Dancing Tobas for the Virgen de Urkupiña :)!

WHAT IS TOBAS?

  Tobas is one of many beautiful folkloric dances native to Bolivia. It is a dance of a tribe of warriors from the chaco region. The conflicts between the Andean and Amazon regions, and their spiritual beliefs inspired the dance. Dancers are broken up into bloques (blocks) of amazonas, figuras, brujos (witches), abuelos (grandparents), tatas and others with distinct costumes, masks, and moves.
   The dance consists of basic saltos (jumps and skips), giros (turns), and fun steps like the bolivar (quick with regular jumps); camba (very agile, one meter high jumps); chucu-chucu (with a faster rhythm, in the foot tips, almost in the knees), cuatro calles (high skip-like movement) and more. The costume is a top and skirt (sometimes girls wear a dress) complete with feathers, intense beading, fringe, sequins, and straw. Many dancers wear some type of ¨crown¨and hold a lance covered in all sorts of interesting designs and faces.

For more information on the different dances of Bolivia, check out this site I discovered: 

http://www.unet.univie.ac.at/~a9750175/englisch/etaenze.htm 

PREPARATIONS, WITH A LITTLE HELP FROM MY FRIENDS...

 It took about 2 weeks to do all the beading, and I still had a bit more to add after the entrada! I will be dancing in one more entrada through the center of Cochabamba in October and might come back to dance CARNAVAL IN ORURO!!! I´m so exciteD!! same costume, so will just have to pay the bands (our group is so big, we have 2-3 bands), transportation, and entrance fee. So yes, although my costume wasn´t very costly in that of itself, dancing in Bolivia can be a little expensive but soo worth it!

                                                                                       Me with the tatas before the entrada

Nestor and I dancing up front of our bloque                
as figures, adding a little bit of our own
    creativity and crazy jumps to the mix.

The Entrada for the Virgen de Urkupiña...August 14 & 15
   The tradition of Urkupiña is that you dance at least 3 years in a row and you dance for a cause, a special person, or special intention. The route is 3 miles?? (what I heard), it took us about 4.5 hours from Calvario to the main plaza in Quillacollo, including 3-4 rest stops along the route. I felt like a celebrity, everyone wanted my picture and were super excited when we came by with our high jumps, kicks and turns!  A couple dudes offered me trago, but don´t worry I didn´t accept anything from strangers and kept to my own water I bought along the way.



   I trained about 6 weeks, going to rehearsals every Monday and Wednesday, the last two weeks adding Thursdays as well. I also had to go a couple different days to the taller in the home of our founders to make my large feathery anklett, lance, and pick up my crown they made us. The founders of our frat are 2 brothers, each married with a little girl ages 4 & 5 respectively (The little girls danced too, super cute). The entrada itself was a lot of fun, I made some new friends in my group, was excited to show off our moves/costumes, and wow the crowd. Needless to say, my calves were a little sore after the 2nd day, but at the same time felt very strong and excited to have finished such an experience. I´m not sure if I´ll be able to come back and dance two more years, to complete the 3 year compromiso, we´ll see where God leads me, but I would definitely if I have the chance!!
For these and more pics, check out my picasa album: https://picasaweb.google.com/100622499197214006441/Urkupina2012ConFratTobasCentral?authuser=0&feat=directlink