Welcome to Suhaila Unveiled, the official e-newsletter for Suhaila Salimpour, the Suhaila Salimpour School of Dance, and Suhaila Productions.

Greetings!

This month is going to be intense!

Each weekend is another workshop in a different State. How exciting! The school is going strong and it is our time in the dance company of working on new material for next year's season of performances. We have just finished editing the new Belly Dance Fitness Fusion Series that was produced by Natural Journey's coming out before the holidays, and I am feverishly working on our final edits for the new Suhaila Productions line of videos. Yes.... they are almost done. Worth the wait!

Editorial by Suhaila

I want to help…. I want to scream…. I want to do more…. I want to know more…. I want to be active and proactive…. I want to enjoy my life and live it to the fullest…. But most of all I want to give back and appreciate each day that I am given.

Carley came into the studio before the holidays a few years ago. She was full of life and very excited about beginning her new experiment (belly dance). She was a professional tap dancer and had done musical theater for years. Now as an adult woman she wanted more for her body and soul and it was time to now explore herself through a movement that would give her another perspective on her body. The movements are womanly and feminine with the power that can be found in a whisper. This was especially important for Carley since her mother Kathie was dying of breast cancer—learning to be proud of your breasts, your body, your secrets, your dreams… your identity and movement having to come together in a dance form and exercise that is so womanly.

I was allowed into this family as a gift during these last few months of Kathie’s life. I shared the sadness and joys of each day being given to Kathie and to her family and loved ones sharing this experience. I had a hard time at first with meeting Kathie. My father had died of a brain tumor when I was 9 years old and to see the reminiscent effects of chemotherapy gave me a tummy ache. I felt as if I was a child trying to be strong as I held a “normal” conversation with her. I was left feeling guilty knowing that she knew I was trying to be strong. She was happy and unbelievably proud of her daughter. I looked up to her.
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Survey

Last Month's Question:
What do you think of certification in belly dance?
1. It's a good idea. It's a step toward raising the level of the dance.
2. It's a bad idea. who's to say what is certified?
3. I'm not sure.

Here are some of your answers:
I personally think that it's a good idea for those who want to achieve something more with their dancing. Being certified (or wanting to be) gives people something more to work towards. The way I feel is, if you are going to be spending the money and make the time to take the classes, why not have something to show for it? Also, when you are in class you will be paying more attention because you know that you will be tested and if you don't know the material (like with any class) you won't pass. Once you are certified (IE. level 1) you have the goal to get to the next level and that keeps you going.
-Brande Bogosian

I don't think it is necessary to be certified. I think in a world of rules regulations and certification who is truly to say what the guidelines should be? We all need to be the judge of what we are getting out of class and if we enjoy being there. That way it is ultimately up to the teacher to teach a class that students are interested in attending or it will die off! Thanks for providing a place for voices to be heard
-Jeannine Pepper Potomac Falls Virginia
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This Month's Question:
Do you feel you need to be a specific "body type" to perform professionally?

Send your answers or comments to:
bellydancesurvey@yahoo.com

Your Right to Vote

How Women Got To Vote
A short history lesson on the privilege of voting...

The women were innocent and defenseless. And by the end of the night, they were barely alive. Forty prison guards wielding clubs and their warden's blessing went on a rampage against the 33 women wrongly convicted of "obstructing sidewalk traffic."

They beat Lucy Burns, chained her hands to the cell bars above her head and left her hanging for the night, bleeding and gasping for air. They hurled Dora Lewis into a dark cell, smashed her head against an iron bed and knocked her out cold. Her cellmate, Alice Cosu, thought Lewis was dead and suffered a heart attack. Additional affidavits describe the guards grabbing, dragging, beating, choking, slamming, pinching, twisting and kicking the women.

Thus unfolded the "Night of Terror" on Nov. 15, 1917, when the warden at the Occoquan Workhouse in Virginia ordered his guards to teach a lesson to the suffragists imprisoned there because they dared to picket Woodrow Wilson's White House for the right to vote.
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