<3

The lady who has run Shimmyfest for years, using it as a vehicle with which to raise money for Dementia UK and other charities, has decided that this year will be her last year.

This is a blow because there is nothing else in the area that combines a really modest ticket price, a wide guest-list, and two good workshops with professional teachers.

In fact there is nothing like it left in the area at all, except the smaller haflas that are put on by individual teachers for their particular classes.

So guess who decided that it couldn't be that hard to do, and volunteered to organize an Ely belly dance festival for midsummer next year, (along with a lovely lady who is much more experienced in this sort of thing.)

Couldn't be me, surely?

Anyway, we're in the process of finding a venue atm. We have small halls which will signal a very modest ambition, but will cost £120 all in, or a nice large hall with pub and cafe nearby, which is likely to come in at £370 but may indicate that we are attempting to go bigger and better.

That might revivify what seemed to be a slightly fading franchise. Or it might just cost us everything we might have raised in tickets.

I didn't expect the most important decision to come so early!

Blergh! Some of the weird taste of last week's spinach smoothie was not just due to leaving the cottage cheese out. I'm having another one today, and the taste persists. Some of it must be because I was using spinach from the garden, and it really tastes as though it was grown in dirt. It was washed and everything but - hmn - definitely a very earthy vibe.

So... Saturday was Shimmyfest, and I was surprisingly not nervous at all. I think the nerves had been beaten out of me by the heat. After that 36°C day I no longer cared about anything in the world, and I was not looking forward to this hafla any more, even though I'd spent the whole year looking forward to it previously.

I packed my bag full of three costumes - the one I'd specifically made for the solo, the heavy metal one with a black skirt, which I thought would probably do for the show-back of the workshop I was attending, and a galabeya I'd made for the Saidi dance Elizabeth's group Allulah were performing. Plus makeup and hairbrush and props (in this case a Saidi cane.)

Fortunately the venue (which was in Christchurch near March) was quite cool and had a nice draft through the corridor when all the doors were open, and the day was only 30°C - which felt tolerable after the Friday inferno. I arrived early - earlier than the zouk, and the first workshop was already going on so I spent the first hour alone reading a book. Which was fine by me.

Then it was time for the workshop I was attending, which was a tribal style 'slow' workshop, teaching you the value of dancing with slow precision. This was supposed to start at 12pm and go on for two hours, and the hafla itself was to start at 4pm and last til 7pm. Giving me (I thought) two hours to browse the zouk and find something nice to treat myself to for my birthday.

The 'Slow' workshop however didn't actually start til half past, and it went on til 3pm, giving me only an hour to eat some lunch and get into costume for my solo, so browsing the zouk didn't happen.

The workshop itself was surprisingly rigourous and muscular. We learned the tribal sidewinder move, and the figure of eight with the hips while putting your weight on the 'wrong' leg. Then we learned a choreography to showcase these moves, and did some stretching to warm up and cool down.

This hurt my back and convinced me that perhaps tribal is not for me after all, but fortunately adrenaline and excitement was carrying me by that point.

Then of course she said that she didn't want anyone wearing black for the show-back. And I had only brought an extra black outfit. So after not being able to get into any of the emergency outfits she had brought I decided the galabeya would have to do for that too.

My solo was on first, and changing into costume for that defeated me. I made the mistake of taking my hair down to begin with, but with it down I became so hot that my hands were sticky with sweat. Plus I still had not lost enough weight around my chest that the bra I had made for my solo felt comfortable. Plus I put the mesh stomach thing on the wrong way round.

So I was struggling in the toilet thinking 'I can't get this on! But I've got to wear something.' Panicking for the second year running. Then I thought of combining the heavy metal bedlah with the white skirt and stomach cover and went with that:

I was a little disappointed not to be able to wear the outfit I'd specifically made for the solo, but it more or less worked. What a relief that I had packed that extra costume after all!

The dance got applause and two guys coming up to me afterward to tell me they had enjoyed it, so that was great and I'm calling it a success. Now it's time to retire this one and make something new.

Then into the galabeya for the Slow showback. This was much less of a hassle to wear, and had been much less of a hassle to make too. (I am now 4 stone - 56lb - lighter and I still can't buy bellydancing outfits that fit me. I quite like making stuff but oh how I wish I didn't always have to.)

Then I flung a different belt on and went out to perform the Saidi dance, by which time the exhaustion was beginning to work its way even through the excitement. I began to feel weird and achy before I even got home, being very glad to reach the end of the drive before I stopped functioning.

Sunday I was mostly dead, and on Monday I made the mistake of going to Louise's class, so today I am dead again but this time with added pain in every joint. It was worth it, but I'm glad I only do it once a year!