Dance Class

We get our butts handed to us on a regular basis by two beautiful and talented dancers, Sali and M'ba (check out the Les Prof page for pictures), who taught us 2 very different dances.  Sali taught us the beginning of Dununba(my favorite already), which means big drum.  The Dunun, or doun doun, is a pretty big drum anyway, but add a “ba” at the end of anything and that makes it bigger.  Dununba has been danced by Malinke people for centuries and is a powerful masculine dance involved in a ceremony where mean wear heavy discs on their arms with blades on the end and slash at each other until one man is standing and the rest are left bleeding and crying on the side.  We didn’t use the blades, but you can imagine....
I'm already in love with Sali.  For one, her dances are more masculine, and she has the brightest spirit, despite a pretty tough life.  Here's a video of her dancing Dansa.  Oh my god...

Mba taught us the beginning of Sungurubanin.  Sunguru means girlfriend.  Add the ba and you get.. (remember? Yes!) big girlfriend, or whore, but then add nin which makes things little, and you get the little whore dance!  This is much more feminine and expressive.  We danced for about 2 hours, which was intense, and then gorged on fried fish and Tegedegana (sp?), a delicious peanut butter stew over rice, and plantains!  That Nafi Coulibaly is some cook...