Farasha Hanem
New member
As I guess most people know by now, I was blindsided when our troupe moved to a new studio and had to reschedule class on a night I'm not able to make. However, Darshiva offered to give me online Skype lessons, and I started last Tuesday evening! 
I'm very excited to have her as a teacher, and even more excited to FINALLY start learning Egyptian-style at long last. I love my troupe and my teachers, but I think the change is going to help me improve my dance. There's probably some unlearning I need to do first, but I'm willing to tear it all down and start from the ground up again. I'd rather make sure I've got technique down correctly, then I can work on my artistry.
Darshiva is a very sweet and patient teacher, and makes her instructions clear, even when I was having audio trouble. The mic kept cutting out, and most of the audio had some sort of weird feedback. Her gestures, along with what audio was coming through, was clear enough for me to follow along.
The audio wasn't the only problem---I'd lost my web cam and couldn't find it. It wasn't where I always keep it, so we just winged it without video from my side. During the lesson, I kept wishing Darshiva were able to see me so she could see what needed work. Then came the faff session (I looked up this word, because I didn't know what it was!). We improved (improv-ed?) to Omda's "La' La'," and I quickly changed my mind and was greatful Darshiva couldn't see me! :lol: I want to learn to improv so badly, because I am bad at it! :lol: If Dar could have seen me, I'm sure she would have thought, "WHAT the *COUGH!* is she doing???" :shok: :lol:
We worked on downward figure 8's and the 3/4 shimmy, plus Darshiva spoke about posture (which I'm going to have to have her go over again because the audio was really garbled at that point). She'll be going over the basics with me for the next four weeks, which I'm very grateful for. In my troupe class, we do drills, but there's a lot of emphasis on learning choreo for performances. I feel like my technique suffers for it, so it's a relief to not have that pressure right now.
Our next session is tomorrow, and I can hardly wait!
I'm very excited to have her as a teacher, and even more excited to FINALLY start learning Egyptian-style at long last. I love my troupe and my teachers, but I think the change is going to help me improve my dance. There's probably some unlearning I need to do first, but I'm willing to tear it all down and start from the ground up again. I'd rather make sure I've got technique down correctly, then I can work on my artistry. Darshiva is a very sweet and patient teacher, and makes her instructions clear, even when I was having audio trouble. The mic kept cutting out, and most of the audio had some sort of weird feedback. Her gestures, along with what audio was coming through, was clear enough for me to follow along.
The audio wasn't the only problem---I'd lost my web cam and couldn't find it. It wasn't where I always keep it, so we just winged it without video from my side. During the lesson, I kept wishing Darshiva were able to see me so she could see what needed work. Then came the faff session (I looked up this word, because I didn't know what it was!). We improved (improv-ed?
) to Omda's "La' La'," and I quickly changed my mind and was greatful Darshiva couldn't see me! :lol: I want to learn to improv so badly, because I am bad at it! :lol: If Dar could have seen me, I'm sure she would have thought, "WHAT the *COUGH!* is she doing???" :shok: :lol: We worked on downward figure 8's and the 3/4 shimmy, plus Darshiva spoke about posture (which I'm going to have to have her go over again because the audio was really garbled at that point). She'll be going over the basics with me for the next four weeks, which I'm very grateful for. In my troupe class, we do drills, but there's a lot of emphasis on learning choreo for performances. I feel like my technique suffers for it, so it's a relief to not have that pressure right now.
Our next session is tomorrow, and I can hardly wait!
Last edited:
