Mike? At Ballet? Psssssshhhhh Not Even Close.

Wednesday during class, our program director, Clara, came in and told everyone she had gotten tickets to the Bale Folcolrico, which I was told was some type of dance performance. The words dance performance, enhanced by what I understood as “ballet”, did not leave me excited for these aforementioned tickets. Being that I am incredibly tough man, I would have much rather spent my time eating meat or doing push ups than attending some dance recital but I was somehow duped into going along with people already on their way. As it turns out, it wasn’t actually ballet (Bale is just some Portuguese word) but it was this awesome rendition of all these sweet African/ Afro-Brazilian dances that were absolutely crazy too watch. It was amazing how they could be doing such wild moves then fall completely in step with one another on a pin drop all to about ten guys going off on some drums. Black people with rhythm….what will this country show me next!? The overall impressiveness of the show is hard to capture in words, but two parts of the show really stood out. First, guys flipped onto to the stage and started these intense fighting sequences. Cool in itself but enhanced by the fact that their fighting and flips were accompanied by swords they clashed mid-air which threw off very cool looking sparks. This transgressed into some of the most intense capoiera I have seen since I got here, with high back flips and roundhouse kicks flowing at a nonstop pace. As cool as this was though, it was without a doubt trumped by the guy who came out representing the fire spirit of Candomble, the Afro-Brazilian religion similar to Santeria. The stage went completely black and then he came out with a huge bowl of fire on his head and two smaller bowls in his hands. It was so dark, it looked like fire was just cutting around the blackness. Then a small red light came on him and he stopped balancing the fire and started dancing in it! Not just walking through it, but actually dancing. He was slowly rubbing the flames all over his body, then he would step into the flames, stand, dance around for a couple of seconds, then step out and dance the burning flames off of his feet. It was unreal to watch. I’m really glad I ignored my manly intuitions because not only did I see an awesome, traditional Brazilian show, but I also learned the valuable lesson that either Candomble or Brazilian PCP is nothing to mess with.