A Belly Dance Diary 2010
Zorba dancing for Bibi and a pair of dance
sisters at theHaute Enchilada. (08/01/09)
2001-2002, 2003, 2004, 2005, 2006, 2007, 2008, 2009, 2010, 2011, 2012, 2013, 2014, 2015, 2016, 2017, 2018 2019, 2020, 2021, 2022, 2023, 2024, 2025 Herein is chronicled Zorba's on-going voyage of discovery into the magical realm of Belly Dancing. Sometimes major events, more often just baby steps along the way. Presented here in reverse chronological order.
25 December 2010
An impromptu performance at Christmas dinner. All of "Mirage" were present, and were asked to perform our TFF set - so we did. I even threw on my YO Girt skirt for the occasion.
And in what should be the last mention, a minor update to the tattoo article with a 5 week post touchup picture. Its now all done.
18 December 2010
Similar to last year, a Mirage performance at
We performed Didi's "Highly Experimental" Tribal piece, then an improv "Flock of Seagulls" with a Tribal flavor, and finished up with Firefly's "Shiraz".
As was the case last year, we had a blast; even though we were down one dancer who had to miss the performance due to a hurt foot. Nothing sucks more than being a dancer with an injury - I was in a similar situation ten years ago. But we had lots of compliments, including from Firefly herself (She says my arms have improved dramatically!) who was in the audience.
No Belly Dance festival is complete without shopping, I came home with a "YO Girt" skirt from
It was pouring down rain when we got there, and pouring down rain when we left. There's nothing like being rained on in a Belly Dance costume!
I even had rain beating down on my "Tramp Stamp" while loading the car when we were leaving. At least it was a warm rain...
27 November 2010
A new article: Basic Skirtsmanship. I'm soliciting the greater Belly Dance community for commentary, additions, and improvements!
21 November 2010
"Santa Cruz Raks" - A reprise of the 5 November performance. Same routine, costume, Zills, veil, etc. Same results too! Took the retouched Tramp Stamp "into battle". 'Twas fun...
Then...
I came home and performed it again for my father who wasn't able to attend the performance. He loved it - but then he's supposed to. He's my dad!
18 November 2010
Six months to the day, I had my "Tramp Stamp" touched up. I've updated the tattoo article with the latest!
15 November 2010
Videos! Go to the video page, and look for the ANAS 2010 clip. Enjoy!
5 November 2010
Performance at Mariama's showcase at the "Cherry Bean" coffee house in Salinas - reputedly the last one as Mariama is looking for a new/larger venue. I was able to at last perform "Routine-2, Uber-short version" as I originally attempted at this venue last July. A pair of new CDs made all the difference! I used my 4 yard A'Kai red/orange silk veil, and played my Zildjian Zills. As I progress as a dancer and a Zillist - I'm appreciating the Zildjians more and more. I can do things with them that I cannot with lesser Zills - I'm beginning to understand why Cory Zamora uses them exclusively.
The performance went VERY well. The audience loved it, Mariama (a veil queen herself) complimented my veilwork - and my drum solo - the energy was right, life was good! Mariama even told me she wanted to steal my costume (The white "Sacrificial Virgin" costume, complete with the "floating sleeves" I made - and I even wore the skirt with it, something I usually don't do when soloing.)! What more could a dancer ask for?
16 October 2010
A performance with "Damascus" at Santa Cruz's "Crepe Place" restaurant, on their garden stage. We did three dances: Pom Pom Perot, Veil, and RB,BB. In addition, The Mighty Siwa and I did solos - mine was "Siseler" (Playing my Zildjian Zills). That darn veil dance! I always seem to manage to get my veil screwed up royally when we do this dance - this time was no exception. The veil wrap disintegrated during the rather vigorous "Pom Pom Perot", TMS did a quick fix which was "good enough" as we started the actual veil number - which actually turned out OK on my (and everyone else's for that matter) part.
Whew!
26 September 2010
ANAS, day 3. The final day found me in the early morning taking a double veil workshop from one of the Shimmy Sisters, followed by a "Dynamic Dance" workshop from one of my favorite teachers, Paulina. The final class of the day was a Tribal combos class from Ashley - that I "died" in the middle of. My 50 year old body said "enough" about halfway through. So I left my wife "at it" and went upstairs to the Paris Cafe to say goodbye to the soft-serve ice cream machine!
But I really wasn't done yet - I was selected to perform in the student hafla! The first time since 2005. This is always done with live music of that totally wonderful and awesome group, Light Rain. I selected one of my favorites of theirs, "City of Dreams", and came out in my white "Sacrificial Virgin" costume with my "Crystalline Curves" jewelry set (VERY sparkly!) and playing my "Grecian Zills". I really should have played my Zildjian Zills given the volume level of the band playing right behind me - but didn't have them with me. I also was able to use the white "floating" sleeves I had made the week previously - and was told they looked spectacular on stage!
Anyway - this being only the fourth time I've performed to live music - this was QUITE the rush! With this particular song, I rode a wave of power and danced my heart out. The crowd went nuts and I had a wonderful time!
And the evening wasn't over yet! They hold a raffle at the hafla every year, that we NEVER win a thing at. This being our 7th year, we actually made up for all those times we didn't win. We won THREE times! Woo-Hoo! Two of the prizes were provided by the Shimmy Sisters - a Gypsy music CD & DVD set, and an unframed Belly Dance print drawn by one of the two (very cool). The third prize was a dance fan from Mesmera - Mirage has decided that we really need to do a fan dance!
Video of the performance, and hopefully some stills coming soon...
25 September 2010
ANAS, day 2. The morning found me in class with famed Tribal dancer Ashley Lopez, new to ANAS this year. The class was "Silky Serpent", which was a lot of the ooey, gooey, slow & slinky Tribal movements that I love and first learned from Firefly.
The afternoon was spent with Mesmera in her "Gitana Arabia" class. All Mirage members were in this class, and we came away with some very cool ideas for tweaking and improving our skirt dance.
Immediately afterwards, by prior arrangement with Mesmera, we performed our skirt dance as we wanted to show it to Mahalia, who had taught me the core dance at ANAS two years ago. Mahalia was just "blown away" - she had never had students come back and show her what they'd done with her choreography. She was VERY touched by the gesture - we had a kumbaya moment with her. The other students from Mesmera's class really liked it too - word spread rapidly throughout the ship. By dinnertime, I was being asked questions by other Belly Dancers who weren't present - I teased them by replying that they really "shouldn't rely on shipboard gossip."!
24 September 2010
ANAS, day 1. Debarkation on the Carnival Paradise. My wife and I both took an evening workshop: "Luxurious Lebanese" from Aradia.
23 September 2010
Once again, late September finds us aboard the
We went with the entire membership of troupe Mirage - and had a wonderful time! 
19 September 2010
Three performances in one day!
First was a performance with The Mighty Siwa and "Damascus" at the Santa Cruz County Fair. We did several dances, each of us participating in 3 - the 3 I was in were our brand new Pom Pom Perot choreography, "Cat Walk", and "RB, BB". I also did a solo playing my Zildjian Zills (outdoor stage) to a George Abdo number that Siwa had picked out for me. I felt a bit lost, but Siwa said I did fine. At one point, there was a woman in the audience pointing a camera at me, obviously waiting for something. It eventually occurred to me to dance forward enough to get out into the sunlight (which I normally avoid like a vampire on steroids) and pose prettily, upon which she promptly snapped a picture! Ok - glad to help!
In the evening, it was "Santa Cruz Raks" - what was previously known as "Cypress Raks" (See 27 June 2010) that is now located at "Michael's On Main" in nearby Soquel. A double performance:
First, "Mirage" performed "Shiraz", the lovely tribal number taught to us by the sublime Firefly. Other than my "spacing out" on my arms in the first part, it went well.
A partial costume change later had us performing with Didi as "Nahaash Raks" again, this time only a "guideline" choreography - it was pseudo-Tribal improv. Went very well. This was my first performance with my new Tribal "hair" (see pix in the 2010 gallery).
11 September 2010
Yet another Performance at Santa Cruz's "Crepe Place" restaurant. This was a "triple" performance. First, I danced with my lovely wife and one of my dance sisters under the aegis of "Mirage, A Bellydance Company"; performing our skirt dance. Then we were joined by Didi, and danced her choreography "Highly Experimental" as "Nahaash Raks". Lastly, I danced Solo-10/Om Kalsoum. Then Didi went on to dance with her troupe "Raks Havohakeem", followed by a couple of more solo performances. Everything went well, good crowd, good food, good time.
A couple of pix from my solo in the 2010 gallery.
29 August 2010
Veil workshop. I didn't take one, I taught one. I rented studio space from Janelle and taught my first "real" workshop. It was very well received, the students asked good, intelligent questions, and we all had fun and more importantly, the students went away feeling they'd actually learned something!
28 August 2010
Performance at Santa Cruz's "Crepe Place" restaurant with The Mighty Siwa as "Dancers of the Crescent Moon". We did 3 dances, although yours truly only did the first, Halay. My troupe sisters continued with a drum solo that I know "halfway", but not good enough to perform; and finished with a sword number that I don't know at all. Then several of us soloed, including myself. I did "Solo-9" with my "Grecian" zills, which came off pretty well.
26 August 2010
Videos! Go to the video page, and look for the entry for COS 2010, plus a link to a YouTube video of last fall's performance with Bibi's Gypsy troupe.
8 August 2010
I performed "Solo-4/Mary Jane's Dance" to some pretty good reviews. Video coming soon! I wore a costume I hadn't worn since a couple of years ago at Rakkasah to perform a Duette with The Mighty Siwa. I call it the "Sacrificial Virgin Costume" (said term first learned from Jamaica) as its pure white with gold trim, with a gold lamé veil.
Speaking of T.M. Siwa, I then performed with her Dancers of the Crescent Moon, performing Halay, the 9/8 dance with Zills (Zildjians), and finishing with the Sai'idi. Overall, I did MUCH better than I did with DCM at Rakkasah - Halay went very well; the 9/8, being a new dance for me, went decent enough with only a few relatively minor screwups; and the Sai'idi which I botched up so badly at Rakkasah came off with only one or two inconsequential blunders on my part.
10 July 2010
Performed with Didi's student troupe at the "Crepe Place", we did the same dance as at Cypress Raks on 27 June. I think I did better this time, this Tribal stuff is still a bit strange to this Cabaret guy - but at least I smiled more!
Oh, and I posted my tattoo on "rate my ink dot com":
2 July 2010
An attempt to perform at the Cherry Bean in Salinas. I say "attempt" as I didn't get very far before my music screwed up. Despite multiple attempts and a cleaning, it still screwed up - even though it had worked fine at home 30 minutes before.
The bad news was that my beautiful dance was ruined - I had worn one of Cory Zamora's veil wraps (the heavy, olive drab 4 yard veil I usually use with the Damascus veil routine) and had practiced so that I could tease the audience with the tattoo. It never got that far...
The good news is that the audience was SO with me, they started clapping and I played my Zills (Grecians) and danced for a bit anyway! It had been announced that I had a "surprise" for the audience - so I did undo the veil wrap and showed them my "Tramp Stamp" to wild applause!
I was passing out flyers for my upcoming veil workshop - and my professionalism during this fiasco paid off even if my veilwork didn't have a chance to. I got two more signups, with at least an additional two very interested. Janette and Bibi also took flyers to pass out to their classes.
Here's the clincher: I checked my diary when I got home, sure enough it was the EXACT same routine (Routine-2, Uber-short version) that screwed up in October of 2008 at the Cypress lounge. That CD is SO going to fly into the swamp right after I make a new copy of it!
Still, I don't think I ever had so much fun with a music screwup in my life. I was laughing along with the audience, herking and jerking with the errant CD. Janette had good things to say about my Zilling too.
27 June 2010
A student performance as a Tribal dancer with Didi's girls. This was to have taken place at Santa Cruz's Cypress Lounge as part of the monthly "Cypress Raks" Belly Dance showcase - except there was a bit of a problem...
Seems that the Cypress was closed, for reasons yet unclear. 50-75 dancers and fans managed to relocate the entire show in under less than an hour to a different restaurant in nearby Soquel. Things were sub-optimal to be sure, but far better than could have otherwise been expected as we literally descended upon this restaurant "out of the blue" with about 30 minutes warning! They made us feel very welcome; and they had good, if somewhat pricey, food.
Our performance went well, even if our formation was a bit cramped! A good time was had by all, especially by the "baby bellies" having their very first performance! More pictures will be in the gallery within the next few days...
Didi (right) and Zorba show off their "tramp stamp" tattoos just before the show!18 June 2010
A Damascus performance - sort of. It was just T.M. Siwa and myself. It was at the 2nd annual
Anyway, getting back to our performance, we danced the tambourine dance, then I did a solo to the Belly Dance favorite, "Siseler" (Playing my Saroyan "Grecian" Zills), T.M. Siwa did a sword solo, then we finished up with RB, BB. A fun little performance - the tattoo was covered up in my Damascus dress for this one...
14 June 2010
12 June 2010
An off topic post: I've started my own society/political/modern life/current events blog:
It won't mention Belly Dance except as a side issue, but I think it will make interesting reading. It has the full-on blog comment feature and everything!
Enjoy, whether you agree with me or not!
10 June 2010
The tattoo is essentially healed up now, and looking even better:
But tonite I attended the very first "official" class I've taken from my long time friend and inspiration, Imzadi! My wife and I both took her "performance skills" class, which is a 2 part workshop. Good class! 
In other news, I've just announced my very first workshop in, of course, veil technique. Flyer forthcoming...
27 May 2010
I never can do something major without writing an article about it - so here is the first version of "My First Tattoo". As the story isn't quite complete as yet, I'll be adding to it a bit more in time...
25 May 2010
A return to
18 May 2010
A picture is worth 1,000 words:
Yes, I have joined my Tribal sisters in dance by adding a tattoo, I'm permanently marked as a Belly Dancer now. Not that a lower back Tatt is peculiar only to Belly Dancers, but around here, most dancers have one! I wanted something "pretty enough for Cabaret", yet "edgy enough for Tribal". You're looking at the result: 3-1/2 hours in the chair for my first ever tatt. There'll be a new article about the whole experience coming soon!
7 May 2010
A performance at the "Cherry Bean" in Salinas. I had hoped to do "Routine-3", a 9', 33" long brand new routine - but just didn't feel it was ready for prime time. Then briefly toyed with the idea of "Solo-11/Cabaret", but as I hadn't done it in over a year, discarded it in favor of good ol' "Solo-4/Mary Jane's Dance", which this crowd had never seen...
Except that Imzadi was unexpectedly in the audience! She's seen "Solo-4" many times - because I "stole" the music from her in the first place! We had a good laugh about that. On top of all this, Janette performed the dance that "Solo-11/Cabaret" is based on, and furthermore, one of my dance sisters "almost" performed this same dance as well! We came close to having 3 dancers do the same dance to the same music!
But the big news is that my Father was in the audience - for the very first time. He'd never seen me dance live before. He enjoyed everyone's performances immensely!
2 May 2010
A reprise of yesterday's performance - except it was on the street in down town Santa Cruz, and the music worked so I was able to perform "Solo-7/Cane" this time, with Nadia's "Cane #2". A co-worker was there who had not seen me dance since the very first performance of "Solo-3" at Kalisa's back in 2003 (21 March). He said I'd improved "ALOT". I sure hope so...
It was a LOT of fun, a small, but enthusiastic group of spectators gathered to watch us dance - as part of national dance week.
1 May 2010
A performance with "Dancers of the Crescent Moon" at Santa Cruz's "Crepe Place" restaurant, on their garden stage. The troupe did three dances, of which I did two: "Halay", and the Sai'idi. As with the "Damascus" performance at the same venue on 27 March, The Mighty Siwa and I did solos. I had come prepared to do "Solo-7/Cane", but Siwa's prepared show CD didn't play (oh how I just *HATE* sound problems!), so we did the entire show to backup music - I ended up dancing to the Turkish song "Siseler", which I know well, but was wishing I had finger cymbals on.
25 April 2010
New galleries! I've been somewhat remiss in adding pix to the galleries, adding them instead in-line in the diary. This was due to both laziness in hand editing the galleries, as well as not wanting to delete pictures of historical interest. So I finally got off my duff and generated a new "year" gallery (2010) with a gallery generation tool. You can find that gallery here. I'll be adding to it throughout the year, and there'll be new year's galleries in the future (2011, 2012, etc). You can also access all the galleries, both old and new here.
While I was doing this, I found out there were some errors in the old Kalisa's gallery which was also generated with this same gallery generator. Unfortunately, I had upgraded my operating system from Panther to Leopard - and the generator wouldn't run under the new OS. Downloaded the latest generator version, which of course refused to work with the old gallery generated by the previous version. Sigh! The wonderful Unix stream editor sed came to the rescue and I was able to fix the problems without too much pain - once I reacquainted myself with sed's arcane syntax that is!
18 April 2010
Performance at "The Ridge", an old folks' home, the same one we performed at last October. This was a Mirage performance! We did both our skirt dance, as well as "Shiraz", in addition to several members soloing (I did "Routine-2/Super short" with my Grecian Zills and 4 yard varicolored pink veil.). T.M.S., who joined us, did 2 solos as well. It went very well, the old folks really love us. One gal told me I was more graceful than most women!
Its also exactly T-minus one month until my tattoo!
27 March 2010
A performance with "Damascus" at Santa Cruz's "Crepe Place" restaurant, on their garden stage. We did the four dances we did at Rakkasah: Tambourine, Veil, CatWalk, and RB,BB (Red Bird, Blue Bird - don't ask...). In addition, The Mighty Siwa and I did solos - mine was "Solo-14/Raks Abdo", but without Zills this time.
All in all, everything went well. My veil turned into a disaster in the veil dance, but I just "dealt with it". The solo went well, the audience was mostly dance sisters, and we all had a good yak and some good food afterwards!
21 March 2010
A "Mirage" Stitch & Bitch. We all gathered with Lana to work on costuming for our next troupe dance, "Moonrise", which is a kind of wing dance that she choreographed. Bra (vest for me), belt, and mermaid skirt. Had a ton of fun and got a lot done; will need to set aside another day to get everything complete.
14 March 2010
Rakkasah, day 2. Like last year, I performed with the Mighty Siwa's folkloric troupe, Dancers of the Crescent Moon, dancing several numbers, including the "Pot dance". It went well. Like last year, no-one, not even me, lost their pot. I was a bundle of nerves all day - partially due, no doubt, to being hopped up on a cortisone shot which was the only reason I was able to even be on my feet for the weekend. A nasty cold had been going around - and making its way through the local Belly Dance community - and of course I got it 3 days before Rakkasah. Anyway, I made a couple of flubs in a couple of dances, and one dance I probably shouldn't have participated in at all - I just didn't know it well enough. But regardless, we all had a good time, and it was a ton of fun on Rakkasah's big stage...
Update: Saw the video of the performances. I was right, the one dance I "shouldn't have participated in at all" was a disaster on my part.
Later, on the Cabaret stage, it was time to dance with Daughters of Damascus - uh, make that just "Damascus"; Siwa felt obligated to change the name for some odd reason since some GUY joined the troupe!
During one of the succeeding dances, I managed to step on Siwa's tambourine as it hadn't been slid out of the way enough - but "dancer's instinct" prevailed, so there was no damage to the tambourine in question, nor did I miss a step.
So aside from being a bit shaky, and a bit of a space cadet, it was a great weekend. I ran into "everyone", as you might expect, and did a bit of shopping. Mainly rounded out my Tribal costuming so I can dance Tribal and actually look the part - but certainly didn't forget my Cabaret side: I purchased a VERY cool combination necklace/belly drape set (with matching earrings, of course!
13 March 2010
Update: The video for Mirage came out well - we're very happy with our performance!
9 March 2010
My long anticipated consult with Teresa of
5 March 2010
Performance at Mariama's quarterly showcase at the "Cherry Bean" coffee house in Salinas. Did a short, but new solo, "Solo-14/Raks Abdo" with my Grecian Zills. Cory Zamora had us dance to "Raks Abdo" in her workshop last month - it had been quite a few years since I'd thought of this classic piece, and I realized that I now have the skills to dance to music like this - so I did! Lots of shimmies in it, even layered a "camel" over a shimmy, a first in performance for me!
Went quite well - received several compliments, including yet another one from a guy! This venue seems to have more guys that are secure enough in themselves than I've seen anywhere else. People liked my costume, which consisted of my very first Belly Dance vest that was made for me by the late, great costumer, Mary Jane Skopos. Added to that was a brand new pair of ruffled leg "Tribal" pants, that I made "Cabaret" by wearing a sparkly panel skirt that was once owned by Lana; who just happened to be in attendance tonite and danced as well. Yes, she recognized it.
Later, I danced with Mirage - this time to do our Tribal number "Shiraz" where I lost the skirt, changed my jewelry and hairflower, and added a few other Tribal bits. This dance went VERY well!
My fave 4 Tribal gals from San Francisco came down again, and did their usual spectacular job - since I'm now learning Tribal from Didi, it was even more interesting to watch them and try to figure out how they were cueing each other.
A picture from the 20 February performance (by Sharif!)
21 February 2010
Cory Zamora's workshop. As always, a wonderful experience. Learned yet another of her veil "ties", a rather simple one this time that seems to work well. I really love her style. Also came home with a coin scarf/skirt "thing" with "evil eyes" all over it, purchased from Cory. Very cool...
20 February 2010
The annual Cory Zamora show, in anticipation of tomorrow's workshop! I danced "Solo-6/Shemadan with short finale" as I'd never done it in Santa Cruz, nor at the Cypress, before. It was a smash hit! Several people tipped me, including Cory herself! Fun, fun, fun!
3 February 2010
A new teacher, sort of. I have occasion to be in the "Space Coast" area of Florida about twice each year, so I figured I'd drop in on a local class. After an email exchange, I gave Mindy a try. I like her. I like her a lot, I wish she was in California where I could take from her more often - she has beautiful arms which I could learn a lot from by emulation! Her combos were a nice challenge, a slightly different emphasis than I'm used to. I'll be back!
10 January 2010
A performance at an old folk's home, both with Mirage (we did our skirt dance, and Shiraz, the extent of our repertoire as yet) and as a soloist ("Routine-1, short version" with Saffron chiffon veil and "King-Tut" Zills). The Mighty Siwa graced us with her presence and danced two sets, my lovely wife Zarah opened, and Sapphira also did two sets, including her fan-veil dance. The old folks loved us, we went around afterward and talked to each and every one of them.
Thus a new year opens. Last year was both a triumph in that I grew substantially as a dancer, and a tragedy as we lost Kalisa, I lost my Mother, and the world lost Henry Z. Steinway.
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