After reading Bhuz a little today and coming back from the holiday, I realized that learning is learning and students are students, regardless of what they are studying. Practice the big issue. We talk about it on Bhuz from time to time that the only way to really get better is to practice outside the [...]

The break provided me with some much needed R&R. I was semi-productive (cleaned, worked on my thesis), but I mostly relaxed. With moving and working simultaneously, it was good for me to take a break. I have more energy now than I did before. I can’t believe that the semester is over soon. Although there [...]

Happy Thanksgiving everyone! Here’s the highlights of what I’m thankful for from this past year: Friends who came through for me when my father died and in general when my life crashed down. Even the little gestures like a phone call or message from someone I hadn’t talked to in awhile meant so much. My [...]

I spent yesterday sick. Coincidentally, right as I began administering the exam for my students, my nose began dripping like crazy. I came home yesterday and slept like crazy. Dance class (I was going to try drop in ballet tonight) is not in my best interest right now. However, I do plan on starting back [...]

Part of what makes teaching, especially being new at it, is trying to figure out what makes the most sense to do. At this school, exams are heavily weighted (20% for 3 tests, 20% for a final), so it’s important that they do well. Everyone here has a system to help the students do better. [...]

My advisor decided I needed to update a graph that I made used Matlab. A small theoretical curve graph, nothing fancy or labor intensive. I thought that it would take 5 minutes to make the small changes. I was wrong, it turned out. Matlab became screwy after I upgraded to Snow Leopard (the latest Mac [...]

Everyone has their theories on dance training. Some dancers are adamant about keeping their dance “pure”, ie. not studying other forms of dance. Others relish in cross training. I’m in the latter category. I love Middle Eastern dance, don’t get me wrong. However, I do get bored occasionally and like to check out what’s there. [...]

Lately, there has been discussion of what good is Twitter for. A lot of people seem to think it’s for the extremely narcissistic. Why else does someone need to know what you’re doing at any given moment? While I’m sure that is true for some,I think Twitter is can be an extremely valuable and useful [...]

Aziza is releasing a new instructional DVD, right before the holiday. I think it’ll be a winner. The title is “Hands, Arms, and Poses.” Aziza has fabulous, well, hands, arms, and poses. Her other DVDs that I’ve seen (the veil one and the practice companion) were good in terms of information and production quality. If [...]

I’m preparing my students for the next exam, which is fast approaching. I forgot how long the semester system can be; when I was doing my graduate degree, we were on quarter system. That means we would end right before Thanksgiving. I used to prefer the semester system, but now I’m not so sure. Perhaps [...]