7/20

So today unfortunately was the last day of class. Even though history has never been my subject of interest, the classes at ABA given by Professor Fitzgibbon have really opened up my eyes a lot and made me appreciate Brazil's past and how it affects the present. I am able to make connections with the things we learn in class when I witness and am immersed in Brazilian Culture.

I was sick, and so I didn't go to class, but it turned out that the majority of the class was used to learn a new dance for us North Americans to teach the Brazilians later in a church dance. I thought that I would get away with just mirroring the other students until at the dance when, I learned just how hard the dance would be to learn! That didn't go over so well, but I still tried.

Dancing is one of those things that I feel makes up the Brazilian culture and seems to come much more easily to them than to us Americans. Sometimes I wonder if it's just a mental thing...but no I'm pretty sure it's not. I tried to dance forro tonight with a Brazilian who was patient enough to help me out.

There's a certain dance where you just take one step to the right, and one step to the left. Simple enough, right?
It's just that by the way the Brazilians so gracefully danced, I thought they were actually taking a couple steps each time. So you can imagine how that looked when I tried to do it. No? Just think white boy stomping all over the place and that should be an adequate image.

Thanks for reading!!!