Desert Dreams Studio, of Boise, Idaho, brought Oreet to Boise for workshops and performances in March.  I was able to take both of her workshops, Sharqui (The Belly Dance Workout) and Taxsim.  One reason I wanted to take her Sharqui Workshop was that I teach my beginning classes with the same goal (Belly Dance taught in a way that keeps it aerobic).  Our styles are similar, except I don’t have my students do all (or almost all) of the moves on their toes, like Oreet did.  Granted, that works the calves good (I woke up with sore calves that night), but my other goal as an instructor is to teach steps as they are meant to be performed, and tribal steps are meant to be done flat footed, for that earthy feel.

As usual, I forgot my notebook to take notes.  However, I took away three moves/styles that I love and will use (and can remember), so I consider it money well spent.  My favorite Oreet move is something I call a tummy dribble.  I can’t remember what she called it, but she explained it as the look our tummies have before Thanksgiving and after Thanksgiving.  If we are dancing with proper posture and form, our abdominal muscles are engaged (that “suck in your gut” feeling).  The music Oreet was dancing to was mostly guitar, and sometimes had a single accent strum/beat.  She would disengage her stomach muscles for that split second, and then pull them back in (after Thanksgiving, before Thanksgiving).  To me, it looked like a “stomach dribble,” especially since my kids took a basketball camp last month, so that’s what I’ll call it (Oreet Tummy Dribble).  It was very unexpected, powerful, and fun.  Even if your music doesn’t have a single beat somewhere, it could still be used on the third or fourth beat of an accent combination.

Oreet also uses hand undulations, and, although we do those in Sidonia’s class too sometimes, I didn’t have a name for them and forget to teach them to my own students, so now I have another hand movement to teach.  The third styling that Oreet uses has presented me with a challenge.  Although I can layer a vibration shimmy on top of other hip movements, Oreet was able to layer it with everything, including chest isolations and undulations.  When I try to do that, it’s like trying to pat my head and rub my stomach at the same time. :-)  Therefore, my challenge and goal is to vibration shimmy through my life, so that it becomes so easy and thoughtless that I can layer it with anything, even upper body moves.