Cecilia Terrasa dancing soleá. April 6, 2008 7:52pm (photo by Hector Márquez)

I had the honor of accompanying Cecilia Terrasa and Sarah Hart in their performance debut of the Manuel Liñan bulerías choreography they had just learned in their recent trip to Jerez. Jason Vera y Aragón who also went on that same trip, joined us onstage helping out with palmas and jaleo! My singer friend showed up, taking a break from studying, and took pics for me. Thanks Hector!

Cecilia. April 6, 2008 7:52pm (photo by Hector Márquez)

Cecilia. April 6, 2008 7:52pm (photo by Hector Márquez)

Cecilia. April 6, 2008 7:53pm (photo by Hector Márquez)

Cecilia. April 6, 2008 7:55pm (photo by Hector Márquez)

Cecilia. April 6, 2008 7:56pm (photo by Hector Márquez)

Sarah dancing tientos. April 6, 2008 8:02pm (photo by Hector Márquez)

Sarah. April 6, 2008 8:03pm (photo by Hector Márquez)

Sarah. April 6, 2008 8:04pm (photo by Hector Márquez)

Sarah. April 6, 2008 8:06pm (photo by Hector Márquez)

This is off-topic but I promised a friend I'd blog about this anyway. Regarding my afternoon playing paintball, I felt like I was getting the hang of "infiltrating enemy territory" but alas my goggles fogged up during one of our war games and as I was making my way stealthily along the perimeter, unbeknownst to me, I managed to stumble upon another war game in progress. Of course, thanks to my fogged-up goggles my vision was slightly impaired so I mistakenly shot my paintball gun at the players in this other war game in progress, thinking they were my friends. Apparently these were more experienced paintballers who take this hobby very seriously. And when they found out that not only was I shooting at them but I was interrupting their "serious" game in progress, they were like, "What the f&*k? Who is this guy?" and they all started yelling obscenities at me and all shot back and I had to make a run for it because I was getting hit by paintballs from every direction!

Eventually I made it out and walked back to the road towards the playing field where I originally started. The shouts of obscenities continued. As I approached, my friends looked at me wondering how I ended up all the way on the other side. And when I told them my story, they all had a good laugh. Those paintballs hurt like hell, but I still had a blast.

I suppose I could relate to the serious paintballers' reaction to my blunder. It's kinda like the overly enthusiastic flamenco newbie who shows up at a flamenco party and goes way overboard with bad palmas (that's handclapping), unknowingly out of compás and obnoxiously loud. Two options: either we more experienced flamencos quietly put up with the bad palmas (not wanting to quell his enthusiasm as a newbie--we were all newbies at one time) or one of us finds a less-than-courteous way of shutting that newbie up. :-)

In other news: local dancer Sara Jerez was in yesterday's Washington Post. The article's not about her specifically but it's more of a review of Vinoteca wine bar where she performs on Sunday nights with guitarists Gerard Moreno and Richard Marlow. There's a nice little pic of the show which hopefully will entice more people to come and check it out. I wrote a blog entry about Vinoteca a week earlier.