Covid Blog Day 36 – Life of a Flamenco Dancer

I guess 36 days warrants a thought blog. Yes, I know I owe a decade’s worth of blogs so I must be in an introspective state to get this far. We are in the middle of a great pandemic. World pandemic. I didn’t even know it was possible to be in a frigging pandemic but I hear it happens once every 100 years or so. The planet’s great equalizer against the humans.

So, what do I do. I get out every day for a walk around the neighbourhood or a hike in the forest, which is very easy to do as I live in North Vancouver on Grouse Mountain. I do not encounter too many people in the forest. I don’ t have a mask, so when I go shopping, I’m just going out…again, there aren’t very many people out so the 2m distancing seems very easy to do from my perspective. I actually think Canadians regularly physical distance!!! It is part of our culture to be in houses apart from each other. So, physical distancing is not that hard…no 2 besos, no kiss-greeting, hugs are optional…heck, I don’t usually handshake either, waves or peace signs are fine. I took one car off insurance because it doesn’t look like the family needs two cars anymore, we barely use one.

I freaked out last week and had a tall double chocolate mocha with all the fat whip like an ice cream cone because my favourite coffee shop reopened after a month and then the next day was my first day out to see my Dad. I spent $130 on frigging Vietnamese and Japanese take-out just because I missed “other food”. The kids and I went hog wild. I really didn’t care what it was costing even though I have zero income right now.

FLAMENCO. I miss all the flamenco people and hope that our flamenco restaurants make it through the next couple months on take-out orders so we have a place to go back and play weekly shows!!! I really miss weekly performances. I feel like I’m getting weak with no performance chops. I have a studio downstairs and still spend at least 3 hours a day in it, but just laziness means I’m not working out 100%…it’s something like 65-70% with no clear goals, I dislike having no show, it’s like shooting with no target.

Many of our Spanish friends are in lockdown in Spain posting their llamadas to keep their fans happy on Facebook. Thank you all so much for keeping us all inspired in the world with your arte. Here’s me undertaking challenges by:

• Jose Carmona “Rapico” on April 5, bulerias llamada. Man, that was hard, 3 hours of my life!
• Ivan Vargas April 6, tangos llamada. I’m rushing the triplets again, have to say “strawberry”.
• Agueda Saavedra April 15, bulerias llamada. Should look great in a skirt! Yea!

I miss giving face to face private lessons and yelling at my students in person (don’t worry, they love that) but zoom class allows me to still do the same lecturing about my flamenco movement theory regarding the Rubik’s Cube torso and Estilo de Mujer hip curriculum. I still get to Chinese-mom everyone, even more so, since all I can do is stare at their images and correct technique and posture with no distraction. I do think zoom is good for something, maybe not full on advanced choreography but working out the details and technique for sure. I have to dispense information slowly due to WiFi issues. Now I can fix some long awaited technique.

The first week we spent time together doing community zoom classes from my iphone10. It’s a good phone but the sound tech sucks. Everybody complained about echo and underwater feeling. They couldn’t figure out footwork with the echo. So, I was demoralized the first week. How can we possibly forge ahead with such poor ability to see/hear with time lags? The following week, I decked out with a new scookum system including large plasma tv, sound cancellation microphone, my mac laptop, my husband’s high definition expensive Sony camera. This new set up seems to mimic what my students would experience in class live. They can see the teacher’s back, the teacher’s mirror image and now I can play my mp3 music and click tracks. Once in a while WiFi bandwidth is overwhelmed and there is a lag, but this cannot be helped. It is the limitation of online.

Mozaico Flamenco Online Zoom Classes: mozaicoflamenco.com/classes/class-schedule.

EXTROVERT. Yet no amount of social media or online communication resolves the need for this extrovert to get out of the house! I appreciate my social media but it’s not enough, so I had to get Pinterest, actually look at YouTube and get games on my phone. Useless waste of time. Oh wait, I have time.

TRAVEL. I travelled a lot in my youth, lived in Denmark, lived in Singapore, backpacked across Europe, studied flamenco in Spain 8X, travelled SE Asia and New Zealand. Since having kids in 2008 and 2010, I lost the desire to travel and just went for R&R trips to the various islands of Hawaii (Maui, Kauai, Big Island, Oahu) each year. Now that I am not allowed to travel, aagh! I want to travel again. I have a list of places I want to visit after this catastrophe is over. Some of these dreams include live in Greece for 1 month, see Easter Island (Chile), Stonehenge (UK), Mexico Pyramids and US 4 Corners for starters. I might have to start writing a list of places I’d like to see before I die.

FAMILY. I’m so grateful I have a family and a dog because if I didn’t, surely would be completely bonkers by now…just having a family and home represents a lot of energy and work. We do a lot of things together now and it is enjoyable because we all have time. Domesticity is not natural for me but I find with the extra time, I actually have time for cooking, cleaning, gardening both flowers and yes, we started a veggie patch. With a garden, you are never “finished” and the weeding is an endless task, so you cannot say you have nothing to do. Overall, it is positive because the children are just soooo happy not to have to go to school. They love the pandemic, actually. They just want to stay home.

MEDITATION. Ya, ok. In November 2019 I thought I should learn how to breathe properly and start meditation. For those that know me, I think they would tell you that I represent an enormous amount of energy. Some tell me I possess bounds of warrior energy, which I suppose is a good thing for Flamenco Puro. In any case, the opposite of flamenco energy, would be a more watery, fluid, flowing type of energy. Let’s just call that Yin compared to flamenco’s Yang energy. In seeking a well-rounded, integrative approach to human nature and art, I started what I consider to be a spiritual journey learning meditation. I started this last December when I was in Hawaii. Quite honestly, I couldn’t get 4 deep inhale-exhale breaths done without getting ADD. In closing my eyes, my mind was racing a mile a minute, perhaps thousands of thoughts per second. I felt that, hmmm, this somewhat disconcerting. So I have been working on it and now I can make myself completely calm in 10 and get into a much calmer, introspective state. I read through a book on the Wheels of Life which educates us on the dynamics of the 7 chakras in relation to moving energy. This theory on the energy centres really resonated with me and the more I learned, the more I actually think I should be looking into a new career that involves energy healing work. If we actually have 18 months of covid, I think I can have a third career and easily integrate flamenco dance as it relates to the root, sacral, solar plexus and heart chakras of the body. As a flamenco, it was very quick to relate our dance to the first of the four energy centres. Learn more: thelawofattraction.com/7-chakras.

FLAMENCO GUITAR. I started playing flamenco guitar because my kids play guitar. For a few years they played ukulele and have since graduated to the guitar now that their hands are bigger. Aside from singing and playing songs like “Over The Rainbow”, I have found that general guitar programs for kids definitely do not have the same strict standards as the Suzuki violin program I had to go to in my youth. So, I switched them over to Flamenco Guitar with a guitarist with Classical training and now we are all totally overwhelmed. Both hands getting coordinated now. Still no paper music in sight…the classical violinist in me doesn’t get it.

For online guitar lessons (via Skype) contact Josue Tacoronte: josuetacoronte.com.

MY NEW CHALLENGE – BULERIAS TOQUE. I chose to play bulerias on guitar and this is literally the hardest thing to play. Why? Because then I can try to sing and play guitar for my zoom dance classes. Leave it to me to choose the hardest thing. From my point of view, the bulerias compas is down pat but this leads to so many, many right hand techniques that I never knew about before. 3 types of Rasgueado and 3 types of Golpes for starters. It is totally hard because I feel like the right hand is doing what my footwork is doing and I can’t change left hand chords fast enough. So I have regressed to the state of rank beginner, trying to make my hands go different. Very humbling. All professional flamenco guitarists think what is easy is actually ridiculously hard when most guitarists mainstream are playing 4/4 and 3 chord songs and use a pick…flamenco guitar is already level 3 man!!! Why is my guitar video getting more views on FB than my dancing, wtf? I guess I’ll blog it so everybody can see the technique improve over 18 months.

CANADA. It looks like Canada has a type of unity consciousness that has kept most of the population voluntarily indoors. I feel like our government is doing the best it can to support citizens and the artists, which I am quite amazed about. It does matter who you elect! I am very proud about being Canadian right now it is almost the vision of unity as opposed to our US neighbour’s duality.

North Vancouver, BC, Canada

About The Author

Kasandra “La China”
Flamenco Dancer and Instructor, Director, Producer, Choreographer

Kasandra is one of Canada’s leading flamenco artists well-known for her unrelenting drive to push the artistic envelope. A tirelessly ambitious artistic director, soloist and prima bailaora, Kasandra is always hungry for new sources of inspiration and knowledge, constantly pushing her musical and choreographic mastery to its limits. She has been identified as “Vancouver’s flamenco star who has embodied flamenco with her dynamic, precise style” by Flamenco-World magazine. Read More