No worries, I have no idea, but I didn’t want to ask. These are good questions to be able to look up if you’re new to dancing or to ostomy bags! Or other reasons.
I think it could! Turns out OP still had a dress that looked like Fifi’s example! I also suggested this site to OP, saying it’s handy for all the stored costume tips!
I've found a few crumbs on the Wayback Machine internet archive, but not enough to be really useful. When Bhuz was dying, there was talk of keeping it as an archive, but the expense and maintenance time must have been too much (understandable). Somebody was going to keep the old MEDlist online for reference at one point, too.
We still have this forum! Lets hope it stays put! Bhuz was huge, so to keep that online and not actively using it would be too hard. In the end they used a lot of ads, that is useful when people are still posting. But I can’t remember what the reason was that it was fully locked down. No one wanted to take over maybe?
I hope, but it has to be a lot of work and money so half a dozen people can put up a handful of posts a week. When Bhuz was imploding, people complained constantly about FB being a terrible alternative to a BB forum with the way their timelines work (hard to follow conversations, hard to search, disorganized, etc.). Sure, a lot of people drifted off to other hobbies or retired from dancing, and COVID did its own damage in the last two years, but where did they all go? Some of them are still out there. Why don't more of them come back?
Wasn't part of the problem also that they brought in a third party to run the selling area that nobody liked? Bhuz was already hemorrhaging users to FB, then they poisoned their own well with the swap meet, and there just wasn't much left.
The sysadmin was her mother, and IIRC, she couldn't do it any longer. I don't know if they held onto it because they had dreams of restarting it, or if they couldn't find a successor, or if they just didn't want to turn it over to somebody else.
If you have a website address, you can enter it in the Wayback Machine, and if it has copies saved for that site, it will show you a calendar of options for snapshots of that page you can view. For example, if you paste Bhuz.com/forum/belly-dance-fan-forum into the WM search box, it will show you all of the snapshots they have for the Fan Forum. The vast majority of thread links are missing, and unfortunately, some of the more useful areas were private (you had to be signed in, so they were never captured by WM), but if you like reminiscing about the old layouts and everybody's usernames...sigh....
The MEDlist was the old majordomo e-mail discussion list. I don't know when it started, but I think I joined it in late 1999. It ran for a few more years until everybody moved on to places like Bhuz, Tribe, and here.
2 reasons as I see it. 1) Belly Dance is currently in one of its periodic nadirs, and 2) What's left of the greater BD community is joined at the hip with "THAT SITE". I'll spare everyone the rant; but only make the observation that of my many interests, Belly Dance is the ONLY one that doesn't have multiple, active, and thriving forums similar to this one.
LOL those names! Insta isn’t good for belly dance either, maybe for marketing for students and gigs? Maybe same with Facesook, you can easily organise workshops in there, classes etc.
Severe arthritis must be horrible! I always had chronic pain, but I was able to work with it, now I could with pain meds, but the dancing itself sends me in a days long exhaustion flare where I have to rest, sometimes not able to move much and that gets boring soon! But in summer I am a bit better and can do some gardening, that is very good as pain killer for me! Plus a fun activity with my partner and MIL.
After forty years of dancing and teaching, I did indeed feel like I had lost an essential part of my identity. About the same time, I had to quit riding my motorcycle because my leg joints were increasingly undependable, and then a couple of years ago, I had to quit riding my horses because ladies with osteoporosis in the lower back don't need to be falling off horses any more. Both my horses died last year; even though I can't ride, I miss them horribly. It has all been a physical and psychological adjustment to make, and like you, I've found solace in gardening. Congratulations on your house!
I'll keep hanging around if you will.
Thank you! I will stick around, I never fully disappeared, I always kept checking from time to time, curious.After forty years of dancing and teaching, I did indeed feel like I had lost an essential part of my identity. About the same time, I had to quit riding my motorcycle because my leg joints were increasingly undependable, and then a couple of years ago, I had to quit riding my horses because ladies with osteoporosis in the lower back don't need to be falling off horses any more. Both my horses died last year; even though I can't ride, I miss them horribly. It has all been a physical and psychological adjustment to make, and like you, I've found solace in gardening. Congratulations on your house!
I remembered that you have connective tissue issues, and thought perhaps that's why you disappeared. Once again: I am very happy to have you back!
I am currently off them too, I need bone surgery next month, and once healed go back on them. My parents both have it, my father’s sister has it. My mum has EDS and my father has symptoms of it, so I won the genetic lottery (there is more than just EDS, unfortunately too long a list, but it’s awful to so disabled so young, but what can you do)
It is awful. Hugs across the miles to you.
That flouncer nowadays (from Bhuz) is living out of her car, last I heard. She just flounced her way out of many people's affections. Sad.
My pet belly dance peeve: costumes that distract and detract attention from the dance instead of enhancing it. Doesn't matter whether it is a weird high in the back low in the front hem, a complex set of accessories, or a costume that begs the questions, "What is going to fall out and when?" I want to think, "What a lovely costume," then lose myself in watching the performance.