Musashino FM Culture Festival in Kichijoji
On Sunday November 26th Bantus Capoeira performed at the first Musashino FM Culture Festival in Kichijoji.
Thanks to Cafune, Mico, Lanterna, Cotonete, Pipoca, Bambu, Guarana, and Ayako for helping out!
And a big thanks to Musashino FM for inviting us.
Click here to see the photos
2nd Anniversary and Bonenkai
Later that day we celebrated 2 years of blood, sweat, and tears at our 2nd Anniversary and Bonenkai (End-of-year) Party 2006. The event was a huge success, with around 25 Bantus students attending the event, as well as special guests and friends. A big thanks to our guests Fabio and Hiji from Nação Capoeira, and Frank.
A big Bantus Capoeira Axé to Ayako, Bambu, Ban-chan, Bo, Coruja, Cotonete, Fumi, Gleidson, Guarana, Kyoko, Lanterna, Mico, Mio, Pipoca, Ruike, Satoko, Seina, Shiori, Sorriso, Sorvete, Sung, Yoshiyuki, and Yumiko.
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It will be a night that no one will ever forget. The surprises just didn’t stop, the drinks were flowing and everyone was enjoying themselves responsibly, and the delicious food provided by the Noodle Chafe team was scrumptious as usual. The Noodle Chafe kindly provided the use of their stereo and projector to lay down some funky Brazilian beats and show some hot capoeira video clips. On the big screen we were able to watch the Juice TV Plus video and the Channelnews Asia clip, as well as the Roda de Rua 3 DVD available for purchase here and at the Bantus Japao shop (ask Caçapa).
Everyone had a chance to mingle and get to know other Bantus Japao students and a few were reunited with Bantus Australia student Sorriso whom we met in Brazil in August. While the others were filling their bellies Cafune was working hard behind-the-scenes making sure things were running smoothly and I was fiddling with Mico’s Laptop PC to show our 2nd Anniversary presentation on the projector. I never got that thing working so I had to settle for holding the PC on my own laptop and calling everyone in close for my annual speech.
I had the opportunity to review 2006, talk about all the great shows and events we’d been invited to perform at, thank our special instructors, and thank all our hard working students. We presented Cotonete with a special gift to thank him for his kind help and humble dedication to our group in the short time that he’s been training with us. I also got to talk about our plans for 2007 and motivated everyone to keep training hard and come to class as much as possible.
Next Cafune brought out the mouth-watering “2nd Anniversary Bantus Capoeira” cake, and then suddenly the lights went down and people started to sing “Happy Birthday”. I was a little confused “Huh? Who’s birthday did I forget?”. It was my birthday! Thanks to Guarana for the surprise birthday cake, thanks to Fumi for the surprise birthday card, and thanks to Coruja for the surprise birthday “Caçapa” beanie and scarf (that’s ‘knitto-bou’ and ‘mafura’ for those who don’t speak Australian English). I was so happy to be surprised like that and felt all warm and gooey inside. Thanks Bantus Capoeira Japao students! You guys ROCK!
The party started to wind down, we thanked the owner, staff, and chef of the Noodle Chafe, everyone introduced themselves to the people they hadn’t met yet, and we packed up all our Brazilian decorations.
While we were all warm and cozy inside, it was cold and raining outside. This was surely going to put a dampener on our after-party street roda, but not to worry, I had the perfect street roda location. Undercover and in an inconspicuous yet central location right in the heart of the busy Kichijoji shopping area. I scouted the spot, and armed the berimbaus. Meanwhile Cotonete fetched the others and we formed a roda. Mico, Fabio, Frank and I took care of the berimbaus and singing while the others played pandeiro and played in the roda. We enjoyed the snug space and had some fun games. A few passersby stopped to take a look, including none other than the organizers of the Musashino FM Culture Festival that we had earlier performed in! A couple of them were drunk enough to try their first game of capoeira right there in our street roda. We were happy to see them relaxing after a successful festival ealier that day.
After trying for about 10 minutes I finally got Cafune to wait with me at the foot of the berimbau for the moment I’d been waiting for, for a long time. In my half-drunken/half-nervous state I managed to spit out the words “I met Cafune in a capoeira class, and now I’m going to ask her to marry me.” It was hardly the elegant and beautiful speech I’d been rehearsing, but it was good enough to get my point across. It was a turn-around from my surprise birthday party, and I ended up the ultimate surpriser!
The rest, as they say, is history. If you want to see how the rest of the night went, you’ll have to press play on the video below.
The “Propose”
Due to technical issues this video has been removed - Edited Jan, 15, 2008
More photos
Check these beautiful photos from our special shutter-happy guest from Thailand Bo’s camera. We love you Bo!
Some here
And some more here
And some from Cotonete’s camera.
More of Bo’s awesome photos can be seen here, here, and here and over there.
Screensaver and Wallpapers
To celebrate the success of our 2nd Anniversary we’ve created a few desktop wallpapers and a screensaver for your PC.
Click here to download and install our newest coolest screensaver for your PC.
Click on the links below to download these cool new desktop wallpapers.
2nd Anniversary - small
2nd Anniversary - medium
2nd Anniversary - large
2nd Anniversary “Gorilla” - small
2nd Anniversary “Gorilla” - medium
2nd Anniversary “Gorilla” - large
What a proposal!! Congratulations to both you, Cacapa and Cafune!!!!
WOW! Congratulations!!!! I had no idea. Spewin I missed it. Kenji says congrats too. Trust me, it’s not as scary as you think
They say there are three major events in every mans life. His birth, his death, and his marriage. We only get to choose one of them. Congratulations on a great decision!!
Parabens!! That is awesome stuff Cacapa! This is Cafe from Bermuda, a very close friend of Fabio of Nacao Capoeira. I wish both you and Cafune a very happy life together.
Ola Cafe, muito prazer! I’ve heard a lot about you from Fabio and the other capoeiristas in Japan! I hope to meet you sometime and see your capoeira. If we’re ever in Bermuda or you come back to Japan let’s meet. Muito obrigado. axé.
Cacapa, I’ll be back in Japan in May. I’ll definitely try to link you then.