Ramona in Istanbul

Traveling, I both love and loathe visiting churches.  On the one hand, churches can impress a feeling – especially on the weary traveler – of utter stillness and peace.  On the other hand, breathtaking churches almost always make travel guides’ ‘Must See’ lists, and after visiting four or five in one city I start to feel less and less asthmatic about them.

Today was my first day exploring Istanbul, and a friend took me to Saint Anthony’s church in Beyoğlu.  I wear a tiny silver pendant of the same name whenever I travel, and it is one of my most prized possessions.  A gift from my best friend, Saint Anthony is the patron saint of travelers and lost souls.

Inside the church today I felt the stillness I have come to associate with foreign religious spaces.  I listened to the resonance of its apse and the breath of its nave.  Like a child biting into a marshmallow, I savored the clink of my coin falling into a tin box, and I chose my slender candle carefully.

Lighting a candle for my grandmother in the foreign churches I visit is as familiar as the sun falling through the stained glass.  The tradition started when I was living abroad in Austria and she passed away, too far for me to bid her goodbye.  She was the woman who taught me, through her blood, to travel and to think for myself.  Because of this, the tradition has always felt like a fitting tribute.

I have no idea if my grandmother, a minister’s wife who was often weary of being one, felt that the churches she saw in her travels were beautiful or not.  I wonder if she would have laughed at my lighting a candle for her today.  She very well may have.

Truth Be Told

We only ever want to share the good things.  Somehow human nature has programmed us to hide our secrets deep inside.  But there are so many bad things that pass through.  Not because we’re bad, but because we’re beautifully fallible and if we were immune to negativity, to pessimism and greed and anger, we would never have the chance to grow.

To grow.  We also like to end our stories that way: sharing the happy morals.  Even if sometimes the moral isn’t so clear-cut.

The fellows have seen the stage.  And with the glow of the lights came the heat of envy.  Why you and not me, many of us wondered.  Why me and not you, more seldom heard.  The hard work of one is not always equal to the hard work of another.  And as much as we’d like to think that team building brings harmony, most of us are just humans who crave praise and reward in the end.

I fell victim.  I grew cold and hot at the very same moment and cried by myself in the corner of the desert.  Then I cried harder to think of my own smallness and my wish to be bigger and stronger inside.

This story doesn’t end happily because it hasn’t yet ended.  Because my morning rehearsals in my pajamas are still fueled by fear.  Because we haven’t seen the next stage yet, and already I’m preparing myself for more anger and jealousy inside.  I tell this story as honestly as I can, knowing that I may never be able to be to be 100% honest.

*****

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Sometimes It Isn’t So Easy

Scene: I have just called reception to get Shubhangi’s room number at our hotel in Abu Dhabi: 1523. I dial “1-5-2-3″ and get the hotel’s room service. The following ensues:

Me: Hello. I’m trying to reach room 1523.
Room Service (RS): Yes. You just dial it and then the number.
Me: Excuse me? I don’t understand.
RS: You just dial it and then the number.
Me: What do I dial?
RS: It. And then the number: 1523.
Me: Dial what?
RS: You dial it and then the room number you’re trying to reach.
Me: Wait. I dial it? But I just dialed it.
RS: No. You dial it and then the number.
Me: Yes, but what do I dial?
RS: You dial it.
Me: But I just dialed it and I got you!
RS: No, no, no! Dial it. It. It!
Me: What’s it?!
RS: Dial it!
Me: What-
RS: It! One, two, three, four, five, six, seven, it!
Me: Eight! Oh my…
RS: Okay? Dial it and then the number.
Me: Yes. Thank you. Goodbye.

And, so the moral of the story is: It isn’t always as easy as it sounds.

How Do You Measure

At the risk of sounding like the lyrics to RENT, how do you measure your life when you’re a dancer on the road?  In items lost in foreign cities?  In hours spent sleeping on buses and airplanes?  In loads of laundry scrubbed and hung in hotel bathrooms?  I’m learning to get very good at doing laundry in hotel bathrooms.

One of the head choreographers with Fire of Anatolia says he doesn’t have a home anymore.  He lives his life out of one bright orange rolling suitcase and countless packs of cigarettes smoked.  Cigarettes are cheap in Turkey and wherever they call him to go, he goes. I’ve lived for more than a year out of oversized Tupperware bins.  It’s worth it to invest in good bins.

I’ve decided that my Christmas wish this year is new luggage.  (Did you catch that segway?)  For all the traveling I do, I have pretty crap luggage, and, thanks to my travels in Turkey with my hike pack, my one good piece of luggage now has a completely broken clasp.  Good thing both my big traveling bags are from L.L. Bean.  They’re going to be sorry they sold to me come December.

In this business, you are who you are because there’s no room to be what you own.  Unless you want to check that ego before you board.  The same 100 people have seen you in the same three pairs of sweats more times than they’d care to count, let alone more times than you’d care to count.  You’re not how you dance because you dance like 100 other people and your job is to not stand out.  In this business, you’re not allowed to cry or to date or to swim on show days.  In this business you’ve got to learn to just be.

One Day, Just Like 13 Others

Today is our last day in Antalya and tomorrow marks our journey, first to Istanbul, and then to Abu Dhabi.  Then we perform.

I think that everyone takes for granted that they are the weakest in a group.  That, when we are put together with others that seem to be just like us, we instinctively assume we are different.  We assume we are the only ones that carry our burdens and no one else could possibly understand our struggles.

Slowly it’s come out.  Over the past five weeks, one by one, we’ve cried.  We’ve questioned ourselves and our purposes for being here.  We’ve feared going home, to 13 different places across the globe; to 13 different places that should feel warm and inviting but often just feel empty.

I wonder sometimes if the Schliersee fellows feel the same way as we do here in Turkey.  I think they probably do, but perhaps not to the same extent.  Artists are their own breed, after all.  Emotion surges through us: sometimes silently, oozing out in a photo, and sometimes fiercely, emitted in a stomp or a shout or kick into the air.

The tears we’ve cried have been universal.  We all feel so connected here.  We feel at home and at peace.  Despite allegations of rose-colored glasses and honeymoon periods and “this isn’t the way your life would be,” we all seem afraid for this project to end.

As Abla-factotum, I’ve been through these kinds of intense bonding experiences before, where many of the other fellows haven’t.  I know in my head that it doesn’t help to count the minutes as they pass – that only deadens the experience of the moment.  I know that at the end of this I’ll cry and my heart will break, leaving a small piece of itself in Turkey, never to be regained again.  But I also know that breaking means healing, and healing means getting stronger.  I know that, like all the other families I’ve made for short periods of time, this family and this experience will stay with me.  I’ll relive little bits of Turkey from wherever I am.  And I’ll smile to remember this.

Living out of passion is far superior to living out of fear.  Nearly every time I’ve left home, passport in hand, I’ve been running from something.  But this fellowship has been different right from the start.  I didn’t apply because I had to get away from something; I applied because I had to move towards something.  And I move towards it with fervor.  But where does fervor turn into delirium?  How fast can I chase this dream before running in the direction of Anadolu Ateşi means running in the opposite direction as Boston?

When we arrived, I was here to learn something and bring it back home. Done.  But I don’t feel done.  I feel there’s far more to be learned than can possibly be learned in three months.  And so my path changes, and now my fervor lies with staying in Turkey to dance.  And I cry sometimes at night because, even as Abla-factotum, I’m counting the minutes and trying to calculate a way to live my passion and not my fear.  Sometimes I know the others are crying too.

*****

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Settling Into Home

It used to be that I felt in the way backstage with Fire of Anatolia.  There was so much running around, and I always seemed to be in someone’s path, standing there like a non-Turkish-speaking lame duck, while sequined costumes ran screaming past me to make their entrances on time.  The D&F fellows have gotten pretty used to just hanging out backstage before and during performances, and last night it struck me that I’m no longer uncomfortable to be manhandled to one side as a dancer flies past me in just her undergarments and shrieking.

In general, things are pretty calm backstage in the States, and only about 20-30% less so in France, where I experienced theatrical life last year.  There’s a propriety that American actors have backstage, where lots of unspoken rules keep people from touching others’ props and costumes, and silence reigns in the Court of Almighty Preparation.  Granted, I’ve never been part of such a large show as this in the States, but I’ve been in some pretty cramped green rooms, and, even with a similar person to square foot ratio, things just stay calm.

There’s a sterility to this calmness that the Turks don’t embrace.  If they did, it would mean a lack of positive emotions for the people around them.  When the Turks start to feel you in their hearts, they let sounds out, and move their bodies, and put their hands on you.  In my time backstage with Fire of Anatolia, I’ve seen impromptu drum circles where song is thrown into the air, and bodies, which I can’t imagine moving another step after all the dancing they’ve already done, are taken, hand by hand, and shaken in time.  I’ve seen group meetings of 130 dancers take place just seconds before the opening music starts, and conclude with 129 bodies running to finish something or other while one person gets squashed – confused – in the middle.  I’ve seen a torch burning with real flames get rushed off stage, just two inches away from my nose, and extinguished in the path of ten Georgian spinners who are warming up.  I’ve seen costumes and drums thrown onto the floor in piles, oversized props discarded haphazardly against walls, and bodies stack up in the wings as they make their exits and promptly collapse with fatigue.

Mustafa Erdoğan has something very similar to the Fear of God in his back pocket.  When he talks, you swear you’re in the organizational grips of an American production and no longer in Turkey.  Even he, I think, embraces the chaos backstage though.  Because, as the man who pioneered this particular exhibition of Turkish pride, he knows that this is how the Turks show their emotions and their joy.  Only a man who knows this could have choreographed so much stomping and shrieking into one ticketed evening.  I look forward to the day when I’m able to step from chaos observer to bonified chaos participant.  Countdown to Abu Dhabi: 5 Days.

*****

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Abu Dhabi, Watch Out!

“I, you, choreography.” And, with that point of his Turkish finger, somehow everything felt better.

Icing my legs and resting has started to become commonplace. I have some fear that that will be a problem when it comes time to jump back into intense cardio dancing, but I’m resting easier now that I’ve accepted rest as a necessity – for however long it takes.

I had some anxiety again the other day when I knew we’d be presenting ourselves – and our choreography – to Mustafa Erdoĝan, and I wouldn’t be able to take full part. I want to show him, more than anyone else, that I’m at the top of my game and worth keeping around for the long haul. But it just wasn’t in the cards. And, so instead of bashing my head against an immovable, metaphorical wall, I just threw my whole self – from the shins up, anyway – into Yakamos and the Eskelet, two of the most rudimentary dances we’ve learned so far.

It felt good to do something so wholeheartedly. It felt good to go over the Troya oriental number while the others polished the Büyük Halai. It feels good to mark through the ‘horse dance’ in my head because I know I’ll be able to do that in Abu Dhabi too, even if I rest and rot for another three, four – heck, even five days without dancing. Because I’ve started trusting in this new family of mine. And cutting out stress and believing in something greater than yourself are two essential parts of achieving any goal.

There will be people to help me when I’m healthy enough to work again. And there will be people to hold me if I get discouraged again before then. As long as I believe, I will always have this family. Anadolu Ateşi seviyorum.

*****

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The ABCs of Homosexuality in Turkey

A wise woman once said, “If nose is the indicator of a man’s manhood, the Turks are oozing with masculinity.”

Turkey is a curious culture.  Men, as little boys, grow up dancing their regional folk dances.  As adults, there’s nothing odd or intrinsically ‘gay’ about joining a dance troupe.  This was the first thing that struck me when I arrived to Fire of Anatolia: a whole gaggle of male dancers – more than the women, actually – and, out of 130, only three are gay.  Openly gay, that is, but still.

According to our sexually enigmatic instructor, Turkey is a land that is magnificent because little boys grow up dancing without stereotypes like you’d find in America.  However, it’s still a very homophobic culture, and there’s a lot of gay sex that goes on behind closed doors, only to be greeted in the morning with loud-mouthed homophobia.  But, even factoring in Fire of Anatolia’s closeted homosexuals, I would still wager that much fewer than half of these men are gay.  Coming from a land where straight women in the arts are constantly frustrated by the sexual appearance of men in dance belts, only to find – no surprise – that they play for the other team, 50% is looking pretty good.

Last night, for Halloween, the D&F fellows threw an ABC Party.  ABC stands for Anything But Clothes, and a handful of mostly-male dancers, who showed up in their post-performance sweats, were quickly coaxed into getting creative and donning costumes.  We had men wrapped in toilet paper, in yoga mats, wearing shaving cream on their heads and fig leaves on their crotches.  In the land of American theatre, this would be pretty tame.  Nobody’s wearing condoms strapped over their nipples?  What, no men in skirts?  Lame.  But for these masculine Turks, the cries of, “No Facebook, please!” quickly resonated through our party-packed villa.  As we merrily snapped away photo after photo (for which they all happily posed), their masculinity was suddenly in jeopardy.  This, coming from men who wear Bedazzled spandex pants nightly, but it’s all relative I guess.

By the end of the night, the Turkish dancers had had their cross-cultural experience of a theatrical, pro-homo Halloween.  They re-donned their jeans and sweatshirts, wiped the cream from their heads and headed back into the night.  Were they changed from our little party?  Did they wake up this morning with a new belief that they can be men – manly men – and still let it all out now and again?  Probably not.  Fire of Anatolia will probably remain a team of 130 dancers where only three of them “are gay.”  Next time I vote for more champagne at the party, and we’ll re-take the count at the end of the night.

The Biggest Suffering Is This

I’ve been struggling for days now to come to some sort of enlightened conclusion about the ‘reason’ for the shin splints which I’ve been suffering from.  Judging by my substitution of factual Twitter updates for a more in-depth blog, it’s clear I’ve failed in this endeavor.

My legs started paining me last Friday during training, but it didn’t occur to me until Saturday that the curious soreness in the fronts and sides of my calves was shin splints.  Immediately and sufficiently horrified by the prospect of this condition, I bowed out of the last half of choreography practice on Saturday, took the entire day to rest Sunday, and returned, albeit lightly, Monday to dancing.  Tuesday, feeling antsy from all the immobility, I attempted to (again, lightly) dance through practice.  The result was a physical and emotional breakdown – in front of all my peers and two of my instructors – that I saw coming a mile away.

Shin splints are exceptionally painful and I’ve always known them as a running injury.  Although I’ve been a runner myself for the better part of my life, thanks to the grace of god and pretty decent form, I’ve never suffered from them until now.  After a bit of online investigation, it turns out that shin splints are common among anyone who does prolonged weight-bearing activity, such as running, power walking, and yes, sometimes dancing.  Shin splints (or medial tibial stress syndrome) is also often seen in boot camps because of all the marching the soldier do, and so it stands to reason that all that heel-toe-heel-dig business we’ve been up to working on two separate Turkish folks dances from anywhere between two to four hours a day, caused my muscles to cramp like gangbusters and my legs to quit on me.

The breakdown I had was more about frustration than pain, which seems to be the common theme for breakdowns here with us.  Yes, my legs were hurting, and yes, that’s probably what pushed me over the edge (that, and our instructor goading me for leaning heavily on her arms while dancing in a line), but it wasn’t the root of my agony.  Between sobs and through my own palms pressed over my face, I cried that I was upset because I couldn’t do the dance because my legs were hurting, but that I didn’t want to stop because I’d fall behind and ultimately that would mean I wouldn’t get on stage in Abu Dhabi in 10 days.  This, in a nutshell, is what I’ve been trying to come to terms with since that initial meltdown.

I came to this program because I’ve always wanted to be a dancer.  It’s one of the many things I tried as a child and quickly quit because I wasn’t good at it.  And because failure was never an option in my mind.  But when I was 17 something pushed me to try again, and for the past ten years I’ve taken small steps, one after another, to dance.

At first, every single class was a battle with my own low self-esteem.  Taking corrections from instructors, stumbling, falling, missing steps and getting hopelessly lost, not being any good and yet, not walking out – all of these things tested my will to dance.  And yet, I persevered.  I enrolled in a year-long program in Paris to learn mime … and ballet.  And I made it here, to Fire of Anatolia, to a place where I’m living my dream and feeling the closest I’ve ever felt to being a real dancer.

“It’s not like you’ve been trying for 10 years to summit Everest and now you’ve failed,” my friend, Shubhangi, told me yesterday, amidst more tears on my part.  “Your success as a dancer isn’t measured by getting on stage and dancing in all four numbers in Abu Dhabi.  It’s how you come out of this whole thing in the end.”

And that’s what I’ve been trying to come to terms with over the past 72 hours: measuring my “success” in ways other than a tangible performance with a looming deadline.  It’s not easy for me to sit back and miss an opportunity.  That’s my blessing and my curse: I want to do it all, and I want to do it well.  So, every day I have to watch the others dance, watch them polish their skills and get closer to that first benchmark in this fellowship, it breaks my heart and rips at my patience not to be able to be a part of that.

I remind myself that rest now means becoming a better dancer later.  I repeat: “You’ll be able to catch up.  If not by Abu Dhabi, then by Belgium.”  I massage my shins and ice and elevate and take Ibuprofen like it’s going out of style.  And I try and try and try to embrace the knowledge that life has no deadline and gives no exams.  That being here and doing what I’ve always wanted to do is already success, and doing it with such love and passion that it makes me this upset is also worth something quite big.  There’s something to be learned from every setback, and if, for no other reason than to embrace the ideals the wonderful Dekeyser & Friends Foundation has put forth, I will try in earnest to find this particular lesson.

*****

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