Day 1.

Yesterday (as you all know by now) was day one of my week long belly dance workshop. I was scared and Sunday night I could not get to sleep. I showed up to the studio and had to fill out waivers and sign in, then I got a goodie bag. It contained lots of bath salts, lotion, and one of those lotion sock thingies that you wear on your feet over night. By the end of the day, I needed it. When we were about to start, she had us all gather in a circle (it reminded me of story telling time in kindergarten) and we talked about our goals, why were here, how this helps us grow, and in general about the dance. It was an excellent way to start class, because it made us feel lifted and excited. We started out like a normal class: breathing, stretching, pushups.. 100 bicycle sit ups!! (she made us count out loud) At one point when she was walking around the room helping people, Suhaila stopped next to me and (as I continued to do my plie-ing and grand plie-ing) she straightened my tangled tank strap. I was very amused. We also watched as 5 cops were standing around right in front of our door arresting some guy. Suhails said "What, they can't move to the left 10 feet in front of the business that is closed?! They have to do it here? Men!! And tey think they are going to save the world this way!" Back to class, we did tendues like we would in the dance movements class, plies, battements, and the like. Then we went into glutes and doing singles. We did drills around the room and by lunch time, I was ready to eat and sit. My feet were beginning to get sore. Suhaila's mom, Jamila had come just before lunch and asked if we wanted to watch a movie of Suhaila from 1992 (I think). She was happy to show us. Then we watched a documentary on gypsies. Suhaila tried calling us back to class, but Jamila said "2 more minutes! It's right there!! Just 2 more minutes!" "No, Mom. Your 2 minutes are.. 2 Arab minutes! They last forever!"
The second half of the day I spent fairly frustrated. I wanted to try to moves and practice and do everything, but my feet were killing me. I tried barefoot, with jazz shoes, and wearing the foot undies. The shoes hurt them more and the undies only helped slightly. I have never experienced this before. Not in class. I usually tire out because my whole body doesn't want to work. But here, my body wanted to work but my damn feet were quitting! All I could do was walk in line with the others and do the painful foot steps and visualize the hip squares we were doing. It takes a lot of concentration when your feet hurt that badly. After yesterday ended, I sat and thought about what we were doing and what all of this is. Basically, the level 2 workshop takes the whole format, the whole 10 week rotation schedule, and we pretty much learning it and go through it in 5 days. So what we would take 2 weeks to learn if I was just going to my hour long class, we leaned in just yesterday. 10 weeks is getting smushed into 5 days. It is also in level 2 and in this workshop that we learn to become good students. Level 2 is where we really begin to understand what we need to learn and how to learn it. I am so glad I signed up for this. The worrying was unneccessary, but this workshop is awesome.
When I came home, the first thing I did was make a hot hot bubble bath and just soak. It felt very good. After cooking dinner I had to go to BigRock to check on my cells and gather up data so I could get something accomplished this week. I also didn't want to be driving back and forth to work every day after I was exhausted from class, when all I have to do right now is data analysis and that can be done at home.
This morning, how do I feel after yesterday's workout and 4 more consecutive ones to follow? My feet feel a little better (let's see how long that lasts) but my calves are beginning to feel some burn. By Friday I am probably going to be so burnt. Heh.