Raquy's Egypt Adventures 2008

Helllo Again, You Dusty City!
Apartment
In a neighborhood near downtown Cairo is the massive tomb of Saad Zaghlool. Next to the tomb is a lively street with an outdoor market of vegetables, meat, clothes, textiles and household goods. On the market street in between a shawarma joint and a 24 hour bakery there are some stairs going up into an alley. The alley is lined with more vendors, and across from the fish stall there is a door. Inside the door and up the stairs above the Nubian men’s club there is an incredible newly renovated “super lux” three bedroom apartment. This apartment is home for the next two months.

Sometimes when you rent a flat for a couple months in Cairo the apartment is full of dingy old furniture. What I love about this apartment is that it is freshly painted and relatively empty, with a minimal amount of tasteful furniture. Plus there are stained glass windows in every room! Small lights scattered about give the impression of candles. What a classy pad!

And in case of boredom, all you have to do is look out of the window down to the market. About every half hour some screaming argument breaks out right below the balcony. There are certain characters who seem to be involved in every brawl.

I feel very happy, inspired and creative in this apartment. I stay up until 5am decorating fresh dumbek heads with colored markers at the dining room table, studying Arabic, composing and planning the shows. And I’ve turned one of the extra bedrooms into a meditation room!

My walk to school every day is only ten minutes, and I get to pass my favorite juice guys. Also near my house is the beautiful music venue called Makan that houses the women’s zaar trance ceremony. I inquired today to see if I could have the free class there, and am waiting to hear back.


My Class
Once again I have a nice class. This year, there are many more girls than before, a group of six Egyptian girls who sit together in the back and giggle. Only a few of the students have dumbeks, but I’m hoping they will all have one by the end of the week. THANK GOD my class this year is at 1:30 and not 9:30 like last year. Even so, with jetlag and all, I can barely drag my butt out of bed in time.


My Egypt Health Balance
On the one hand I’m drinking fresh juices all day long, and eating almost all raw delicious fruits and veggis. On the other hand the air is dusty and polluted, I smoke all kinds of stuff here, and going jogging in Cairo would be ridiculous and counterproductive, so I figure it balances out.
We did bring pet scoby with us and chef Rami has begun the brewing process for the historic first batch of kambucha in Egypt.

And for you raw foods people, how about this – sprouted foul! I’m serious! It’s good!


Auditions for My Own Egyptian Troupe!
I’m VERY excited because I’ve started assembling my new Egyptian drumming troupe!
As soon as I landed I started spreading the word that I’m looking for some young bright drummers and who can play stuff that’s not only Egyptian. Today I had two meetings from guys who were recommended to me, and they are both GREAT! The first guy, Mustafa Abbes, was wearing these fancy pointy shoes and picked up everything so fast! I had him play a challenging series of maksum variations and then I showed him my new samai with that part in 14 (3+4+4+3) and he got that as well! So this guy was on time to the meeting, he didn’t ask to smoke cigarettes in my apartment, he said he was on a diet, and he could play in 14. I was like, “Mustafa, are you sure you’re Egyptian?”

The second guy Baha was also great and picked up everything. And he was sooooo enthusiastic and excited!

Oh and did I mention, they are both hot? I even started imagining how I’m gonna dress them up for the show!

Pretty sweet! After meeting those two, I have a feeling this is going to be a kick ass show and I’m really getting psyched!

The first rehearsal will be at Mustafa’s studio next Tuesday.


Jet Lag
Jet lag is hilarious! I’m up every night being enormously productive at least until the morning prayer around 5am or so. Last night I ate an enormous meal at 2:30am. Today I woke up just in time for my afternoon class with a craving to smoke. I’ll probably adjust somewhat, but in the meantime I’m enjoying being on this crazy schedule!

Dumbek Fever Sweeps Cairo!

Egypt Blog, Feb 15 – Dumbek Fever Sweeps Cairo

I thought people and New York had dumbek fever! But I’ve never seen such dumbek fever as I’m witnessing here in Cairo!

My class at the University keeps getting bigger and bigger. Every day more people ask me if they can come sit in even though they’re not registered!

My students adorable, and they are so into the dumbek! They stay after class to practice. I can’t get them to leave! One of my students came up to me after the class today and said, “Thanks so much, Ya Doktor! Most people come to University with books, but we get to come to University with tablas!”

The free class is getting bigger too. The first week I had 2 people, the second week I had about 10 people and a bunch of people I don’t know called to ask about the class next week! Every week I need to find a bigger place to hold it! Because of this, it has the quality of some kind of clandestine meeting – I don’t reveal the location of the class until the last minute!

I also have a private dumbek student and a kemenche student as well!

I must say, I love the structure of having a class four mornings a weeks! I have a 20 minute walk through a lovely area of Cairo, past some beautiful mosques, parks, markets, ect. The people I meet on the way know me by now and they all say hi to me. Every day I stop at the juice place and have an orange juice on the way to school. Then I have a carrot juice at the same place on the way back. I get home with a carrot mustache on my face and Rami makes breakfast while I edit my book in the sun on the balcony. After breakfast I go back to bed.

I had a meeting with some people from TV stations yesterday. They are planning to cover the show and do some interviews beforehand.

Tonight we went to a concert of Beduin music on an outdoor stage on the Nile. The percussion section was hilarious. It was a dumbek player, one guy playing a rusty gas tank and another guy who had an Israeli army artillery box with Hebrew on it and was playing on it with drum sticks! The gas tank sounded amazing! It has a great bass sound and the artillery box was almost like a riq!

The three of them reminded me of me, Rami and Carmine at the Figaro!

Egypt Adventure Continued

February 9th

Fish Offering, Concert Planning and New Dumbek Design!

Meeting with Said!

We went to Said’s yesterday and had a meeting about our concert!

Rami, Dominique (the guy studying tabla from Canada) and I got to his place at midnight and he wasn’t there yet, so we got to practice really loud in his practice studio for a couple hours before he arrived.

Saiid made up for being so late by bringing us about 30 medium sized grilled fish wrapped in paper. This is like at 2:00am! He put all 30 fish on top of the wrapping on the table and left the room. All for just the three of us! There was nothing else in the meal but the fish and some pita. Not even any silverware! It was a bit overwhelming, but they were delicious (I even tasted a little!).

After the meal we went up to the “office” and talked about our plan for the show. I won’t give it away, but it’s going to be amazing.

I told him about my students who are coming and he said that he needs to hear each of them play before he allows them to perform in the concert!

He told us that Orbit TV has been rerunning footage from our last show again and again for the past two years, and that the show created a huge buzz!

I haven’t hung out with Said in two years and the difference in my Arabic skills is noticeable! We had much better communication – I could understand almost everything he said, and I could express most of what I wanted to say. I still have lots of work to do with the language, but it was satisfying to see that all the studying is paying off and that I don’t feel like such an idiot as I did last time.

New Raquy Dumbek by Gwaret Al Fan

We met with Nasser from Gwaret al Fan and he’s all excited about a new idea for a Raquy Dumbek made out of wood and silver!

I love the regular mother of pearl ones that he’s been making for me, but I’m open to new ideas, so he’s getting a couple ready for me to see and then I’ll decide if I like it or not. His idea is that if I like it, we will make the show in Cairo the “coming out” party for the new designer drum. He’s already made a bunch of the new Raquy drum heads – and they look amazing! Soon hundreds of people will be hitting my picture!

Yom Agaza ( day off) !
Today was my first day off from school! What a luxury! I slept till 2:00pm, went down to the outdoor ahawa on my street and read my book! Then we came back home and Rami made a delicious lunch of salad, cauliflower, green beans and rice! YUM! The veggis here are so delicious it’s hard to believe they’re real! All we have scheduled today is a lesson with Fikry my rababa teacher at night.

My University Class
My class is going great! It totally filled up! They called me from the department yesterday to ask if I would accept a 16th student even though the limit is fifteen students, so I said “Yalla – why not?” I got through the first week of school smoothly. The class is so fun – it goes by so fast everyday!

I had everyone buy a copy of “Dumbek Fever” as the textbook for the class!

The first quiz is gonna be the Time Exercise next week. Everyone will have to do the Time Exercise up to four and then go back down to one next Thursday, and I will grade them on it. Hee hee.

It’s gonna take me a while to get used to them calling me “Ya Doktor”! Every time they call me that I look behind me to see who they’re talking to!

Guess what? In the University in Egypt the janitor will make you coffee! Yesterday I was so tired when I got to class, so I got the janitor and said, “Mahmood – would you please make me a double coffee?” and he brought it to me in the class! Sweet!

Raquy's Egypt Adventures - First Week in Cairo!

Raquy’s 2007 Egypt Adventure Blog

Here I am back in Egypt! It’s really starting to feel like a second home!

Apartment!
This time we found an apartment right away. It took about 20 minutes! Our Boab from last year hooked us up and took us to this place in Moonira. It’s HUGE – our friends call in “The Palace”. It has sequenced guilded elephants all over the place and an amazing balcony overlooking a very unique old building. The bedroom has this awesome 70’s decour with furniture that looks like an old automobile! The neighborhood is wonderful. The entire street corner on both sides is an outdoor shisha café that makes great coffee and there is a sook (market) right around the corner with fresh produce.

The place is a fifteen minute walk to the University, which brings me to my next subject:

My University Class!
I can’t believe it actually happening! Introduction to Arabic Drumming semester course at the University! I have about 12 students enrolled in the class. Most of them are Egyptian and there are two girls from the states on a semester abroad. Not all of them have drums yet, but conveniently there are little tables attached to the chairs, so the ones without drums are banging on the tables! There’s a great vibe in the class, everyone is enjoying it very much, and there are several that are showing signs of serious dumbek fever! I’m thinking of giving them a “Pop” quiz! Ha ha, get it? “Pop” quiz?

The biggest challenge for me with this class is the time. It meets four times a week at 9:30am!!!!! That means that I have to get up at 8:30am!!!!! I really don’t want this to cramp my nightlife in Cairo, so here’s what I’ve been doing:
Go to bed at 4am
Get up at 8:30am
Teach my class
Go back to bed at noon
Sleep until 3 or 4pm

It’s a little weird, but it’s working so far.

Free Class in Cairo!
Remember how I usually give a free class on Mondays in New York? Well I thought, why not in Cairo!
There are two guys here, one from Canada and one from Prague, who have basically dropped everything else in their lives in order to come to Egypt and study the dumbek. So they came over on Monday and we had a free class! And I will do it every Monday – I’m just looking for a bigger place to have it cause the word is spreading, and now lots more people want to attend!

Fikry, Said and Halim El Dabah
So far I’ve seen these three. We went to Fikry’s folkloric orchestra rehearsal, and I got to jam with them a little and hang out with him. I’m going over to his house tomorrow for a lesson.
We got to hang out with Said a bit before a show he was having. He was better dressed than ever! It was great to see him and we’ll go over to his place later tonight.
Also my buddy, the 85 year old Egyptian composer Halim El Dabah who lives in Ohio was giving a lecture in the classroom next to mine after my class, so I surprised him and we jammed, him on the piano and me on the dumbek for the essembly.

Our First Show in Cairo
Last night it was the birthday of this guy Hisham who is a huge fan of my music, so his friend Nader organized a house concert in a beautiful apartment in downtown Cairo. It was weird for me to have all these people there that I’ve never met before who listen to my music all the time, and were actually requesting specific songs!

All in all, I’ve been seeing some incredible inspiring music shows, eating lots of tomatoes and artichokes, smoking shisha, practicing my Arabic and enjoying the sunshine. It’s good to be back.

Saiidi Concert - The Messengers in Upper Egypt!

We just got back from an amazing trip to Minia otherwise know as ‘The Jewel of the South’ ! Minia is a pleasant three hour train ride from Cairo, one of the first cities in ‘Upper Egypt”.

For some, reason, the government is freaked out by having foreigners in Minia. When we arrived, all the transit workers were saying stuff like “six Americans have arrived” into their walky talkies– we were the buzz of the station.

A van was waiting for us as well as a car of armed guards who followed behind for our protection. They took us straight to the Jesuit Compound, a walled compound heavily guarded.

The compound was wonderful. They gave us cozy rooms with beautiful balconies right above the theater where we were supposed to perform and fed us amazing meals in the restaurant downstairs.

After dinner we wanted to go for a little stroll on the Cornish. The gates were locked so we told the security guards we wanted to go for a little walk. Wow! What an ordeal!

! Everyone got on their walkie talkies and it took a half hour to organize everyone until they let us walk outside. With us were two plain clothed security guards leading us, a couple armed guards behind us and a truck full of soldiers crawling beside us! Everything that we did, they reported into the walky talkies – stuff like, “ok, now they’re crossing the street. Now they stopped to pet a cat. Now they’re looking for a place to have shisha”. When we stopped for tea we also ordered drinks for the eight people guarding us. By the end of the walk, we were quite friendly with all the guards – they were very nice guys.

Whenever we asked them why they needed to guard us so heavily they just shrugged and explained that they are being very careful because not many foreigners come to Minia and they just want to make sure nobody kidnaps us or anything.

The next morning they took us out on a boat on the Nile. It was a old boat and it was a windy day, so in the middle of the boat trip the sail broke and the boat almost overturned! We all rolled around the boat frantically clutching our drums!

But we had nothing to worry about because the speed boat of security guards that was following us came right to the rescue and pushed us to shore. You see, there are advantages on being guarded wherever you go!

The concert was the best one yet. The place was packed with people, and what an audience!!! They were clapping, yelling and singing along for the whole show!


I saved the new song , “Do Saidi” for last and called up one of the guards, “Akram”, who’s also a great drummer, to play with us. The energy was amazing!


Now we’re back in Cairo – it’s nice to be able to walk around freely! But I’ll never forget the special concert in Minia, and I have a feeling I’ll be back there next year!

Concert on the Nile!

Yesterday was our show at Sawy on a beautiful outdoor stage on the Nile! There was a medium sized crowd that was very excited and enthusiastic. Some of the crowd was there because they had seen us on Good Morning Egypt!
I started with my unaccompanied solo, then Rami and I did some duets, then we did some pieces with the girls, and as a finale I called up Henkish to play a drum solo with us. We ended the show with everyone playing together and the whole audience singing along to Salamat, Reni Li Shwoye Shwoye, and as an encore, Ana Fintizara!
There were some television stations that came to film the show and interview us afterwards.

This morning we gave a lecture/ demonstration on Middle Eastern drumming at the American University in Cairo.

This evening I had a rababa lesson and my teacher said, “if you’re going to Minia, you have to play this piece – they’re gonna flip out” and he taught me a great Saiidi song that I’ll play in the concert in Minia!

Tomorrow night is our show at the American University! Stay tuned!

Good Morning,Egypt!

Morning Talk Show, Good Morning Egypt (Sabah al Khiir, Ya Missr)!


Yesterday the girls arrived! Natalia got nice introduction to Egypt. Shortly after her arrival, our Boab knocked on our door and told us that he was having a party in his apartment and that they would love us to play for them. So we went upstairs to a small room on the roof with about fifteen people stuffed inside and played a few songs. On the Egyptian songs they all sang along – it was very sweet.

Then we had to go to the old market area to approve the new Raquy and the Cavemen galabias! They are gorgeous! “Raquy and the Cavemen” and a picture of a tabla are stitched into the back in gold thread!

Afterwards we saw the huge crowds of people in the market and thought to ourselves, “this would be a good place to promote our show” so we took out the drums and started playing Nubian. while Rami’s cousin Karime handed out fliers for the show. About half way into the song the police had to come to disperse the crowd of people that had gathered around to see us play!

The next morning we had to wake up very early to go play on Sabah al Khir, Ya Missr! (Good Morning, Egypt). It was a little nerve wracking to be filmed, knowing that it was being screened LIVE both on channel 1 Egypt and on satellite TV!

But it went very well. We started out playing the Nubian, then we were interviewed, then we played Farid Al Atrash then Dust. We had the whole camera crew dancing! There was a simultaneous interpreter available throughout the interview, but I actually spoke in Arabic the whole time!

When we arrived back to our neighborhood, our friends were very excited that they had just seen us on TV!

For the rest of the day were entertaining people in our apartment. It’s amazing in this country how we can have people coming over all day without actually inviting anyone! Among the people over were:

• A beautiful woman named Fatima from Hungry who’s a dumbek player! We picked her up on the street while we were handing out fliers.

• Osama’s mother and brother who came from Damanhoor to visit and brought a box full of sweets that I could barely lift.

• Marjory came to rehearse for the show.

• Haytham (my’ Arabic teacher)’s brother who’s an actor and friend who we played for and are now trying to get us on another TV show.

• Ustaz Henkish came over to rehearse with us and brought some guy named Christiian from Hungary.

• In the middle of the rehearsal a group of furious neighbors, the boab and the landlord came by to have a big argument about the noise.

• We had a late night visit from the Andrea, Amy and Mariah!

Tonight we have a rehearsal on a falooka for our concert at Sawy which is tomorrow!

Saiidi Street Wedding!

Saiidi Street Wedding!


Ok –now this night was something I’ll never forget. My Rababa teacher’s cousin was marrying one of his other cousins and he invited us to the wedding. It was in a neighborhood called “Ataba” which is a lot different from “Garden City”,the ritzy neighborhood we live in.

We got out of the cab and Fikry was there, decked out in his traditional Saiidi outfit, complete with cane and all. It was great to see him in his “hood”. He is like the king there. As we walked towards the wedding he proudly pointed out all the things he loved about his neighborhood – his house, his neighbors and the beautiful sook (market) that we walked through.

The wedding party was outdoors on an unpaved street with a stage. There were lights everywhere, a sound system, and everything on the stage was simultaneously showed on tv screens farther from the stage. As we approached, we heard on the loud speaker “welcome fikry wl ganawy and his friends from America” and we saw ourselves on tv.


We were seated at a table with the ‘cream de la cream’ of the wedding. Most of the guests were musicians, and all the celebrities who arrived were ushered straight to our table. They kept bringing out these plates of kababs and on the trays were coals covered in meat fat so that it would make lots of meaty smoke. And these guys were partying! I don’t think I’ve been hanging out with people getting so wasted since I was in college.



Periodically groups of curious kids would gather around to shake our hands only to be shooed away by the adults. The kids had a game of sneaking up and stealing kababs from the adult’s table. When this happened the adults pretended to be outraged, but as soon as the kids disappeared they would laugh.

The band was amazing, especially the percussion section – two dafs (frame drums) a muzzhar, and a few tables – extremely coordinated and tight. Certain of the celebrity guests were invited up to sing. There were also two AMAZING belly dancers on stage.
The women were all in a different section than the men and at one point Fikry brought me over to dance with the bride. That was really fun! Those girls were getting down!


Later one, he brought me to the stage and announced that I would play one drum solo and one song on the rababa! They handed me horrible out of tune tabla and set me up with a mic. I looked at the other drummers and said” Yimsik Asess” (hold me the rhythm) and they did an amazing job of accompanying me on my drum solo. They got all my cues – it was as if we had rehearsed!
The funnest part was playing “Wahiishni Rod Aleya” on the rababa! The full band accompanied me and everyone in the crowd was singing along! What a thrill! Fikry just stood there and beamed the whole time. He didn’t want to play along because he wanted everyone to hear that I could play it by myself.


That may just have been the best party I’ve ever attended!

The other news is that we’re going to be on a TV show called “Sabah Al Khiir, Missr” (Good Morning, Egypt). a day before our concert at Sawy in order to advertise it!

Also we found a huge four bedroom luxury apartment on the Nile for the girls (Andrea, Maria, Bashira, Amy, Marjory and Natalia), who are all arriving in the upcoming days.

escape to sinai + cavemen in tel aviv

Escape to Sinai – Feb 23 - 26!

The plan was to take the hellish bus all the way back to Cairo, but right after we crossed the border it was a gorgeous day and the Red Sea was looking mighty blue, so Rami and I looked at each other and said,”let’s go to Sinai for a few days!” We jumped in a local cab and went to Tarabin, a remote beach resort on the Red Sea.

WOW! Where to I start? First of all, because of the terrorism scare, this place that is usually teeming with Israeli vacationers was EMPTY! Bad for the local workers but nice for us! We went to the Nikhil Inn on the end of the strip and got an upstairs room with a balcony right over the beach. This place has a staff that is gracious and hard working by day and at night they turn into incredible dancers and drummers. As a matter of fact all along the beach in the shops we found wonderful tabla players that we jammed with!

After a day or two of being there, we didn’t feel anymore that we were on vacation. Word spread fast about who we were (and half of the people recognized us from TV) and we could not walk down the strip with out the store people begging us to drum or for me to play “reni li shwoye shwoye” and other Egyptian favorites on the kemenche.”

Typical Scene on our way to lunch:
We are walking down the beach on our way to have lunch at our favorite restaurant.

Carpet Guys: Hey where were you last night? You promised you would come to the shop and play and we invited all our friends and you didn’t show up! Everyone was waiting for you!!!!

Us: Sorry – the guys at our hotel made us play all night – the chef Mohammed is a drummer and wanted to jam with us – we couldn’t leave!

Carpet Guys- Ok – so play now.

Us: We’re on our way to lunch – we’ll stop by later.

Carpet Guys – When?

Us – We don’t know exactly – we’re supposed to be on vacation.

Carpet Guys – Alright then, at 9

Us – We’ll try

Carpet Guys- You promise?

Us – Ein Sh’alla.

At one time we actually triple booked! We told our hotel staff, the carpet guys and they Beduin bracelet girls that we would come by and play, all on the same night! It got to be uncomfortable towards the third day – we had to sneak down the beach in the dark wearing disguises, hoping to make it to our room without being asked to perform!

But it was really one of the closes places to paradise that I can imagine. And the great news is:
SPRING DUMBEK RETREAT 2007 IN SINAI!
I’ve arranged everything with the hotel to have a week long retreat at the Nikhil Inn, Tarabine, Sinai! It will be in March or April – stay tuned for more details. With special guest Fikry (my rababa teacher).

The bus ride back to Cairo was hellish. Rami and I were so bored that we started imitating everyone we know and the other person has to guess who it is. If you’re reading this blog, chances are that we imitated you.

Now we’re back in our Cairo flat, and tomorrow morning will start the next task – getting people to come to our upcoming shows!

Cavemen in Tel Aviv! Feb 16 - 23
The bus ride from Cairo to Tel Aviv and back was a nightmare, but I don’t feel like going into detail.
Tel Aviv is one of my favorite places. We spent a wonderful week visiting friends, eating hummus, sitting in café’s, walking on the beach and shopping on Shenkin Street. It’s so clean and easy to walk around compared to Cairo!

One of the college radio stations did a whole program on Raquy and the Cavemen and we played live on the air and were interviewed. Rami actually spoke in Hebrew on Israeli radio!

We were a little nervous about the show because it happened to be scheduled on the same evening that this TV talent show had the finals, and, believe it or not, several people said they couldn’t make it to the show because of this stupid TV show!

But it turned out to be a wonderful show. We had a great crowed (half of which was the Buchbut family) and they loved the show. We had everyone dancing and whooping and begging for more when we finished – we could not have asked for a nicer audience. And since Mr. Yo couldn’t make is because of his visa, Fishky’s brother Ofer played the bass line on a baritone sax! It was amazing!

Women’s Zaar Ceremony!

Today since we had our concerts all organized, we took it easy, and it as actually our funnest day so far! We had lessons – Rami with Ashraf on the Riq and me with Fikry on the Rababa. The lessons were schedules 2.5 hours apart, but one came late and the other early, so they ended up getting here at around the same time (that always seems to happen!) But it was ok – I got to chat with Fikry while Rami was having his lesson. It’s nice because this year my Arabic is so much better so I can really communicate with Fikry. He explained to me that when he was a kid, people only played the rababa as a drone for singing and that he was one of the first people to play actual songs on the rababa! He is AMAZING! In this lesson we worked on Taksim (improvisation based on the maqams). I learned SO MUCH! He wants me to play with him at a family wedding – one of his cousins is marrying another one of his cousins. I think it will be a blast and he said I could bring the girls as well!

After the lessons we went to meet with Henkish. I decided that rather than have a joint concert like I did with Saiid, I’d rather do my own concert and then have him as a special guest for a song or two at the end. So he’s fine with that, and we’re all excited about the show. We’ll rehearse a few times after I return from Tel Aviv.


On our way back from Henkish we had a nice surprise! Right next to the Kings Tomb on our street, we saw, on the sidewalk, about 4 dumbek and 4 frame drums made of skin, being heated up next to a burner. There was a guy there so we asked him what’s going on and it turns out there was a womans zaar ceremony just starting! We went in and saw the whole thing. It was AMAZING! The Zar is a healing ritual performed mailnly by women for women. It is an ancient purification rite that aims to pacify numerous spirits. The participants are meant to reach an altered state of consciousness. The ritual is lead by a woman called Kudeyit, who usually possesses a remarkably strong character. The Kudeyit in the ceremony we saw was like out of a dream – Rami and I both felt that we knew her before.

This ritual is one of the few acceptable ways for women to release pent up emotions and frustrations while consciously seeking healing powers.

This ceremony was very powerful and interesting. I don’t know if I reached an altered state of consciousness (or maybe I’m just always in an altered state of consciousness). Anyway, if anyone every has the opportunity to see such a thing I highly recommend it!

Now I’m back home and I have about 4 hours until my bus leaves to Tel Aviv! My next blog entry will be from there!