I Fight and Become a Sunflower
Capoeira is a fairly obscure martial art that’s been gaining popularity for the past few decades. The reactions I typically get from those who’ve actually heard of it are “Isn’t it more of a dance?” and “Really? How intimidating can a cartwheel be?” And yes, it looks like a dance, it was meant to be thought of as a dance since the African slaves who first invented it meant to hide their fighting and training from the slave owners so they wouldn’t be suspected of trying to revolt – which they eventually did, revolted I mean, not uncovered the art. Aha, good job slaves, your ploy worked!
I have no excuse for the cartwheeling (or au as it’s called). But I can tell you, it’s crazy fun to do.
There are a lot of wonderful things about Capoeira and I can go on and on and on about it, but then, that’s what my Whatsapp group is for. What I can tell you is that what got me sooo excited about restarting Capoeira again (I did it seven years ago with poor results) was getting my name or apelido. You see in the days of the slaves, fighters never used their real names, they were given names by their teachers to describe anything from how they look, how they acted, how they fought or even a strange piece of clothing they wore during the Roda (or the game) – I have a friend named “headband,” for reals. This is because back then, if the authorities ever caught you, you wouldn’t get to give the names of your fellow fighters even if you wanted to. And so, the tradition continues until today.
My classmates have awesome names, other guys from the other groups had weird names. My classmates had names like Urso Branco (White Bear), Da Terra (The Earth), Mare (The sea or the tide), Vaidosa (Vain), Malungo (Bro) and so on. I was so very anxious about my name, because I knew that my Contra Mestre namedTucum (Palm Oil) would give me an awesome name. I also know he watched all of us very closely and I always felt really exposed and vulnerable in class. I always felt out of my depth – I’d always been good at picking up new things, learning new songs, learning new dances – but with Capoeira, my learning was tough, my progress slow.
So the months passed and I got a lot of feedback that I looked like I was dancing and not fighting – well I was a dancer for a long long time. I was too “pretty” in the game, not mean. I’d never gotten pretty as an anti-compliment before, LOL. Okay, fight uglehhhh. I was too easily distracted and talked too much – well anyone who’s known me for two seconds knows that. What? Bacon? Where?
I started dreading the possible names – Esquilo (or Squirrel) or Chihuahua (self-explanatory). These were not unreasonable fears, one of our seniors was namedRato (rat). And there was a mestre in Korea named Esquilo.
Finally the day came, and out of the blue, Contra Mestre Tucum said, ahhh, Anama, I have your name. I wrung my hands together – which you’re not supposed to do in Capoeira, you block the axé (or I like to think of it, “good vibes”). He said it’s GiraSol – it sounded fancyyy and tough. I knew sol was “sun.” He said it’s sunflower -- due to the fact that I’m always sunny, smiling and positive even when my butt was getting kicked. He’d seen me suffer and smile and be giddy through the months of hard training. He said, it’s gonna get tougher and he hopes I don’t lose my sunflower attitude.
I loved it. I jumped up and down and smiled my sunflower smile and laughed my sunflower laugh. I loved how he saw this part of me despite me having a hard time. Anyone who knows me for two seconds knows that I’m a sunflower through and through. And that I love bacon. Omigod, thank God he didn’t name me bacon. What’s Portugese for bacon? Lardo?!? Jesus Howard Christ, I dodged a bullet. Lardo is soo not sexy.
(Photo credit from Visit Brazil on Flickr)