I'm back at work after a long weekend of Capoeira and all things related. Erik and I loaded up the R32 and headed up to Victoria on thursday night... pretty uneventful drive up, and we managed to catch the 7pm ferry which got us to Victoria in plenty of time to get some quality food and drink some beer with his friend Matt who was letting us crash at his house.

Friday we had some time to kill since the training didn't start until the evening... so we wandered around downtown Vic... checked out Parliament and the Empress and some other random stuff like that. Training on friday night was pretty light - there were a lot of people in the small space, so we didn't do too much, but we got into the Roda a couple of times and represented Axe Seattle pretty well. Friday night we found ourselves at the Cactus club where we met up with the rest of the Seattle crew (Bolo, Cara Rachada) who had driven up... we had us a couple of drinks, some food, then just crashed in preparation for saturday.

The training on saturday was awesome. We had classed with Mestre Boi from Axe New Jersey, Mestre Suino from Capoeira Candeias and Mestre Paulo from Capoeira Brasil. We learned some pretty cool new moves and kicks, got a great workout in, then had a couple of good rodas. Coquinho even got me to play the berimbau in the roda - a bit intimidating since we were playing in front of probably about 100 people and I was the only person with less than an Azul/Marrom belt to be playing the instruments... but no one yelled or anything, so I figure i did okay.

Sunday we went to the Farquar Auditorium (that name jsut cracks me up) at U Vic, watched the Brazilian dance show, then had the Batizado. Turns out that Bolo, myself and Vara Seca were put up for promotion to Azul (blue) cords. When my turn came, i got to go and play against Mestre Boi . I (think) i was doing pretty well... threw some kicks, did some esquivas, and then at some point i managed to walk right into a martelo right into the face... which left me with this little gem:

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So now I've got a blue cord and a black/blue eye to match it. There is a video out there and will post that when i get a hold if it.

Also, congrats to Cara Rachada for his promotion to Crua/Azul!

The drive home was a bit rough since i wasn't feeling so hot - luckily erik took care of the at the wheel duties while i just navigated. But we made it home by 1, crashed pretty hard and are right back here where we started. My face is a bit tender today, but i'm pretty sure i'll be at practise tonight just because i'm a glutton for punishment.