imported culture
Nov. 3rd, 2014 09:34 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
twoelevenyesterday, we saw the national chinese¹ acrobatic troupe, who gave an amazing performance. the show was a bunch of short acts, and most of the really eye-popping routines were in the first half.
1: thuggish mainland chinese, that is.
the performance started with a group of women juggling drums with their feet:
they juggled a couple of different styles of drums, and tossed them to each other as well.
the drum juggling was followed by a unicycle act, the highlight of which was a small group of women tossing stacking bowls onto each other's heads using their feet. while riding unicycles, because otherwise it would be just too easy. we were also impressed by the frameless bicycle riding, a couple of boys riding unicycles, but steering with a bike's front fork. they also did tricks with the fork while unicycling to show that it's really not so hard.
that was followed by a bouncy beam routine -- apparently formally called the russian beam -- in which people did variations on balance beam acrobatics on springy beams made of bamboo. y'know, simple stuff, like doing backflips between beams and while carrying partners. (though they had spotters who had to help them with some of the landings.)
then a rubber woman act. dïe überblönde swears she must have extra joints in her legs, because dïe überblönde's hips certainly don't move like that.
that was followed by a large-ensemble LED flying devil act done in the dark, so all we could see were the flying devils being casually flipped about, tossed, juggled, and otherwise handled in ways most people can't do in broad daylight. the last few minutes of the act were done under UV light to show off the performers' costumers while they did synchronized passes (which is how i'm sure the glowing balls were flying devils, not that many other things move like they do.)
then, oh, something boring: a guy doing gymnastics on top of a teetering tower of chairs. how hard could that be? i mean, i can support my weight on one arm for a few seconds, so it could be that difficult to do (for example) something like an inverted iron cross² on top of a bunch of chairs? nah...
2: a one-hand-stand with his legs sticking straight out in front of him and his free arm out to one side, sorta like the rings exercise, just done upside down.
the first half ended with some guys jumping through rotating hoops. *yawn* :)
three acts stood out in the second half. two were pair-gymnastics acts, two guys and (a man and woman). both of those acts had alarming demonstrations of strength and flexibility. both of us were briefly clutching various of our joints, since it was clear we'd simply snap in half if we tried those routines.³ in the M/F act, the woman was briefly taking the pair's weight, something not done in similar western performances (eg, ballet).
3: one stunt had the two guys making a shallow V, one guy leaning back to cantilever the other guy off his thighs, taking their combined weight on bent legs. i swear my knee caps would simply pop off if i tried that.
there was also a plate-spinning act, which the troupe made look so easy that the plate-spinners were used as stage decoration for the "real" act:
the photos are scaled down from the act's promoter's site, which has more pictures, some video, and the program (in charmingly dodgy english), along with some other stuff. sadly, the technical notes for venues staging the performance make no mention of brown m&m's or any other similar check on reading comprehension. i'm so disappointed.
1: thuggish mainland chinese, that is.
the performance started with a group of women juggling drums with their feet:
they juggled a couple of different styles of drums, and tossed them to each other as well.
the drum juggling was followed by a unicycle act, the highlight of which was a small group of women tossing stacking bowls onto each other's heads using their feet. while riding unicycles, because otherwise it would be just too easy. we were also impressed by the frameless bicycle riding, a couple of boys riding unicycles, but steering with a bike's front fork. they also did tricks with the fork while unicycling to show that it's really not so hard.
that was followed by a bouncy beam routine -- apparently formally called the russian beam -- in which people did variations on balance beam acrobatics on springy beams made of bamboo. y'know, simple stuff, like doing backflips between beams and while carrying partners. (though they had spotters who had to help them with some of the landings.)
then a rubber woman act. dïe überblönde swears she must have extra joints in her legs, because dïe überblönde's hips certainly don't move like that.
that was followed by a large-ensemble LED flying devil act done in the dark, so all we could see were the flying devils being casually flipped about, tossed, juggled, and otherwise handled in ways most people can't do in broad daylight. the last few minutes of the act were done under UV light to show off the performers' costumers while they did synchronized passes (which is how i'm sure the glowing balls were flying devils, not that many other things move like they do.)
then, oh, something boring: a guy doing gymnastics on top of a teetering tower of chairs. how hard could that be? i mean, i can support my weight on one arm for a few seconds, so it could be that difficult to do (for example) something like an inverted iron cross² on top of a bunch of chairs? nah...
2: a one-hand-stand with his legs sticking straight out in front of him and his free arm out to one side, sorta like the rings exercise, just done upside down.
the first half ended with some guys jumping through rotating hoops. *yawn* :)
three acts stood out in the second half. two were pair-gymnastics acts, two guys and (a man and woman). both of those acts had alarming demonstrations of strength and flexibility. both of us were briefly clutching various of our joints, since it was clear we'd simply snap in half if we tried those routines.³ in the M/F act, the woman was briefly taking the pair's weight, something not done in similar western performances (eg, ballet).
3: one stunt had the two guys making a shallow V, one guy leaning back to cantilever the other guy off his thighs, taking their combined weight on bent legs. i swear my knee caps would simply pop off if i tried that.
there was also a plate-spinning act, which the troupe made look so easy that the plate-spinners were used as stage decoration for the "real" act:
the photos are scaled down from the act's promoter's site, which has more pictures, some video, and the program (in charmingly dodgy english), along with some other stuff. sadly, the technical notes for venues staging the performance make no mention of brown m&m's or any other similar check on reading comprehension. i'm so disappointed.