At this brunch, I was able to get an insight into the life of an Israeli dancer and his struggles of being a professional dancer in a country that does not have many professional opportunities for dancers. He illustrated that being a professional dancer in a strict country like Israel means that you risk your life putting on performances for the population and risk getting placed in jail. However, he states that this is a risk worth taking because dancing is his passion. He does not know what his life would be without it. However, the reason that he is able to be a dancer is due to his parents motivation and support. There are many people in Israel whose parents tell them that they can not pursue a certain career, but should go down more traditional routes. This results in people who do not follow their passions and end up working in a job that they don’t like. However, with his parents support, he was able to have the motivation to pursue his dreams, even when it did get hard to do so in Israel.

Sharaf DarZaid really opened my eyes to the beauty and the struggles of being a professional dancer and I was able see a bit of myself in him. When I was young I used to love dancing and always wanted to turn my passion into my dream by making it my career however my parents always warned me of the cons of doing it as it would be very hard to manage financially. While obviously I don’t have anywhere near the talent Sharaf possesses I still was able to learn about how he efficiently managed the challenges of being a Palestinian dancer. This is because he faced many impediments to his personal life from family to business but still is able to carry on to this day and maintain his passion which I find both inspiring and brave.

This was a really exciting opportunity for brunch. I got the opportunity to meet Sharaf DarZaid, a palestinian dancer who was performing in Ithaca. I had no idea about all of the different rules and laws in Palestine regarding the arts. He was able to explain all of the details about what steps he had taken, how he learned dance, and his journey to various places around the world. I didn’t know much about dnacing in general, but my conversation definitely exposed me to a variety of details that I likely never would’ve learned about.

On March 1st, we had the honor of meeting Sharaf DarZaid for brunch at Rose House. Sharaf is a Palestinian folk dancer instructor and director of the group of Palestinains who use the form of dance to maintain ethnic identity. The use of folk dancing or any kind of cultural expression is an essential form of transferring and solidifying values within cultural groups. This was the story that we heard on March 1st, about the ways the Palestinian dancing troupe had been able to travel around towns and camps in Palestine and perform and recall to folks living in towns and camps pushed to the margin the dance and story of their heritage. Sharaf shared with us a few stories that cemented this point that his dance troupe was able to communicate shared identity through dance with people that would not have otherwise been exposed or have had the ability to share in their own cultural dna. Sharaf’s groups would, for their expressed purpose, perform in places that had not had a strong history for the arts. While most towns and cities in Palestine support the arts, the places that Sharaf made an effort to visit, were the towns that had few of these cultural institutions. In my own experience living out in the countryside rather than the city, I could understand the deficit that folks without access to consistent cultural events might have in terms of an insularity and increased feelings of marginalization. The second story that I have is relates to the difficulty that Sharaf faced as a mentor for his dance troupe. The arts do not generally pay very much, and many groups depend on donations or foreign aid. The same is true with Sharaf’s organization who faced international pressures that oftentimes prevented arts groups from receiving aid given suspicions cast on how the aid was to to be used. As a result, Sharaf has needed to make sure that his own livelihood is secure and has been doing so by working in business.  Sharaf has been part of the business management side of nearly all the arts organizations that he has been part of in order to support his interest in coregraphyand mentoring. He advises his students to pursue a career in the arts to the extent that they will have other revenue streams that allows for that option if the arts is unpaid, or minimally-funded.

Sharaf DarZaid is a Palestine artists. It is shocking to hear that there is cultural oppression against dancing as a form of art. Dancing is seen to be against religious beliefs. Funding to dancing organizations is little to nothing unless an agreement is signed with the government. To me, I find it appalling to hear how hard it is to receive support as a dance, because of the cultural resistance existing in Palestine. However, Sharaf shared with us how he maintained a hardworking routine where he would wake up early to do his work and go back home late every day. Sharaf is an inspiring artist, and I felt like he is under-appreciated. To find out more about what he does, there is a concert and teaching class/workshops starting tomorrow at Schwartz Performing Art Center, enjoy yourself while showing him your support. To learn more about him, https://pma.cornell.edu/content/technique-classes-and-lecture-guest-artist-dance-sharaf-darzaid