she got the beat

[zyzyly]

I was walking across the campus today and came across a woman tucked away in a corner playing a drum. I liked how her hands looked against the drum head and I took a couple of pictures. She noticed me and I went over and said hi. She asked if I was a journalism student and I told her I was. She told me she was a world music student. Camera meets drum.

I sat and listened to her play for a few minutes and she told me about her drum. It is an african drum--a djembe. She bought it about a month ago. Half-price.

She is from Taiwan. As she talked the conversation took a gradual transition from drums to martial arts--there was a connection between the two that I didn't quite get. I enjoyed hearing her talk, and I didn't take any more pictures.

We talked for about 15 minutes, and then I had to go. She looked a little disappointed--I think she would have liked to talk more.

Sometimes a camera can be something to hide behind, and sometimes it's a bridge.

Comments

[velvetink.livejournal.com]

This book "The Way of the Drum" - talks about the Tao of the drum...and compares it to martial arts, keeping things in balance.
http://books.google.com/books?id=Uzqv2nH3_0IC&pg=PA103&lpg=PA103&dq=drums+and+martial+arts&source=web&ots=aT86GU9f4M&sig=rz0SD_7KP3uj2xVSWLtJxYsbZcI

Nice detail catching her hands like that.

[lowflyingsquab.livejournal.com]

I think that is what she was talking about--the discipline of both.

It was her hands that drew me in. It's a funny thing--after the eyes, the first thing I notice about a person is their hands. Sometimes I'll meet someone, and after, the hands are all I remember.

[fivecats.livejournal.com]

a bridge. definitely a bridge.

...

[lowflyingsquab.livejournal.com]

this time it was.