2015

Since my last post a lot happened.  2015 was the year when I decided to put in practise a few of my ideas with better planning and advertising.
I started by setting up a few events that I want to keep for the years ahead; In February I run a workshop called Cambridge Capoeira Meeting, inviting different guests and their students to get together in for a weekend of training. We hosted on the first CM Coqueirinho from Sweden, Mestre Chitãozinho, CM Carrapeta and CM Sanhaço both from London. 

---

Also in February I organised the tour called Capoeira 4 Refugees. I been following their work for a while and I decided with the charity's support, to organize a trip to Palestine and Jordan, train with the local instructors and try to get a few people to come and see their work. They do an amazing work with children affected by war, violence and forced displacement. It was a leap into the unknown. Since November the year before I made a video and a facebook page and a  loads of regular posts. We managed to get 4 people to come to Palestine. The initial plan had to change  last minute because of a snow storm. It was a great experience to witness first hand life in Palestine and how Capoeira is being used there in the community. We went to Bethlehem, Ramallah and Jerusalem. We did a roda Al-Quds university, taught in East Jerusalem and also inside the Shu'afat Camp. The last place was the most interesting for me. It reminded me a lot of the favelas in Rio - loads of people living in close proximity, small streets, loads of kids the only difference was a 8 meter wall surrounding the entrance... It was surreal... But I was so grateful to be there, experience it and teach capoeira... It reminded of me 20 years ago teaching in Fallet in very similar circumstances... Watch the video above...

In May I had the unique opportunity to have Mestre Acordeon for a workshop in Cambridge. It was the first big capoeira workshop I organised in a while. I had people coming from all over Europe to join us. I got the band of CM Sanhaço to play in the party and we cooked feijoada for over 90 people... It was a blast! Also I had to privilege of spending time with Mestre Acordeon and listening to his amazing stories for a week.

Later on the same month I did my first event in Bali where I tried to combine Capoeira training with tourism and get capoeira students from other countries to visit the island of Bali during the batizado. This together with the previous experience in Tehran that led me to create the Capoeira Me Leva tours in 2016.

What all those events had in common apart from the capoeira is that they all had been promoted with videos on facebook with plenty of time of notice. They were all  successes and most of them were sold out. 

The second semester of the year was also a busy time. I got to travel to a dream destination: Hawaii. I stayed seven days in this paradise island. I was a guest of my friend Japa who has been living there for a number of years. His group is small but with such a great vibe. Japa is a contra mestre of Grupo Senzala that is a great student of our art. He is passionate about every thing Capoeira: the traditions, the old mestres stories, the tiny details of Berimbaus toques etc... A real example of a soul capoeirista. He works hard during the day putting solar panels in roofs and the rest of his time is dedicated to his passion.

Getting back to the UK I had little time left to finish organising the gradings and batizados in Cambridge and Scotland.

I got such a momentum from the year of 2015 that I decided to dare even more in the following year... What could happen? I was in a winning streak...