Last night I saw the Whirling Dervishes, which are performed by an Sufi Order of Islam here in Cairo... they are freaking AMAZING... It was so much fun to watch, both as a dancer and just someone who is interested in what they believe... If you dont know, the Dervishes is a musical and dance religious ritual which is suppose to put the performers in a trance and allow them commune with God... but what is interesting is that from the Audience you can see the men go into their trance, while spinning, yep, they are spinning, and while the one person, or three people are dancing, there is a group of men who surround them with their drums, and dance around them... it is Intense, but it was so cool to watch, it just blew my mind...The night started out with some music performed on a violin type instrument, and a flute type whistle...After them, a group of men came out with drums, cymbals, and one guy was on the Oboe type instrument that you hear when you think of Snake Charmers... and they played, and at times
a few of the drummer got a solo, and would sorta enter a trance while performing... The best part of this part was the man playing the finger cymbals... he was hilarious, he was such a diva performer, he would stick these hilarious poses, and he was just so entertaining to watch... Once these men were done, a man came out and started to sing, and once he was done with one song, which was entirely in Arabic, the drummers came back out and performed a little, dancing while drumming it was really cool, and then the first spinning dancer came out... he was wearing a colorful green outfit with the cool looking pinwheel skirts, that is the only way I can describe them, they looked like a pinwheel design... 
and he started to spin, and he was wearing more than one skirt, so at tone point he had the first skirt over his head and was spinning it over his head, and then he folded it while spinning and handed it off to someone... yeah that is right he FOLDED IT, while in a trance, and while spinning... I was amazed... and then he was handed a flag type thing, which he spun around with, and then refolded... again, amazing... I will say he was spinning for maybe 3o minutes, and he did not stop, and when the music went faster so did he... also it was so weird because it almost seemed like his head was not attached to his head, he was like a spinning bobble head, it was so weird... I wish I could have taken footage of the performance, but it is not allowed... :-( anyway, he finally finished his spinning...After him came another group of drummers performing, and then a new spinner came out, and he was wearing bright Yellow, but he was not alone, after he had a few minutes alone, two more dancers came on the stage... there were three men spinning like tops on the stage... it was intense... The first guy took off his first skirt and spun it around his head, and folded it as well... that is the weirdest part for me, they fold it... but after more spinning they started to ta
ke off their second skirt, but it turned out that it was made of two layers, so one layer was still attached to their waist, while the other half was above their head, they truly looked like spinning tops when this happened... it was so freaking cool to watch... after that they spun around some more, and then they took off their last skirt, and were spinning it above their head, and they stopped spinning but they kept on spinning the skirt, and they started to perform with just the spinning skirt... and one point they were on the floor spinning the skirt above their head, one of the guys even went into a splits while spinning the skirt...This was maybe one of the coolest performances I have ever seen... it was funny because as a dancer I could sorta understand what it is like to spin that much, but to spin for 30 minutes and be able to stand still and bow to the audience me astounded me, the first guy stopped, and he was not swaying or anything, he was perfectly solid and unmoving when he bowed to the audience... I know I could never do that...
Well tonight I am going Horseback riding in the Desert!!! This should be fun!!! I cannot wait!! Also I am done with my Arabic class, I took my final exam today, and I think I did well! Now I just have to study for my other exam on Monday and then I am done with Summer School...
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