...Capoeira.

When I started this blog, there were two things I had in mind: food and art.  I wanted to cook and create my way into everyone's Facebook newsfeed and inspire my friends to attempt new recipes and projects.  But here's the thing, that's not for everyone.  So I'm going to branch out a little more, step outside my comfort zone, and start attempting something different every now and then.  

A friend of mine convinced me to try Capoeira.  The beginner class was on Monday nights when I usually play volleyball, but all of a sudden it was Veterans Day, volleyball was canceled, and I didn't have an excuse.  Not gonna lie, I was nervous.  I'm convinced I have some sort of nervous disease where I can create in my head any sort of scenario I need to in order to ruin something that might be fun.  

But as nervous as I made myself, there was no getting out of it.  I was committed.  

She's committed!  

So we made the trek up to Long Beach to BodySport Capoeira for the Total Beginners class.  If you are unfamiliar with capoeira, it is a Brazilian form of martial art that combines fight with dance to create one awesome style of combat.  The origin, as it was explained to me, was from slaves who were forbidden from learning to defend themselves, so they used dance as a way to disguise the combat training.

I cannot recall the reason for the handstands.  This was before the class started.

The class was led by these two ladies, Rebecca and Heather, and wow, did they know their stuff!  Heather (in white) was the primary instructor for this class.  Because we are all facing a wall-to-wall mirror, she knew exactly when you did something wrong, and yes, she calls you on it!  It's a little embarrassing until you realize you're in the Total Beginner class and no one else knows what they're doing either.  You all feel just a little silly together in the beginning, and you all get that sense of accomplishment together when you finally get it right.

After about 10 minutes of warmup, which involved some jogging (forward and backward), some shuffling, and some cartwheels across the room (which made me incredibly dizzy), we began to learn the basics of capoeira.  The first and most used move of the night was the ginga, which is a continuous movement side to side, stepping one foot backward and forward, and then the other.  With the ginga, you're always ready to defend or attack, and with the constant motion, you make a very frustrating target for your opponent.

The ginga.  There were actually other people in the class, I promise.

The next moves we learned were the Meia-lua de Frente (front half moon) and the cocorinha.  Or in common terms, a outside to inside kick and a squat to avoid a kick.  The moves themselves were not that complicated.  If you watch someone do them a couple times, you can do them, too.  But when you consider the fact that the moves are all done in the middle of the continuous ginga movement, it gets a little more complicated.  Eventually, we had to partner up and when one kicked the other had to duck, and back and forth.

The Meia-lua de Frente, front half moon kick.

To finish off the class, we had a roda, which was by far the coolest portion of the class.  Everyone gathers in a circle and a few people keep rhythm using tambourines and an instrument called a berimbau.  They begin to sing and everyone is expected to sing back, and it's all in Portuguese.  Yes, there was some pretend singing going on, but you learn as you go.  The other aspect of the roda is that everyone takes turns in the center of the circle showing their moves for all to see.  This is probably cooler than the singing.  Yes, it's definitely cooler.  But all of it together made for a really great experience.  I'd love to see what it looks like in a non-beginner class.

I did it!  And I was rewarded with a tiny cup of water!

And before I knew it we were done, and I hadn't died of embarrassment, boredom, or exhaustion.  And any night where I haven't died of one of those things is a success in my book!  Give it a try, you'll have fun!