Cairo Carnivale

This dancers boyfriend designed her costume.

I saw this young lady walk past me and I had to chase her down and take her picture. The back of her skirt was so darling! It reminded me of a Victorian bustle and the socks go so perfectly, don't you think? I hope she doesn't mind if I posted her picture as I forgot to ask...ooppppssss!

Isis Wings

These are beautiful while twirling as the light dances off the iridescent fabric and you can do so many things with them...who would have thought.

Have you ever been to a Belly Dance Festival? They can be a lot of fun and a great place to people watch. It's sort of like visiting a mini gypsy camp.
Every year my friend Kathy and I drive up to the Santa Anita Racetrack to check out the dancing and all the colorful characters at Cairo Carnivale.

I'm not sure how many different styles of Belly Dance exist but my favorite is Tribal Style.
I love the earthiness of it and the rhythm is much slower than traditional belly dance plus the costumes are so gorgeous with all their layers, belts, and hair accessories.

We stopped by one booth that had these huge earrings and we were trying to figure out how you would wear them. Do you wrap them around your ear or what? The woman behind the table casualy told us that you have to stretch your earlobes so the holes are about 1/4 inch in diameter...eeewwwww! NO THANKS! She was tatted up from head to toe so stretched earlobes would be nothing to her but, Kathy and I? We're sweet little Christian girls from conservative Orange County. The most adventurous thing we would do would be to buy a toe ring. Not very adventurous huh? But that's ok because we're perfectly happy being non-adventurous. Ok, I've used that word enough so I must continue.

This year didn't seem to be as large as years past but there was a lot of great dancing and plenty of vendors to choose from. By the end of the day we were exhausted and both had agreed that it was time to get serious about our abs.