FLUPP festival took me to Rio and I still haven't shaken Rio from my shorts.
(Cue surprised face)
Highlights weren't necessarily the expected ones - you know, like winning the Rio International Poetry Slam. Ok, I won't deny that was a pretty big one: the competition was fierce; the poets were numerous; the event was live streamed on the internet and reported in national press so, yes, it did send my adrenaline pumping way up there.
But, away from the fast and furious poetry battle, I managed to run workshops with simultaneous interpretation, perform with a samba band at a Rio version of Tongue Fu (btw, Tongue Fu is on again on Thursday, and is looking good… and tickets are selling fast #justsaying) and write on-the-spot poems for visitors with various requests, in an event similar to The Poetry Takeaway. I also got to see some of Mangueira and dance in the samba school, as well as shaking my stuff at a funk event in the now-famous City of God. Plus all that other stuff, like hanging around with various authors and slam poets from around the world… maybe you'll start to get the idea why winning the slam was really just the icing on the cake.
(Cue pic of me smiling with the trophy #evidence)
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| Happy people from the British Council! |
I'll be posting a few more snippets from the trip, starting tomorrow. And I'll be updating other stuff on this blog, too. So stay tuned.
NEVER MIND….
Speaking of tomorrow, it's time again for Never Mind the Fullstops, the poetry gameshow that's the talk of the East End. I'll be on #TeamVarjack, doing a bit of poetry larkin' on a winter's Tuesday evening. Plenty of laughs, and reinterpretations of pop classics are in store in this Xmas special. More details on the Hackney Picturehouse website. Come along!
Ok, signing out till tomorrow. (Cue peace sign)
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