Dancing for Arab/Turkish public - my experience

[Helena]

Hi all!

Me and 3 friends of mine have started an oriental dance group. Yesterday we danced in front of an almost entirely Turkish and Arab public, so I wanted to share my experience on this forum. The intercultural center here had organised a party for women and children to celebrate the 'Seker bayrami' (Eid in Arabic I think).

What I had feared came true:
There were some teenage Arab girls there who obviously didn't like the fact that we came to dance there. One of them said: is it not finished yet? (we danced only 3 short songs). I guess they felt insulted that we danced something that is their heritage...

What I had hoped came true:
Luckily for us, there were many other girls and women there who enjoyed our performance and were clapping and cheering all the time. These people are much more enthusiastic than a Belgian public, which makes it so much more fun to dance.

After the performance some girls came up to us and told us how much they have enjoyed our dancing and it made us totally forget about those other girls who didn't like our performance

 

[Moon]

Good to here you had a good time Helena! Don't let those rude girls spoil it for you. The others liked it so I think you were all dancing great. I can imagine people from the middle east don't like seeing "bad" bellydancers, but I don't understand why people would get insulted because people from other cultures are interested in their dance. :think: They should be proud! Maybe they were just jealous.
I'm really happy for you the others liked it

 

[Aniseteph]

Congratulations Helena! :clap:

I think Moon's right. Those girls were probably too bothered about fitting in with each other and trying to show attitude. I bet some of them were jealous of you, or secretly enjoyed it but were too inhibited to admit it.

 

[Mouse]

Congratulations on your performance! :clap:

I think bellydance is much like everything else in life - you're never going to please everyone. That the positive response outweighed the negative proves that the problem was theirs and not yours, so don't let them bother you and keep dancing for yourselves and the receptive audience :dance:

 

[chryssanthi sahar]

Dear Helena.

I also agree with the others: you shouldn't let those stupid girls who mobbed you, destroy the fun you had while dancing. There will always be people like that, not only at Arab and Turkish feast. Just dance and enjoy

Happy dancing

 

[Helena]

Thanks for your replies girls!

*Happily continues dancing* :dance: