Cathinkas dance blog

My new website and blog is under construction;-)

This past week I have mentaly been living in The Gambia. Probably because the summer is gone, and I can feel the winter season is comming on waaaay too fast! Im trying so hard to stay in the moment, but I think I was born a dreamer. Norway is a wonderful country, I guess one of the best places in the world to live in.  I am so thankful that I was born here, because its a country of opportunitys.  Jobs and education is avalible for everyone, and the economy is good and stable. I travel alot, and often because I feel like I wanna run away from Norway.  But I try my best to never forget where I come from, and Norway is the reason why I got to go to all the places ive been to. I try to see put the negatives against the positives, and you will always find a number of both no matter where you go. What I feel about Norway is that the good economy and all the goods we have creates a lot of excpactations. Who are you? What do you want to be? what education do you have? Where do you see your self 10 years from now? How does your perfect soulmate looks like? how many kids will you have, and how can you make theire life perfect (including buying them the lates I Phone) ? Where will you build your house, and what about the cottage in the mountains and the one by the sea? Dont forget that the curtains have to mach the couch, you need al least two cars so you still can drive your kid to football training (5 minutes walk away) while the dad is at work, and its IMPORTANT that your mark your eyebrows the right way so you look will be perfect. Dont miss out on the latest diets, haircuts and shoes!!!! You will get cancer if you tan too much, but you will be depressed and ugly if you dont get enough sun, and then you will get cancer again. It all has to be perfect, but WORNING! Pay attantion, cus whats perfect today might not be perfect tomorrow!! I think alot of people are draged into the ”circle of perfection” -Spend your whole life to get a good education and a job that pays alot, so you will make enough money to buy alot of materalistic things and you can afford to send your kids too good schools so they can earn enough  to buy alot of things to their kids and so on and so on.  Life is not about surviving, that part is allready taken care of. Your goal has to be higher than that, you have to fit into the sociaty -the perfect sociaty! I belive theres no such thing as perfect, so how can you ever reach your goal? where do we live in all this? Lets try to keep our feet on the ground, see the little things and live for today!

Well that was some of my positive and negative viewes aboutlife in  Norway, I hope will all can stick together and use all of the goods we have in this beautiful country for the better!!

Why I said I was mentaly living in the Gambia right now is because thats a country  I have been visiting 3 times the last coupple of years, and I love being there! Its very interesting to see the opposites. Its a poor country, where life its about how to make a living. Its hard to get a good education, its hard to get a job and people work 24/7 trying to make business with extremly low pay checks. Still the positive energy was everywhere, and people are always smiling.  Its hard for me as a tourist to say what life is like there, cus I see everything trough a tourist eye. Even though I have been traveling off season, and to villages with no tourists, I still belive I will never experience the REAL life in Gambia. What I can say is that it seems like its population with more problems, but less stress. And its inspiering, and it makes you appreciate alot of things. But I also notise alot of people there eagering for I phones and fancy things. We are all humans, just born with different tools. Thats why I always try to put my self in another persons possiosion before I judge. You can think something someone does is completlay stupid, but what would you do? I once heard ”never asume” I loved those words, and ever since kept it in my mind, Even if you think anothers persons reason is crap, its always a good enough reason for that person. Most of the time maybe thats all you need to know?!? This thinking kept me away from arguments and trouble for a long time now, and it makes it hard to be angry at somone, at least to the point where you bother to make a conflict or issue.

Well this is supposed to be a blog about dancing. So back to Gambia and the reason I went in the first place. I went to do dancing and music workshops with my school. It was unbelivable. We learned alot about how music and dancing works together as one, wich I think is the biggest difference from dancers here making rutines while counting 1,2,3,4,5,6,7,8! I will get back to this as, in the mean time I post a little youtube link of some west african ladys dancing!

This weekend was super amazing! Romeo and I did our first salsa and reggaeton show together, and it was at the royal castle in Oslo!!! It was a great experience. The feeling you get when you see the crowd smiling is unbeliveable. It makes me so happy to know that dancing can be so inspiering, and bring so much joy! Romeo is such a greta dancer and person, and its amazing to work with him again.  This will not be our last time performing, for sure! And heres some pictures after we did hair and make up.  Hopefuly I will be able to film next time we perfrome, so I can share it with you all!

Rather than that life goes on on Oslo. I went to Kaos and Thors Hammer this week. Both really nice places for salsa lovers. I Even put a little clip from Kaos at youtube, when Chris Lyngaas and I are dancing together. I always have a great time at kaos, and what I love the most is the mix of people. Many different ages, and dance backgrounds. Its really a plce for everyone!

I also tried to do some mixing with my amature computer knowledge. I made a little promo video of my self dancing. Until I get something more proffessional, Im just having some fun trying out this. Check it out!

At reharsal with Mandela Dance Crew yesterday, we talked about how we feel in ballet classes. And all of us who ever did ballet had every now and then experienced what we call a ”fat ballet day”   Meaning that the mirrors and the ballet outfit can make normal healthy people feel bad about them self.

I many times thought of why im choosing to do something that its all about looks. What you do in life will always be about presenting your body, and what kind of pressure does that put on you?  I find it verry interesting how something that can make you feel so good, at the same time can tear you down. I guess everything in life comes down to how you deal with it. When you dance your body is your tool, thats why its so important to treat it like one! It needs both energy and rest. Is this search for perfection and trying to live up to what you think the world expects from you that can become dangerous.  To give of your self its more easy when you feel good about your self. And you should all feel good about your self! You gotta love your self before you love some one! since we all want to be loved by others, start loving your self people;) I think dancing should about personal expression rather then trying to be someone or something. This might sound Ironic comming from me who just posted videos of my self ”saxy dancing” to reggaeton (haha) But  I think as girl im aloud to act femenin, and dance a little sexy.

Whenever I feel bad about my self, I listen to this song. Its been a huge inspiration for me, and really made some gray days becomes sunny! ”Im not the avarge girl from your video…” Since it looks like thats what im  trying to be, I just wanna say that Im not trying to be anything but a girl who loves dancing. Hope it will inspire you guys to!

How are you feeling?

This weekend was super! Romeos art exhibition yesterday went fantastic, with alot of people comming to watch. I  think we made an exiting dance prformance, with Romeos creative expression! ( I will put up some pictures when I get them) He was presenting different themes through hes art, like for ex animal cruelty. For those of you who didnt get the chance to see it, he was talking about the fure industry and how we make animals suffer just so we can wear something pretty, or have something nice to look at, at our walls? Dont animals have the same right to live as us? He made his demonstration by painting human heads to hang on the wall etc. I think this is an important thing to think about, and I think its wonderful how you can use art to speak out! Like he also said and showed, how life is a dance, cus we all how to move through life. Is Wonderful how loud art can speak. That is why it inspires me so much to do dancing. I have quit dancing several times, often cus ive been feeling selfish and thought ”whats the use, go out save the world instead” but then I realize you can do alot through dancing. Spread joy and entertain. And its a good way to get people to listen. Your message doesnt always have to be very serious or have a deep meaning, somethimes it could just be the joy of moving. You nevr know, maybe a little dance is just what it takes to make a doctor to perform a brain srugery the next day. We all have to contribute in our own ways, and together we become strong. If we all respect eachother and give away some smiles, we have done alot allready!!

The rest of the weekend I spent dancing and reharsing my own freestyling. I figuerd that from all the dancing ive been doing, I almost dont have any documentation at all. So Im gonna start to make sure i get films from what im doing. I started filming a little reharsal yesterday. First I didnt think It was good it enough to put it out, cus I wanted something ”perfect” to show, specialy cus I want to do my own perfromances, and then it should look really good so people want to book me. But the I desided its all a progress and a developing.  I guess I will have more to put up in the future, so I start with this.

The first one is just me moving and enjoying, nothing more nothing less. the second one is about the rollercoaster of emotions people goes through during a lifetime. Love, how and where to fit in, the big issues like what is really going on in the world in different sociaties, searching for perfection and happiness, and comparanse between your own feelings and what goes around outside ”your world”?  At the end of the day, where do all of this emotions go? Are you really taking the time to live them, or is it more easy to hide them away from the surface?
Its a try out with freestyling as an expression, rather then to show a spesific style of dance.

For being such a small city, I think the offer of salsa dancing in Oslo is great! Theres alot of places where they play latin music weekly, and always someone aranging good events. My favorite place for salsa dancing is Kaos, at grunerløkka on tuesdays. Its kind of small, but such good vibes. It feels a little like cuba:) For more party club Mojito has been good this summer. Anywhere DJ Yaiko Habana plays, its a good party! Great DJ and dancer!

This weekend it will be a Bachata & salsa party at sagene samfunnshus. My past dance partner George Daniels and hes partner Ricke will be having a bachata class. If you need some bachata inspiration, this is the place to be on Friday. Check faceebook event!

http://www.facebook.com/event.php?eid=105905689513109

Oslo also has alot of good schools for salsa, in both i LA and Cuban style. But after visiting Canada, I got my eyes up for New York style. Really cool!! I Hope some good New York dancers will show up in Oslo soon, please let me know if you know about anyone?

Tonight its going down at Tors Hammer! Hope to see you there

First of all welcome to my new dance blog!

As a dancer its always good with a little promotion;) I will use this page to keep you updated on what kinds of projects I got going on, to post pictures and videos of past events and most importantly to share inspiration and the joy of arts!

This Sunday I will  be dancing and modeling at my extremly talented friends Romeo Ramos art exhibition. Hes a hard working multi artist, and hes work is amazing. I bet there is nothing in this world  this guy cant to! (that actually goes for all of you!)

 Check out the facebook event http://www.facebook.com/cathinkac#!/event.php?eid=169821459761711

I promis, you dont want to miss this!

I am at the time working on my solo project, wich I will be presenting for the first time in two weeks at my friend Sandras birthday party!    Most of my past performances has been in groups or a couple, and this one will be based on freestyling wich is also new for me (exept for in the clubs or reharsing), so im very exited!  I will post a video after the perfomance!

I got the inspiration to do this when I a couple of weeks ago went to Montreal, Canada. I was honored to meet some great people and dancers who reminded me to belive in my self, positivity and LIFE! I got to do some street performing over there, and thanks to my firend Loshyne and the wonderful people at Mont Royal Metro in Montreal, it became an unforgetable experience.

Check out the youtube links of this two amazingly humble, talented and hard working guys Loshyne and Walter Rivera! 

I was lucky to meet and dance with them both during my stay in Canada.

Rather than that my dance group Mandela Dance Crew and I are working on our first performance as well.

We just started working together, and are now in progress. Building a dance group is a long prosses, but  for now were a group of dancers with different backgrounds who meet to excahange experience and skills:)

No matter what you do in life, belive in it.  Theres no limits for what we can accomplish. Share love and positivity with everyone you meet on your way, cus love and positivity makes you unstopable!

Have a great day!