Day 43 | Baltimore: Day 3, Part 2

Good day Mi Gente. Just finished my last workshop at the Kizomba-Salsa-Bachata Congress in Baltimore. Epic! A bit tired, but to be expected. It’s a great event and being with amazing people that actually want to learn kizomba makes me feel happy. Happy Easter to everyone. And for the folks that were there encouraging me, for you and your family and your loved ones, make sure you do whatever you do on this date, and I’m just following everyone that says Happy Easter, to be honest with you I don’t give two fucks about this holiday. Not to hurt anyone’s feelings because I need to reeducate myself my about everyone’s holidays and not just do the popular holidays and remember the not so popular ones in this area of the world. Now I understand how the minorities feels when we celebrate Christmas, aka the birth of Christ but we don’t celebrate the birth of Muhammad. Pretty stupid if you ask me. We need to share the love in mutual way, and not do things like the majorities do. I’m sorry for keeping it real, it’s your savage boy Dr Kizomba, just to put a little food in your brain.

Conclusion on the 3 workshops that I taught this weekend at the Baltimore Salsa Bachata festival: yes, it’s true it is a big salsa and bachata event, but I was very pleased to see people interested in learning kizomba. As well I saw some old friends, instructors and dancers and it really touched me a little bit what they were doing, because everybody is working for the same cause: to spread the love of this beautiful art, by the name of kizomba, which includes includes semba and which includes kuduro. So yes, I wanna thank the organizers for inviting me, and for being able to teach my natural dance at all levels, kizomba, semba and kuduro. Of course for my first workshop of afrohouse/kuduro most people didn’t know what it is, but they came because they know me, they know the name Manuel Dos Santos or Dr Kizomba. I can tell you that some people that knew me from last year, because I was here last year, they really liked what I did, and they saw me on the roster and they came to support and follow the love that they had last year. But this year, they got a little bit more educated about the dances, its origins and where they can find full satisfaction if they wanna experience a full weekend about these dances, of course they know that I’m talking about Gindungo Montreal Kizomba Festival. Oh well, first come first serve. And I had to tell the truth about what people is doing about saying the name of kizomba but not really teaching kizomba and I found a better way to address this problem. I made sure before they buy anything they must look at the roster just like when you are buying a product in the store, you should look at the ingredients, and if the ingredients have any mix in their name that is not the real McCoy. Semba and kizomba and kuduro is the name of the game. Not traditional, because that shit means old. Just plain and simple semba and kizomba and kuduro. And the mission was accomplished. As I continue my mission, today there is more dancing to do. And more shows to see. I’m gonna support my brothers and sisters in their performances by screaming and yelling and being myself.

Can’t wait for next week, I will be at Calgary Salsa Congress, that was one of my first congresses in Canada, organized by Eric and Kelly but before that, we got our Kitaba and we got Baila Con Gusto, Manuel & Flavie are teaching there on Thursday. But this trip isn’t over yet, I still got one party to go and some sight-seeing tomorrow.

Stay tuned Mi Gente, and your boy Dr Kizomba will give you some more juice after the party, if I am not too tired, of course.

Hey, I just capped the MacBook Air. This shit is niiiiiiice! As a good deed, I’m probably gonna offer my old computer to one of the black kids I see on the streets in Baltimore, hustling and trying to make their life better. I’m gonna let them know that this computer helped me get to places I thought I couldn’t get into otherwise, so take care of this laptop because there is the heart of a hustler behind this machinery. And then, gotta give it up for GFranco to hook up your boy Dr. Kizomba with 3 pairs of dance shoes. Feels good to be a model and that’s how you do business.

#soberdays | #day43 | #Baltimoreday3part2