festa italiana

yesterday was the Italian Festival of DC.

a bunch of us met up there ready to win raffle prizes (a trip for two to italy for starters), indulge in the taste of old Italy, watch some folksy italian singing and dancing, do some grape stomping, etc.

the festival was tiny, but full of people. by the time we got there they had just about run out of food. it was a pretty unimpressive festival. there were some people dancing around one of those pole things and hanging onto ribbons. that reminded me of Busch Gardens. i didn't know italians did that.

me, gianmaria, dianna, deedee, chiaki, robyn, billie (the dog), barbara (gianmaria's beautiful sister), david (her husband), and their three adorable boys (sidney giovanni, allesandro, and massimo) all went to Sette for lunch.

here is a picture of allesandro (who is usually brave to a fault) freaking out when billie tries to play with him. note sidney savoring the moment.



afterwards we went to Ben and Jerry's for ice cream.

massimo is the perfect baby. he watches everything that's going down with his huge eyes. he looks happy to be here, he's digging everyone and checking everything out. if you approach him his eyes get bigger and he starts smiling and keeps staring back at you. if i ever have a baby, i want a massimo brand baby. anything else and i'm sending it back.

arabian nights show

last night me, chiaki, colleen, tribal remix and raqs east performed in yucy's arabian nights show. it was more fun than i expected it to be. took me awhile to get the hang of dancing again after our break in august. this helped alot.

afterwards, me and chiaki were hungry, as usual. what was unusual was the weird service we got from the first restaurant that we tried to go to as well as the one that ended up eating at.

here's one of many examples. when i politely asked our waiter for some bread (the bread that everyone gets while waiting for their food). he scoffed and replied "you get bread with your sandwiches". a few minutes later he plunked it down on our table and sauntered away.

me: have we been drinking?
chiaki: no
me: could we be drunk and don't know it? and we're being bitchy to people and that's why they're being mean to us?
chiaki: maybe they think we're prostitutes?

earthdance

i didn't make it to the pillowfight on saturday. but, i did make it out to this (click image above). my friend Hawah (aka everlutionary) was there doing spoken word poetry. there were djs, artists, drummers and dancers. the dancing was a lot of fun. i made friends with two grrls who do fusion dance theater for children. they were so fun to dance with. plus, i like science club. that was only my second time there. two friendly people who i knew back in my ESL days are the owners. to my surprise, the downstairs bartender is a lady that i used to work with. it was good to see old friends. it was good to dance.

no burning man, no japan

so i didn't go to burning man. i was busy performing in shows in july and early august and didn't have time to plan for it. i also made the decision to go to costa rica. i felt like doing both trips would be too much. there was an opportunity for me to dance in japan for a couple of months that i was hoping for, but that fell through. so, i'm not going anywhere.

in the meantime, it's cooler outside and i don't like it. it's making me sleepy.

but looky here! a huge pillow fight to be had!



could be fun.

i went to the adams morgan day festival on sunday. i love festivals. there were lots of babies and puppies and running into old friends (and old friends with new babies) and eating festival food and music.

i saw mayor fenty there. i took a pic of dianna with him (dianna, the pic didn't come out at great and i didn't think you'd appreciate seeing it online). his cell phone rang and he actually said "gotta go...somebody needs help" just like in his commercial. i was like "bwahahahahaahah!!!". look at what Kenta did with the sticker.



he is bad!

i got to see alin and sara and their new baby, river. she is the most beautiful baby. i also got to spend most of the day with billie (robin's dog) and played with this cute puppy, too:



and there were bellydancers. from all the way across the street and through a thick crowd i saw the sun reflecting off of probably a single coin on a bra and my mind screamed "BELLYDANCERS". i abandoned my friends and ripped through the crowd and plunked down on the ground to watch the show. (my friends knew where to find me once they got word of bellydancing going on).



weekend before last, robin turned 28 and we had a little dinner party in his honor at Cafe Rumba. happy belated bday robin. you're the bestest.



and here is a silly picture of me and chiaki happily drinking soda on the night that we all went to eat crabs (who do not scream as they are boiled alive). oh, and thanks for giving me your flu cooties chi chi face! i told you that i did not want to practice kissing anymore!!!!!