This youth group performed several times a day on the center of the village green and were easily a crowd favorite. Large circles of viewers would stand for thirty minutes watching the highly charismatic and entertaining kids dance.
This young lady and her sister were part of the village green youth dancers and were truly amazing. They h
ad attitude and flair to spare!
2 comments:
Actually the traditional dancers soon usurped the steel drummers as my favorite (and hence best-tipped) street performers. The dancers at the arch were from the Diphala Traditional Dance Group of KwaZulu-Natal, although I never got the name of the group I usually saw performing near the Village Green. THAT group was HOT!
My favorite performance usually started with one of the members leading the group in a sort of 'call-and-response' song (think: "I love the Lord, He heard my cry). After a few lines the drums would start up and one or two of the dancers would step into the middle of the circle and go through a series of punches and kicks versus an invisible enemy (think Tae Kwon Do when a student performs one of these rituals perfectly in order to advance to the next belt). As each strike made contact with the 'opponent,' the rest of the group would shout, sort of like a Korean kiap. The dance ended with the dancers jumping onto the ground, sometimes landing seated, in the prone position, split, or on one knee - prepared to challenge the next opponent.
Breathtaking!
I think I found this girl along with her sister and cousin...
... so I go to Google Video and google "Xhosa Dance," thinking for sure I could find a clip of Xhosa men doing the Ubo Xhlensa (that's how I think it's spelled based on the Shakaland tour guide's pronnounciation) dance, where they shake their upper torsos vigorously (and quickly, at about 4 cycles per second, all movement isolated between the neck and solar plexus, in a front-to-back, not a side-to-side, motion. If you read the blog on "Umshato - the Wedding," it's the dance the Xhosa prince, along with his royal guard, performed to entice the Khoi princess).
Why was I looking for video of dudes shaking their shimmy? I want to practice the dance myself!
What I find instead is this:
http://video.google.com/videoplay?docid=5084981837038127135&q=xhosa+dance&ei=xA4MSJ6iCKX0rALZm5GxBA&hl=en
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