17 May 2014 – London School Of Capoeira Batizado – 2014
When I arrived in London at the tender age of 18 years and 3 months, back in November 1989, The London School of Capoeira had already been here for a year… It was the first school of capoeira in this great city I call home.
Back then, at £7 a class, it was too much for my hard up self to afford, I had also found another class, nearer where I was living with my mother, in Highbury Roundhouse, with Instructor Robinson from Muzenza, founded by Mestre Burgues. Everyone knew everyone back then, and I knew who Sylvia was, and I had been to a couple of events where she had been too and even played a game with her.
Robinson left the UK in 1990, and so it ended my year of training capoeira. After that life sort of took over and I never quite managed to train again, even though I wanted to, I often thought about it, and always hoped I’d get back to it one day. Years later, in ’98, I was having a meal in Finsbury Park when I noticed, on the table next to us: Sylvia and her husband, Mestre Marcos. I was always in awe of Sylvia, I had never seen or heard of a woman Mestre until I came to London, capoeira for women was just starting to become more mainstream in the 80s in Brazil when I left.
That night I started talking to them and decided there and then I wanted to do capoeira again, so I got all the info from them and decided I would start training again. Not long after that I got pregnant, and once again, got busy with life, family and also my ‘career’ in computer programming. It took another 13 years for me to find a place to train, this time in South London, while searching for a place nearby for my son to learn capoeira.
Thanks to Facebook, I found out about the LSC batizado, anyone could go – and so I went. I love batizados. I took some photos too and re-lived some of my past life…