About Me
- Satima Flavell
- Perth, Western Australia, Australia
- I am based in Perth, Western Australia. You might enjoy my books - The Dagger of Dresnia, the first book of the Talismans Trilogy, is available at all good online book shops as is Book two, The Cloak of Challiver. Book three, The Seer of Syland, is in preparation. I trained in piano and singing at the NSW Conservatorium of Music. I also trained in dance (Scully-Borovansky, WAAPA) and drama (NIDA). Since 1987 I have been writing reviews of performances in all genres for a variety of publications, including Music Maker, ArtsWest, Dance Australia, The Australian and others. Now semi-retired, I still write occasionally for the ArtsHub website.
The Dagger of Dresnia
The Cloak of Challiver, Book two of The Talismans
Available as an e-book on Amazon and other online booksellers.
Mythic Resonance
Mythic Resonance
Mythic Resonance is an excellent anthology that includes my short story 'La Belle Dame', together with great stories from Alan Baxter, Donna Maree Hanson, Sue Burstynski, Nike Sulway and nine more fantastic authors! Just $US3.99 from Amazon.
Got a Kindle? Check out Mythic Resonance. 
My Blog List
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Medieval Jobs That Disappeared - If you go back to the Middle Ages, you’ll find numerous professions—some requiring skill and learning, others chosen out of desperation—that have since van...2 hours ago
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Places I've lived: Manchester, UK
Places I've lived: Gippsland, Australia
Places I've lived: Geelong, Australia
Places I've lived: Tamworth, NSW
Places I've Lived - Sydney
Sydney Conservatorium - my old school
Places I've lived: Auckland, NZ
Places I've Lived: Mount Gambier
Blue Lake
Places I've lived: Adelaide, SA
Places I've Lived: Perth by Day
From Kings Park
Places I've lived: High View, WV
Places I've lived: Lynton, Devon, UK
Places I've lived: Braemar, Scotland
Places I've lived: Barre, MA, USA
Places I've Lived: Perth by Night
From Kings Park
Inner Peace Blog
Awarded by Joanna Fay. Click on the image to visit her lovely website!
Versatile Blogger Award
Awarded by Kim Falconer. Click on the pic to check out her Quantum Astrology blog!
Fabulous Blog Award
Awarded by Kathryn Warner. Click on the pic to check out her Edward II blog!
Monday, 1 June 2015
What a Weekend!
Monday, June 01, 2015 | 
Posted by
Satima Flavell
I'm just coming down from one of the high points of my year – WAMED, Western Australia's annual Middle Eastern Dance Festival. Dancers and instructors came from as far away as Wales and Canada to participate, and they were well-supported by excellent local presenters.
Belly dancing might sound like a strange interest for a septuagenarian, but it holds a longstanding position in my life's journey. I've been belly dancing, on and off, since I was about twenty years old. In those days, I was in the 'ballet' at a King's Cross nightclub. We opened the show wearing the classic showgirl outfit of upstanding tail feathers and diamanté bras, and closed it with the can-can, complete with high kicks and frilly undergarments. Between shows, especially on Friday and Saturday nights, I would sneak out to double as a belly dancer at various pubs and clubs around the suburbs. It paid about twenty pounds a time, which doesn't sound much by today's standards, but it was well over a week's wages for a tradesman and was about as much as I earned weekly from my regular 'tits'n'feathers' gig at the nightclub. Of course, a lot of it went on taxi fares and costumes, but I was still ahead at the end of the night.
There were some excellent evening performances
at WAMED, and they were only part of the festival. For three days, we were spoilt for choice as
the four-stream timetable offered us goodies as varied as How to Decorate
Costumes and Dancing to Quanoon. (There was a lovely little bonus from Laziza and Hassan in the form of a booklet delineating the various rhythms of belly dance music and the styles they typify.) Some of my favourite moments were found in the teaching and performances of Phynia, who dances in a style very like the one I learnt as a young woman. Even her choice of music was similar.
Oh, and quanoon? Yes, all right, I’ll enlighten you! Wikipedia tells us that the kanun (Arabic: قانون, qānūn, pl. qawānīn; Greek: κανονάκι, kanonaki; Armenian: քանոն, k’anon; Persian: قانون, qānūn; Azerbaijani: qanun; Turkish: kanun) is a string instrument played in much of the Middle East, Central Asia, and southeastern Europe. And here’s the pic to prove it:
Oh, and quanoon? Yes, all right, I’ll enlighten you! Wikipedia tells us that the kanun (Arabic: قانون, qānūn, pl. qawānīn; Greek: κανονάκι, kanonaki; Armenian: քանոն, k’anon; Persian: قانون, qānūn; Azerbaijani: qanun; Turkish: kanun) is a string instrument played in much of the Middle East, Central Asia, and southeastern Europe. And here’s the pic to prove it:
This is ‘the first 79-tone Turkish kanun designed by Ozan
Yarman - based on the 79 Moment of Symmetry out of 159-tone equal divisions of
the octave tuning by the said author. Implementation of Wittner brand type 901
String Adjusters to the right is the author's’- courtesy of Wikipedia
As
well as quanoon player Mohamed Lelo, we also had the services of an excellent
drummer, Jamal Zraika, together with Emad Nasir on violin. These three gentlemen helped to lend the event a truly professional
air.
The weekend was arranged by the founder of the WAMED festival, Keti Sharif, and it featured several mature dancers, including Belyssa Radzivanas, the doyenne of the WA belly-dance scene. We are very fortunate to have such enthusiastic and knowledgeable people here in Perth. Long may WAMED continue to flourish!
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4 comments:
Sounds like a great weekend. I love watching belly dancing but I've never done it. Good for you keeping on with it. It sounds as if you've led an interesting life!
Sure have, Robin. I'm fond of telling people that I'm the only person I know who's been both a ballet teacher and a pig farmer. (Not both at once, though!)
Great post. And what an interesting person you are, Satima!I keep learning new things about you.
I could bore folks to death with stories about my life, Louise. It sure has been an amazing ride so far! :-)