet, and I can't picture it.

So I'm having to go back to what there is and go from there, and follow my own heart, do things because I want to and not because I think someone else needs it. And be willing to let my vision of what it is I thought I was doing here to change. As an example, the past week I started judging for a Kpop dance contest on CTN, which is fabulously amusing, but that is not at all what I thought I was coming for -- a TV personality on Cambodian TV, WHAT??? But there it is, and it's fun, and though it is not the artsy fartsy production/creation I had in mind, it is here and happening, and I have to follow it.

Life is complicated, and so is this country, but for better or for worse, I am here, and learning by the day -- and maybe, in the end, that's the real and only reason to be here -- and maybe it's reason enough!

Protection from the overbearing west, or covering your eyes?: Why I'm teaching ballet here

There is an ongoing debate going on in Cambodia right now about arts and culture -- to evolve or to preserve. And on the side of evolve, there's another split as to how. They agree that it's okay to change and move forward, but as to how -- with what influences, etc -- is the question.

Essentially it all boils down to the question, how much of the west is too much? For the preservation side, any is too much, but even on the evolve side that can be true. The west has done enough. Cambodians should evolve from their own culture, and the west should stay in its own place. 

This week I found myself in the middle of this debate as a result of my decision to teach western dance history in a workshop at Cambodian Living Arts. I prefer not to say who the debate was with or how it came up, but the basic question was this: if we're encouraging contemporary Cambodian dance that is still based very much on Cambodian culture, then we should be careful about showing/exposing the dancers to too much western dance so they don't get a certain idea fixed in their head. 

Now here I have to say, I have no idea what the best way is, obviously. I have only what I think, and while I do feel pretty strongly about it, I can't say I'm right and end of discussion, as no doubt the truth is more complicated. 

But what I think is that there is nothing more important than education. There is nothing more important than being exposed to as many things as possible, ideas that challenge what you feel, what you think you believe. Personally, I've watched a lot of dance. I like maybe 10%, and I really love maybe 5%. But the more I watch, the more I understand what it is I respond to, the ideas I really appreciate. 

Now, if it were to be the sort of thing where someone comes in and says, "This is Martha Graham. This is what dance should be. The end," that would be a different story. But I can never say, this is what dance is, this is what it should be. Those ideas are constantly being challenged, and the most revered characters in dance history are those that broke the rules, that did things completely different from those that came before. 

Why is it that we westerners are allowed to steal from every other culture, and yet when it comes to Cambodians learning about the western forms, suddenly it's seen as the overbearing west? 

Isn't it true that looking at the western forms -- and any other cultural forms and dances -- that they might understand what makes Cambodian forms unique and special, and being able to really exploit those areas? 

Besides education -- learning history, context, seeing what ideas other choreographers are playing with -- what about teaching other techniques? This has been a different side of the debate in the past. I am planning, as part of my dancers' training, to teach basic ballet and basic contemporary techniques. I want to do this because I think there are certain tools of movement -- like strength, flexibility, and balance -- that ballet is really good at offering. Graham technique is excellent for core strength, another useful tool, and other techniques I've learned are really good for strengthening and learning to use the back, yet another useful tool. 

But in doing this, am I squashing the Cambodian side? Even if we never actually perform a lick of ballet onstage. Pilates might be okay, but ballet? Too western? Of course I don't know the answer to it, but I do believe that as a dancer, the more tools you have in your pocket to help you move in different ways and adjust to different styles or think of different ways to move, the better. What I know is ballet and contemporary and that's what I can teach. 

Does all of this make me a blind, overbearing westerner? 

I know that sounds like a sarcastic question, but I mean it honestly, and the answer is, I don't know. Maybe it does. But I just can't let go of the idea that it's important to know what's out there, what other people are doing and why, because I'm quite convinced that the more you understand the other, the more you understand yourself. 

It has to be done tactfully, in the sense of showing -- this is this choreographer, they were trying to do this -- and not lecturing. But there is no need to shelter these dancers. Let them look, let them learn, and let them decide for themselves what it means to be Cambodian. With the education behind them, it will be a much more informed decision. 

I don't know all the answers, but I just think that covering your eyes does not help you see. 

Losing the thread, or rather the words

I wonder if there is a moment in any new experience or immersion such as this -- such as Paris before it -- where words become completely inappropriate. When taking the time to find them, to place them together in strings of meaning that may or may not encapture that which you are living, is too long and cumbersome and in the end it doesn't say what you wanted anyway.

Maybe it's just the busyness -- that around a year of building, of negotiation, the seeds that were planted and watered and cared for are suddenly exploding out of the ground with the sheer joy of being free. Or maybe it's the craziness of someone working too many jobs and adding too many projects, and when I do have a moment to breathe, I spend it mostly playing silly games that do not require thought, or analysis, or negotiation.

Either way I've noticed the weeks flashing by and I think about the blog, but often find I have very little to say. Are there still cultural differences to be noted and learned from? Of course. Daily, hourly. Each moment of being here is a negotiation. But it's hard to put those into words, because they must be lived, and breathed.

It's funny, this blog has mostly been about life, about the fact of living here. Dance is referenced and mentioned -- as it would be impossible not to -- but often in the context of a job, like CTN, or a mention that it happens. But there is very little here about the conversations I have very regularly about dance, about my vision of it, the negotiations that take place around that subject.

In some ways I guess I feel like the blog was intended to track the cultural side of things, the adventures and challenges related to that, life as it tumbles along and my thoughts from the wake of it, and maybe dance philosophy wasn't exactly part of that.

I guess what I'm saying is, lost inside this existence where words seem very clumsy and time-consuming, I wonder what this blog is for -- it's certainly not written for a wide public audience, maybe just more for myself to keep a record of this time as it was happening. Looking back to things is cheating because then you have hindsight, and perspective that now lacks, and sometimes I like to look back at previous posts -- to find solace in the fact that SHE didn't know what she was doing either, or to see how far I've come, or just marvel at this crazy journey I've been on.

But there are things to be said. There are remarks to be made, things that have struck me as beautiful or profound. I suppose I'll try taking the Pixie Dust Chronicle into a new direction -- not just long, in-depth studies, but remarks, things I notice, short posts about one thought or conversation.

I'll wrap up this mostly useless post with a story: I met someone the other day who is doing some very beautiful dance/theater work in Siem Reap with three Cambodian girls (www.newcambodianartists.com). He was telling me about one day when the girls were doing an improvisation, and one surprised him with this kind of feral, tigress kind of thing, low and open and very, very daring especially for a Cambodian girl. They took a long time to get back to it the next day, but when she at last got there, he asked her how she felt in that moment.

She said this: "I felt very alone, and I felt like I could dance very well."

I thought it was one of the most beautiful and perfect things anyone has ever said about a performance.

គ្មានការរំាជីវិតគ្មនន៍យ: Actually, it means something

I've been spamming the heck out of my Facebook wall tonight, so I decided just to write a short post about it because I've been so up in arms -- and sort of surprising myself in the process.

The background is this: this week, for Saturday concert, I was told that there were no slow songs to dance because the singer had their own team of dancers. At first, I just accepted that, hey, whatever, but when the concert came on tonight, I found I wanted to watch it. If the dancers are good, I thought, no problem, but if they aren't, I'm going to be upset.

It was a singer that's been on quite often, some big star, that was featured, but the thing was, he sang two slow songs, and no dancers were present. There was a group of dancers doing a traditional dance, but the longer the concert went on without slow dancers, the more agitated I got, and when he finally came on with dancers, it was for a disco song.

The dancers weren't bad and he had clearly rehearsed with them, which is actually something I've been wanting to see from the stars, so there was that. But what about the slow songs? Where were the dancers? And if they weren't performing, then why, I demanded of the television and my flatmate ad infinitum, weren't we invited?

I was actually quite ticked off about the whole thing -- the having their own dancers, the lack of slow dancers, the lack of my dancers, everything. It wasn't reasonable -- hell, they're a giant corporation, they can do whatever they want, and he's a big star, he can do whatever he wants.

But then I had to step back, and I realized something kind of surprising: I care about this job.

I know. All I do is complain about it. But when it comes down to it, I'm proud of the work I've done and the improvements made under my watch, and whatever happened with CTN or the singer meant nothing, but it touched on my pride (That's my stage you're taking away from me...).

But beyond that, it actually touches on a much deeper thing in me, which is that I love what I do -- dance, and creating dance -- beyond all reason.

The tattoo on my leg, and the title of this post, reads "Without dance, life is meaningless" and gets a lot of funny looks. People read it at stoplights and kind of laugh or give me weird looks. Sometimes, with a bit of a teasing voice, they'll ask if I like dancing. But what I want to say is, you don't understand. You don't get it. Dance is in my very bones, above anything else in the world. If my family asked me to stop dancing (which they never would, but just to prove a point), I'd choose dance first. If a man ever asked me to stop dancing, I'd choose dance first. Without dance, I am lost.

But not only do I love what I do, I take pride in it. That's why, although I'm not required to be at CTN for the live concerts, I'm always there, because I want to see it -- and not just the clips in the background you get on the television. I need to see the whole picture, how the space works, which parts work and which don't, and I get upset when things go wrong. It matters, and matters deeply, that I do my job well, and never stop improving.

All things considered, the poor singer probably didn't deserve the wrath I was sending his way, but along the way I learned a pretty important lesson about a job that some months ago, I was considering running away from.

Duly noted, universe....

Letting go of the drama: a lesson to be learned, over and over

I think it must be the lesson of my life, because it comes back, time and time again, in different forms with different faces.

If you've been reading my blog, you know what's been going on for the past two months: fits of drama, stress, and anger. I had in my head a vision of working with technically trained dancers who care about their craft, in a company where everything goes right all the time and everyone gives me what they're supposed to. Where expectations are clearly laid out, people take responsibility for what they're responsible for, and I'm not the one who takes the fall if that doesn't happen.

And that's just not the reality. The reality is the essentially the opposite, and the drama has come about because I just got angry with this fact. I fought it and I fell into vicious cycles that repeat and fall deeper into themselves, and spiral down into bad energy, constant stress, and really just not good health.

I can't change the reality. I can't change what I'm given. I can't change the company. The only thing I can do is change how I look at it and how I do what I do.

And so that's what I'm going to do. Starting here, not getting music on time, getting the wrong music, dancers wanting to leave early or butting in with suggestions for what would be better, being under a microscope and judged as inadequate, that's normal. That is the world. My work is what to do inside of it. How do you prepare for everything to go wrong?

I don't know yet. But I do know that the anger is stopping right now. The stress is stopping. The fighting is stopping. What is given is given. What's on my plate is not what I thought I was getting, but that's the way it is. Fighting over the fact that I was supposed to get chicken is taking the time away from the essential.

I've been so busy worrying about the extra stuff that I haven't had time or energy to focus on that essential: creating dance. Thinking of new varieties of movements, tempos, spacing, energy, etc. Instead, I've been in the constant energy of "everything is wrong and I can't work like this." No. Everything is not wrong, it is the way it is.

If it turns out that me and the company are incompatible, then so be it. If it turns out that our energies and expectations simply do not match and cannot be made to do so, then so be it.

So here I am. I have two choices: continue in the drama cycle, fight, be angry, be unwell, or change how I look at things and go forward without all that on my shoulders and focus on the only things that I can change and control. Doesn't seem like much of a choice to me, when put like that.

I don't know what, if anything, it might change. I know that if I make this change with the expectation that it will cause something -- anything -- to happen, then I'm not really making it, and just propagating the same cycles of drama. And so I don't expect anything. I only know that I can't go on the same way. So if the only thing I can change is me, that's already something.

Starting now, what was "wrong" is normal, and inside it, I am perfectly calm, I do what I can, and I don't spend time fighting ghosts.

I guess we'll see what happens.

Go away, borohte: "Foreign Living Art"

After filming the informal showings during my summer workshops, and collecting the footage filmed by my translator on his iPhone, (and minus all the footage from my solo workshop thanks to an ill-placed spectator), I had a lot of film, and a friend of mine named Bernadette Vincent mashed it all up into a lovely reel style 7 minute video (link is here).

Cambodian Living Arts, who after all, facilitated the workshops, picked up the video and put it on their website and facebook, and prompted an entire cultural debate.

One person said, this isn't Cambodian, CLA used to do good work but now this? He asked, shouldn't it be called Foreign Living Art instead?

Others responded that this IS living art, it evolves and grows and creates. But it is destroying my culture, the guy repeated. Only Khmer can save Khmer culture.

He's not alone. For many people it is a legitimate fear. How do you deal with a generation more interested in contemporary than the classical? People here have seen their culture almost entirely vanish during the Khmer Rouge. There are no teachers, masters left. No wonder they are anxious. They have only begun to reconstruct, and now this western kind of culture is mixing in with the old and they worry, and perhaps rightly, about that what came before.

I'm sure you know where I stand. You can't keep culture in a box. I responded at one point, but I'm not trying to save Khmer culture. I'm just here to teach and encourage and experiment and learn. My background is in Western dance, and that's the only thing I know how to teach. The students enjoy it and I try to encourage them to be proud of their work, take control of their art, and be unafraid to create.

Is that destroying Khmer culture? Am I distracting them from focusing on what's important? Is it the west doing what the west does and would every one be better off if I took my westernness to the west where it belongs?

Of course I don't think so, and of course I don't know for sure. I think it's not about any one culture but the cross-culture, two fundamentally opposing cultures and dance learning from each other to explore what's possible.

Is that destroying Khmer culture?

Honestly, I think that'd be giving myself FAR too much credit.

Professionalism, Performances, and serious Déjà Vu

I suppose it's anywhere you go, the madness and the last-minute nature of things. Anywhere you go something goes wrong on opening day, Cambodia or New York or Paris. However, add in all that and mix with cultural and language differences, and you get quite a mess.

The one problem with the arts scene in Cambodia is the lack of venues, for performance and for rehearsal. The only "western" style professional theater is Chenla, which is kind of on the outskirts of town. I don't know the rates for that, but probably fairly expensive. But aside from that, it leaves few options.

I was asked by a friend to perform for the year-end school of the new ballet school in town (my friend runs it), and immediately agreed (especially seeing as I wasn't being recruited for a ballet, but a contemporary piece.) The piece ended up being a 15 minute duet (including a five minute solo) with a lovely Scottish woman, and it's been incredibly nice to have some time to just do what someone else tells me to do instead of the madness of creating, producing, and etc.

The evening was rounded out by a one-act ballet provincial style, with bales of hay and all the other various props that go in ballet-ballets (so much ballet...), including a posse of ten or so kids to hop in a circle at various intervals, and a community outreach contemporary piece, performed by eight Khmer students. My friend is determined to put together a professional school and not just the place you send your kids to fluff about for awhile, and he's doing a pretty good job of it. He has a real passion for teaching and it comes through.

He rented a theater called "the Department of Performing Arts." I am not sure if classes take place there or really what it is for, but it is hidden back amongst the houses around it and you have to be looking to find the alley way that leads to it, a large, somewhat oddly shaped building with stairs unnecessarily wrapping around it. It looks big, but isn't particularly, seating 150. The stage is a decent size, but there are no dressing rooms or backstage areas. The bathrooms are downstairs and you have to go outside to find them. Mirrors for makeup don't seem to exist anywhere. The stage is wood and nails creep up here and there.

In addition, nobody bothered to tell us that while we could be in the space all day, if you run the lights that long they burn out, and halfway through the afternoon all the dimmers blew, leaving us with access to the four mains onstage and the bank of spots in the front of the house. The only way to turn them on and off was by unplugging and plugging the cables. On or off, no in between, and the production staff decided to blame  us for using the lights so long.

That pushed the rehearsals back, the hair and makeup people were running late, the people coming to do the hair for the community piece were late, the film crew turned up two hours late, and with my friend overwhelmed and running around, it was left up to me and my duet partner to warm up the kids.

I don't know how to warm up a bunch of seven year olds, but nevertheless, we played some silly games. They ran around. I taught them a bit of Thriller. They got bored. We stretched, they were even more bored. But we'd wasted ten or fifteen minutes and they pronounced themselves ready to dance.

A word about the kids -- all expat kids, their parents here for work. French, British, American, earnest and adorable, asking endless questions and adoring the older dancers, their hair in two french braids and little dresses (the one boy in green trousers and a white shirt). They were all me, fifteen years ago. I could see it so clearly, their parents helping with the show like parents do anywhere. Only in Cambodia. It's just where they live, nothing special. Back in America, they say, it was like this, but I don't know here.

It was such a mind-twist for me, to see myself as I was fifteen years ago, the little ballerina girl with the blond hair and hamming it up, but here, in Cambodia, in this somewhat rickity, imperfect theater.

The show sold out. They had to turn people away. Everyone had a good time, the lights didn't look awful, and no one was any the wiser. I didn't overbalance on the tilt. The kids were great. The community piece looked beautiful in a shadowy light, with their white costumes and crazy hair.

I guess, wherever you are, the show must go on.

Auditions

I don't like 'em anyway you cut it, auditionee or auditioner, because either way someone is staring at you and expecting something, which has always made me uncomfortable (see: why I refuse to teach in a classroom and have had to be talked into teaching contemporary technique classes). As much as I can talk about being one of the few trained choreographers here, I still often feel like a little kid on the big kid's playground.

Anyway, this one was kind of a mess, somewhere around 25 young kids, of two hip hop groups, mostly guys and of the seven girls, only three or four could actually dance. They did a routine of entirely sexy movements, while all the while staring at the ground. Charming. The guys were a bit better, in the one group all tough, the other group looking like a motley crew of kids in comparison, but turned out to be equally good dancers.

I was looking for a couple things -- the plain old ability to move your body is pretty important and not that obvious apparently ---

Well I guess I haven't actually said this yet because I haven't actually signed a contract yet and I didn't want to talk myself into where I'm not, which I've done before, but seeing as they're having me audition dancers I think I can safely say that I'm signing on with Cambodian Television Network to choreograph the back up dance for their weekend concerts. They have five, three are "slow" and under my responsibility.

The current state of backup dance on the concerts is pretty abysmal, with freelancers that aren't together and have no energy or stage presence to speak of (sorry, just telling it like it is.) They are hiring a whole new group of dancers -- proving to be more complicated than anticipated thanks to the turnout at auditions -- and choreographers (yours truly) to build it up from the ground and make something worth watching.

I think it's going to be a fascinating experience for me and my career, and am quite looking forward to it, but getting the songs on Wednesday for a Saturday concert and thus having two days to prepare close to 12 songs is going to be extremely challenging -- especially since I'm going to have to basically teach the entire vocabulary and technique to the dancers.

As such, I was watching for fast learners, very important. I always watch for stage presence. This time I added a couple other criteria to the list -- do they respond well to being put under stress (learning a lot quickly and being tossed out on their own, corrections, etc), and do they seem like fun people?

The last might seem strange, but let me tell you what -- if we are going to be working together every week under extreme conditions, we damn well better like each other. We don't have time for butting heads or personal problems.

Drama comes here too -- one of the groups was upset because the assistant for the fast choreographer taught their phrase, which they felt gave that group an unfair advantage. They were still talking about it when I left. I hate drama. I try to avoid it as much as I can, though artists have a disproportionately large amount of it, which I've never understood.

Anywho, it will probably all come to naught, as the production managers get last say, and they'll probably stick me with my last choices. Welcome to television, Gillian!

Imprinted on my eyelids: Friday night out

I remember the place like this: black chalkboard walls and low blue light, people and live rap and then whenever someone took a picture, everything would go pure white for a full second except for whatever I had been looking at at the moment the flash hit, imprinted in white.

The latter half of the evening was like that, flashes of white and the memory of an image floating in my eyes, like capturing little bits of eternity. It was a fundraiser for detainees and the heart of the urban art scene here, spoken word poetry and performances, on the spot rapping, some crazy reggae style Khmer band, and DJs, in a little random bar where the bartenders juggle the bottles while making one of the three cocktails available.

I was there until about two, dancing and as happy as a clam, but at a certain point I was getting tired and my feet were hurting, having worn heels (and jeans, it's been positively cool), so I managed to head outside precisely as a rainstorm was hitting and was absolutely thoroughly soaked by the time I arrived home.

The night didn't begin there, though, it began in a really too-cold auditorium at a show that started a half hour late and ran an hour late for the closing of the Youth Arts Festival. The show itself was an eclectic mix of things -- a somewhat too-long but nevertheless interesting shadow puppet performance, a duo of old, extremely good musicians singing apparently hilarious stories in Khmer to judge from the audience reaction, and a blind, very old man sitting in a chair and recounting a story with at least five characters -- by himself, each character with a distinct voice and style. It was really quite surprising.

What followed then were a couple of attempts at contemporary dance, one made by the kids I worked with in Siem Reap (who have been a joy to see around at the festival, as they are also so happy to see me and so sweet) which left me with my hands over my face and solemnly swearing I had nothing to do with the piece (which I didn't), and one choreographed by someone I don't know but danced by a couple of my students, which left me scrambling for a notebook and a pen.

I don't want to say they were bad, but they looked to me like what someone thought contemporary dance should look like. It looked like people doing technical movements without having the backing or the training to do them cleanly and well, and the second piece was essentially taking what the two kids do best -- for one, looking statuesque and sexy, and the other, bending in all sorts of crazy ways -- and doing it for five minutes.

In any way, it told me exactly what I need to teach them, so that was fine.

The coolest part for me was afterwards, when one of my other students was performing with her band outside, and I got to have some dance bonding time with the kids. I did notice sometime halfway through that I was the only white person around, but no matter, they didn't care and I didn't care. It ended strangely with the group very angry because apparently the organization was terrible and they were frustrated with CLA because of it. I guess drama is everywhere you go, and as always with drama I'll be staying very far away, especially if it's between an organization I am intimately implicated in by working for the ED, and students to whom I am very tied to as well. As always, I'll just stay on both sides and let it play out as it will.

But in any case, the night continued for me in spectacular fashion, as I saw another student, now more friend, at the event and got to chat for a bit before hitting the dance floor.

Good music, good friends, and dance, dance dance. That is all I will ever need.

The stage, the dust, and the prettiest afternoon sunshine you'll ever see

It's pretty clear that the Khmer Arts company is out of town, as the normally immaculate stage was covered with a fine layer of dust, and I left footprints where I walked, the fine dust making my feet slip more than usual.

I think it was the nicest day of my entire stay here, the sky a brilliant clear blue and not a cloud to be found. The afternoon sun was hot, but not overbearing, and it had faded to a deep gold when I arrived at the Khmer Arts theater on the back of a moto, stepping into the empty theater.

Normally there are people there, rehearsing, the orchestra and the dancers together or otherwise, but today it was silent and still except for the ants and the birds and the monks on the loudspeaker from a nearby pagoda. The stage, which usually has a block or two on it, was clear, and the sun was making the temple-like building at the back stand out, playing on the green plants.

I think I could have stayed forever. I only stayed an hour, working on the Linda piece and practicing what I know of Cambodian classical dance (not much), but it was the most peaceful, quiet time. My driver chilling out in the back of the theater as he does while he's waiting, the relative quiet, and the golden sunshine.

In the middle of a week in which everything is changing and my mind is constantly racing, the time to just be with the stage and the dust was very welcome. There are some very exciting things happening and I can't confirm any of it yet because it's not set, but it's surprising and fascinating and let's just say that life does what it does and I'm just trying to keep up.

If the current things pan out, well, I think you'll be hearing about it.

In the meantime, I took one hour out of the madness to a place where the dust settles, instead of flying through the air, and the world without it was clear, golden, and quiet.

In case you haven't seen it, this is what the theater looks like:

Tuesday Night Chatter

The rains are drumming the roofs and the thunder is rolling the city. The wind is making the rain into sheets and little clouds of moisture, flying off the roofs in waves. When it rains like this I always wonder if it'll just pull down the sky. 

The King Father's passing is messing with life here. The streets around the Royal Palace are closed, except sometimes you can still go down them and I can't figure out when or why, and traffic has gotten exponentially  worse what with all the people here to pay their respects. I haven't been by the Royal Palace yet, but there are always people there. The other night there were a thousand monks praying, and I do wish I was there for that. 

The clubs have been shut down and the bars aren't allowed to play music. I'm not sure how long this is supposed to last -- I had thought just a week but now the NGO is saying that we can't do the Thriller flash mob next week (would be such a bummer!!!). In three months they are having his official funeral but I think everyone is hoping this state of affairs doesn't last three months. 

This morning there was a whole procession going by my window, several thousand people walking the street in their white shirts and black ribbons. I don't know why today -- maybe it's the seven day marker? Either way, it was impressive. 

My life has been infinitely complicated by the arrival of something really awesome, which is a potential (probable?) job as a choreographer for the weekly concerts Cambodia Television Networks, the number 1 station in the country, puts on. It complicates my life because it almost certainly means something else has got to go, which is tough, and also it's a really, really great job, and goes on the list of things that are rooting me here. 

I don't know how I can leave, and I also don't know how I can not go. I want to go home -- and that's not a question, it's staying home to produce a show (oh yes by the way that's a thing), which I really want to do and think maybe now is the right time -- but it's hard to leave so soon after starting this. I'm pretty sure I would train up one of my students to take my place, which would be good for everyone involved, but -- not ideal. 

I don't know. I have no clue. I guess I need to see how this goes for the next couple months. I was not formally offered a job, but I was told to look at the stuff they prepare for me and then come back with a schedule and a proposed salary, which I take to mean they want to work with me. 

I would dearly love to just do dance and choreograph all day, which I think I have the opportunity to do. The question is how to gracefully quit my only non-arts related job without screwing over my boss and not feeling totally guilty, which will be a tricky maze to tiptoe. 

My Khmer tutor today told me he thinks I understand a lot. I was quite proud of myself, especially since -- with many pauses to write down words I don't know and speaking very slowly -- we spent the first half hour talking about this new job and I was able to more or less tell him what was going on. 

Mostly, I'm just torn. There are a lot of opposing wishes in my heart/mind right now, and I'm not sure how to deal with them yet. I think this is one of those times when "sleep on it" is a highly appropriate expression. 

Choreographers in training

This showing is going to be much more classical than the previous.

For the others, the kids have had three or four days to put things together, work on them, and what comes out is definitely 'western' with a classical twist, but with just an hour or two to think, set, and practice their pieces, they've had to draw on their training much more heavily.

It's not a bad thing, it's just interesting to notice. I've also been watching how they work with their dancers, how they watch, how they structure things, and it's really quite fascinating.

Across the board, the thing I think is the coolest is that almost everyone has taken real ownership of their work. Usually they ask for notes; this time they haven't. They ask for music with authority. When their piece is being performed, they sit in front and watch very attentively. Sometimes in the breaks, they work to fix things, they ask their dancers to practice.

They are just starting as choreographers, and they've had no time, so naturally their pieces are raw, unfinished. They are just sketches, not really dances yet. They are fairly long -- most of them, in my opinion, too long. If we had more workshop time, I'd like to see them develop, become more precise, and clarify what everything is doing and why it's there.

Some of the pieces are very strong, and I can see the budding choreographers. I'm not really sure how to describe it, but it's a way of working with the movement, a kind of experimentation, the way they structure it and think about it. Their pieces are complex and original.

Maybe it's just that they live and die with their pieces. Sitting in the front, I can see them moving with their dancers, breathing with them, so inside the piece they can't help themselves but move with it. I know that feeling. I've been there, many times now.

Some of them are more clearly dancers, and there's nothing wrong with that. Or maybe it's just that they aren't choreographers yet. One of them, the baby of the class (sixteen, where most everyone is at least twenty) and also my most faithful student (I think he's missed two classes since the first workshop), is an incredible dancer, and his piece is one of the better ones, but he's had to fight to get it there. He has a ton of ideas, but he's not super confident in asserting himself yet, and he hasn't quite figured out how best to communicate what he wants from the dancers. I think he's taken the most time to try and iron out the kinks.  He'll learn, or he'll be a stunning dancer.

Either way, tomorrow is the showing and it's my very last workshop at CLA, which is kind of sad. I'll miss the kids a lot, and am definitely hoping to see them again for my next project...

Happy Birthday MJ

PDC has to take a moment to acknowledge its inspirations...well, mine at least.

If Michael Jackson was still alive, he would be 54 today.

Last year, for my thesis, I spent a long time with MJ, watching music videos on repeat, comparing with his back up dancers; I read a 650 page biography and his autobiography, watched This Is It and other random videos, and read several dozen articles. Of course I knew about him, but I had never really watched him dance before then.

And then I spent a whole semester doing so.

Because I'm posting this, I'm sure you know how I feel, but let me just say: he was (and is) the most incredible dancer I have ever seen, with the ability to move without moving and walk without weight. There is no comparison, and especially not in the influence he had. Everyone knows who he is, and how he moved. You start a move and everyone says, oh yeah, Michael Jackson.

So happy birthday, Mr. Jackson. You inspire me.

Catching up with the workshops (holy cow these kids are talented)

It's been awhile since I've written about my workshops, and yet they have continued, Monday to Friday of every week, from 2-5pm. There's a lot to say, and it will take me more than one blog post to say it (and no doubt I'll forget half of it, or come back to it some weeks from now), but I thought I would try to put something down into words.

I'm not sure where I left it, maybe somewhere during the first workshop when the kids were finally starting to understand what was going on. Understand it they did, and went crazy the final week with creating their solos. The day of the showing they brought in costumes and make up and various other extravagances, and quite thoroughly made an impression on the Cambodian Living Arts staff that was not expecting to see anything quite so well put together.

The second workshop, on group choreography, was a very different group; while the mean age for the first was somewhere around sixteen, this was more like twenty. The first day I had about eleven kids, but three of them must have decided it was too much, as I finished with a good group of eight.

The thing about that one was that I had designed it awhile ago and had included a lot of improvisation. Knowing at that point how little improv these kids had done, if at all, I was pretty worried for how well it was going to go over, but surprising me greatly - and pleasantly - it was no issue at all.

In fact, the workshop was a really great success, shorter but more intense and ultimately more productive than the first, and they finished with two group pieces of four dancers each. Well-thought out, crafted, interesting pieces each, and again wowed the CLA staff, enough that the program director suggested we start looking for a way to do a public performance to bring these pieces to a wider audience.

(Maybe I've already mentioned this before, but I can't say just how excited I am about this idea, and how it has sparked the resurrection of Gillian-with-a-project and kicked the six week slump to the curb. Whereas my personal pet projects are going nowhere, this idea has energy and movement, and I'm ready to jump in with both feet. Something about regular performances and spaces to create work...)

These were the kids that wanted to eat together after the showing, the ones who are now not just my students, but my friends, and four of them returned for the third workshop. Two have been with me since the beginning. Two of them had sat in to watch previous workshops. Out of the eleven total, two are women, and the mean age is probably around twenty again.

This last workshop has been really interesting, some good, some bad. Besides the daily standoffs, this one is about how to choreograph, and I'm finding it somewhat tricky. I have redesigned most of it on the fly because I don't like the exercises I'd planned. How do you teach someone how to create?

Mostly I've just been trying to show them a bunch of stuff, lead them through exercises to get them to explore all the various possibilities for movement and for structuring the work. I've had to explain it a few times, and have gone off on a couple rants about taking responsibility and taking charge and not looking to anyone else for validation.

I think some of it is working, at least, I hope. I can never tell. On Friday I had them use what they'd learned to make a little mini-solo -- each one a wonderful expression of its dancer's style and personality -- and then put it on someone else. It was a fascinating experience, and while it was too short of a time to really properly teach the solo, I noticed one of my guys was nervous when his dancer was performing his solo.

He had taken ownership of that little solo to the point that he was nervous about seeing it performed, and it made me so happy. Yes, I wanted to say, it's ridiculously nerve-wracking to see your own work on the stage. Because it's yours, because you love it, and because you can't do anything else but watch.

We'll see how next week goes -- each student gets forty five minutes to set their own dance. I'm worried that they'll try to do too much and make long dances, when forty five minutes is nothing at all and if it were me, a minute long would be pushing it. But hopefully it will work out, and I'm very excited to see what they come up with.

The fact of the matter is that these kids have become incredibly important to me. I think they're incredibly talented, curious, and courageous. I want to do everything I possibly can to help them to be professional artists, to get them in front of audiences, to offer them a space to create and refine their skills. Let it no longer be said that Khmer people can't/won't/don't know how to create.

In fact, my only problem is getting them to stop creating long enough to be good dancers for each other, and not frustrate the heck out of whoever is trying to tell them what to do.

Gillian vs. The Tourists: Sovanna Phum Arts Association

I just returned from seeing a performance at the Sovanna Phum Arts Association (www.shadow-puppets.org) -- as you can guess from the URL, they mainly do shadow puppets, employing various arts students and graduates. I think it's either entirely or almost entirely a male troupe, though that might have just been this performance.

Their theater is in the south of Phnom Penh, somewhere you would not expect to find a theater. It's on the side of the road essentially, a slanted tin roof to cover it and maybe five lights. The stage itself is wood, with a white screen for the puppets. Backstage is hidden by black sheets, and the audience sits on wooden benches, each progressively taller than the one in front of it.

The audience was mainly expat -- I suppose it's advertised by tourist agencies as an authentic experience with the Cambodian culture, as there are very few performances to choose from. There was a live orchestra, and we were welcomed by the director, a man with a kind face and broken English, but a wide smile.

The performance was a mix of shadow puppets and classical dance, telling a story from the Ramayana involving a lot of fighting and a demon masquerading as a Prince's wife. All sorts of good stuff, in other words. They gave us a program explaining the story, though I finally noticed that if you pay attention, you can follow the story, even with the puppets.

The puppets themselves are made of some unidentifiable pliable substance, maybe paper, and intricately cut to represent different scenes. The dancers use them both behind and in front of the screen, their own movements often mirroring the sentiment of their puppets'. The pictures do tell the story, though occasionally -- something I found somewhat strange at first -- the orchestra stops and one of the band members speak/chants the words of one of the characters -- more like theatre.

I have seen enough of the classical dance to start to recognize the characters, and am building a sort of base of knowledge to understand what's going on. In fact, even though most people say it's just slow and boring, I'm finding this to be patently untrue. There is emotion, there are dynamics -- you just have to know how to watch.

As the performance began, the lights went out. There were five shadow puppets, without people, resting in front of the screen, and one by one the performers came out to kneel in front of them and bow. Paying respect to the stories they represent and the art form, I would guess. On the center three, incense sticks were stuck into the puppets and lit. A solemn ceremony, and after talking to Sophiline I understood its importance.

Not so, apparently, everyone around me.

As soon as the lights dimmed and the ceremony began, the tourists began snapping nonstop flash photos.

Now. In any kind of performance, you don't take flash photography. It is common courtesy and common decency, I don't care what kind of show it is. But then to do so during a very obviously sacred ceremony? Sacred dance depicting a sacred text? It's not just flat out disrespectful, but disgusting.

Not only that, but they didn't stop. Each time a new character appeared onstage, out came the cameras, and the flashes. Who cares if you actually see the performance, right? You gotta get the shot of that weird monkey creature. Besides, you don't know what's going on anyway, so may as well just photograph. Say you went to see real Cambodian dancing.

You might have guessed by now that I was livid. I was trying to block out the flashes and focus on the performance, but couldn't help seething. Who the hell do these people think they are, to storm into this country and this performance and take flash photography during a shadow puppet show, without any trace of shame? Oh look, we also went to see the local dance, isn't it amazing, here's a picture....

I'm sorry. That's not how it works.

Perhaps I'm overreacting, but the whole sorry business reeked of patronizing and arrogance. They wouldn't dare take flash photos in a theatre back home, but who cares here, right? It's just a dump of a theater, a roadside sideshow?

No, my friends, you hopelessly clueless and hopelessly arrogant people. No, this is art, art that has existed for thousands of years. It is a story that's been told a thousand times, and danced a thousand times, and when the performers put their hands together and bowed to the floor at the beginning, chanting and lighting incense, they were acknowledging a history and a sacred tradition that is intricately and inextricably tied to their culture.

But you missed that. You were too busy taking a picture.

Honoring where I have come: Khmer Arts, pt 3

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.

The master at work: Khmer Arts, pt 2

The dancers laughed with each other, making fun of the movements like any dancers do, pausing to hitch up their pants, a recurring problem. They stopped to stretch out cramps, and in the off time stretched their hands back to achieve the seemingly impossible curved hands of the form.

During one of the breaks, Sophiline came up to me, and invited me to the stage. We sat on the stage, concrete but covered with a soft carpet, and started to talk about her work, and what I'm looking to accomplish.

She was very supportive of the idea, and discussed some of her own experience "braiding" her work with the contemporary choreographers who come, that she does what she does best and they do what they do best, and they braid it together. She said she had six dancers who might be interested in working with me, and we spend a long time discussing how important it is that it be just two collaborators, on equal footing and with equal authority.

"Otherwise," she said, "it's just another form of colonialization, and Cambodia doesn't need that. We've suffered enough."

She called the dancers back and had them introduce themselves one by one. They went back to rehearsal and I sat on the side of the stage, watching as they tried to space a piece. At one point, they were trying to work on one section. Whatever Sophiline was seeing she didn't like, and sat the company down to watch as she herself did it.

While the others were clearly trying hard, stretching their hands and working to make the movement slow and beautiful, it was clear the movement was inside Sophiline's bones. There was no effort, no stretching or trying, just pure elegance.

I had already started to notice it earlier when the company was working; while before the classical dance seemed boring, and uneventful, here it was trance-like and elegant, and I could appreciate its beauty. I didn't know the stories they were telling with their hands, but watching Sophiline, I thought I got a sense of the emotion behind it.

At the end, she sat them all down and gave a full twenty minutes of notes, captivating just speaking -- and I didn't understand a word of the Khmer. I've known some -- but precious few -- people with that gift. Whatever it was she was saying, it was important, and I think it had to do with challenging themselves and pushing farther, as well as having self-confidence and presence onstage.

When the company left and she returned, I wanted to ask about her mission for the company, but asked if it was okay to talk. She said it wasn't really a good time, she was hungry -- but then something stopped her.

The short version, she said, is that I try to do everything. To build the classical form to be just as good, and then better, as it was in 1960, to make new choreography with the traditional form, and to investigate the contemporary form of the traditional.

But, she said, everyone thinks that to be contemporary, you have to be western, but I disagree.

It's funny: people say the Ministry of Culture isn't happy she's doing that contemporary work, and the westerners discount it because it doesn't look any different from the traditional dance.

It was another wake up call, a sort of 'duh' moment. Yes, me too, I had been thinking of 'contemporary' as synonymous with 'western', but yet she was talking about something different. An exploration, a deepening of her own form, her history and her training, and seeing where else it could go.

Thinking back now, about watching her work, fixing the angles of the hips and the shoulders by infinitesimal degrees, pulling the arm back an inch or adjusting the fingers ever-so-slightly, and then how the form just flows from her body, and it makes absolutely perfect sense. To make what she does -- this perfect and easy elegance -- into something that it's not, just to be western and therefore 'commercial' (another point she brought up), would be a massive and disgraceful disservice.

Especially after what she said about honoring where she comes from.