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While in Salvador, which I think is the most colorful and architecturally interesting city so far, we went to a capoeira show, and the capoeira show might be the coolest thing I have seen so far on this trip. Capoeira is a martial art which was thought to originate in Brazil. This martial art was developed by the slaves to fight their masters, but since they were forbidden to practice martial arts, it was disguised as a dance with music and interesting poses.
So really the only capoeira I had seen in real life was at Colgate, which was a student group who were all learning (including the instructor). I have never seen anything like this. The show started off with just 2 advanced students doing a slow demonstration of sequences. Then the group of about 20 advanced students and an instructor started the music and clapping and two people would “fight” at once. It looks very choreographed, but it is not. It just got faster and faster and picked up intensity! They were doing crazy rolls through the air which I thought only possible in The Matrix. Two people would face each other and do windmill kicks, so fast that it was a blur but coming within inches of each other’s head! These people are amazingly strong–they do these poses like upside-down L seats and head cartwheels and others that I can’t even describe. They also did stick fighting which was really cool too. It gave great rhythm and made it look even more like a dance but deadly at the same time! At one point they took a little break from capoeira and brought people from the audience, including STEVE, out to dance some Samba. The group looked like they had so much fun whatever they were doing.

So, we were so inspired by the show, that we decided to stay an extra day and take a class the following morning. Also very cool, and we are so sore! I thought that it was a beginner class so we would just do some slow movements, and I wasn’t really expecting to get such a great workout! We learned kicks, and cartwheels and of course the basic pattern. For awhile he had us doing this lunge defense move that almost killed me after a minute. He said, “Keep going! Don’t stop!” and came back after 10 minutes! Oy!
Great fun!!