Our plan on this visit was to take the audience on a little tour across North Africa; introducing them to the different costumes and dances as we went.
Day one started off in Tunisia and our first set gave us the opportunity to show off one of our favourite costumes and all our ornate jewellery.
 |
| Meroe, Phoenece, Mish Mish, Naima and Tameri in their Tunisian finery |
We then moved on to a Moroccan dance. The scarves that we used in this dance inspired the Mini-me dancers from the crowd to join in. Scarves where twirled around like helicopters. I don’t think the Easter Island figure or dinosaur quite knew what to make of it!
 |
| Meroe leads the scarf dancers round the museum exhibits |
For our second set of day one we moved up the Nile to Nubia to celebrate two weddings, which are, of course, are joyful occasions with lots of clapping and singing. This set was so well received that we repeated it on the Sunday but added in a solo from Meroe. It was nice to have a contrast of a traditional group dance with a modern solo routine. Meroe was able to use her beautiful Nubian costume that she had specially made for the Funoon wa Alwane show in Liverpool, which we’d taken part in earlier this year. It was certainly a hit with the museum crowds!
 |
| Tameri, Mish Mish and Meroe performing a traditional Nubian dance |
 |
| Meroe performing her solo |
Our third set saw us staying in Egypt with a Saaidi routine from Luxor, followed by a fun dance from the farming community of the Nile Delta. The dance mimicked winnowing and water collection, and we got to wear our colourful headscarves.
 |
| Meroe and Phoenece mimic winnowing, with Naima and Mish Mish behind them |
We had planned to get the whole museum dancing to a Lebanese Debke at the end of this set, but it very rapidly became apparent that the Ya Raqs ladies are a lot fitter than your average museum goer! (It must be all of that cake!) Everyone started off brilliantly, but as the energy levels rose, testing folks’ stamina to the limits, it was only Ya Raqs, a few hardy youngsters, and one member of the museum staff who made it to the end of the dance - but it was a great try!
 |
| The Debke - towards the end! |
For the final set of each day we headed to the nightclubs of to Cairo to let our hair down and to show off our more glamorous costumes finishing up with a free for all dance with the audience!
 |
| Naima, Tameri, Phoenece and Meroe show their glamorous side |
We only did one workshop on the first day which went down really well – we certainly saw some very good mini-me dancers. The workshops are always a hit as they give the children a chance to dress up to look like little Egyptians. And of course there is always that promise of the now famous Ya Raqs Certificates!
This bought us to the end of a very successful day one with an audience of 490 – not bad, but could we top that on day two?
For the second day we decided to change things round a little, so stayed firmly in Egypt for the day’s performances. The first set was a Ghawazee set, and our costumes were based on those worn by the dancers from the nineteenth century around Luxor. This set led into the first of two workshops for the day. Both were very well attended and we even got some of the museum staff to join in. And in case you are wondering – yes they got certificates too!
All in all it was a wonderful weekend – and the time went so quickly. An excellent venue with a super audience who weren’t afraid to have a go. The atmosphere, the participation of the crowd, and the wonderfully vibrant energy bouncing off our mini-me dancers, who proudly went away with their certificates, meant that we all came away feeling quite elated!
Ya Raqs would like to say a big THANK YOU to the World Museum Liverpool staff for making us so welcome!
Oh! And if you are wondering whether or not we beat the audience total from day one – we did. We reached 580 on day two giving us a grand total of 1,070 for the weekend!
No comments:
Post a Comment