Good B-Boy break dancers will make your jaw drop.
Before last Saturday night, I'd only ever seen breakdancing briefly in movie clips or on YouTube, but after seeing a live competition and observing the B-Boy culture in person, I feel inspired. The way these dancers move to hip-hop rhythms and simultaneously explode with gymnastic, yogic, strong-man feats of athleticism commands respect and awe. What's more, the breakdance scene is infused with B-Boy culture, a stylistic front that translates to poise and presence in the face of competition— heavy attitude on and off the floor. While the attitude isn't something I'd like to infuse with my life, the B-Boys' ability to match music and movement, their meld of strength and toughness with dance, became that night something I wanted more of in my life.
I guessed with my yoga training that some of the moves would be easy; wrong! While I could find my way into many of the "freezes", moving between them with a rhythm was way hard. Like a fool, I fell all over my living room floor with Girl Talk playing loudly as I tried spinning and jumping like the badass B-Boys I'd just seen. I'm going to keep trying breakdance movement, but in the meantime, I'll maintain a massive respect for the few strong that inspired me.
Props to all the dancers at Saturday night's South East B-Boy Championship who inspired and others, and to the organizers for their work in realizing a vision to promote breakdancing and the hip-hop life. For more info read this informative Mountain Express article by Aiyanna Sezak-Blat. See also this follow-up story with video, here
Any B-Boys who find their picture here please holler at me to get your name under the shot and copies of your image.
