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The Barakaat Middle Eastern Dance Company. Photo by Stereo Vision Photography/Stereovisionphotography.com

Looking to infuse your nightlife with a little culture? Then maybe it’s time to get your Asia After Dark on this Thursday evening, July 28, at the Freer and Sackler Galleries. The “One Thousand and One Nights”-themed event kicks off at 6:30 p.m. and features Arab beats courtesy of DJ Turbo Tabla and a belly dancing performance by the Barakaat Middle Eastern Dance Company. Cocktails and finger foods will be provided available for purchase, and each guest gets one free drink with his or her ticket. Themed attire is encouraged, naturally.

But let’s get back to the belly dancing, shall we? As a newbie to this graceful, flowing genre, this was the perfect chance for me to uncover the meanings behind those mysterious hand gestures the dancers make, as well as find out if dancing really does work the abs. I caught up with Mariza, a seven-year belly dance veteran and one of the members of the six-person Barakaat Middle Eastern Dance Company, via email below:

Why were you initially interested in belly dancing?

I’ve always loved dance and took classes here and there as a kid, but as a very tall kid I always felt like the lumbering giant in the back. Belly dance does not require a certain body type, nor does it require that you begin training at the age of three. So as a very tall adult I was glad to finally find a place where I could enjoy dance movement without feeling too weird.

What style of belly dancing do you practice, and what makes your style distinctive?

I have trained in Egyptian Cabaret, Tribal Fusion and Oriental style belly dance. My style is a conglomeration of everything I’ve learned plus things I make up and other stuff I see on America’s Best Dance Crew.

Are there levels of certification, like belts in karate?

There is no generally accepted certification or credential system in belly dance. Some individuals have taken it upon themselves to create certification programs but these are particular to that individual and their philosophy. The vast majority of belly dancers do not possess any certification, and it is far from required.

Mariza strikes a pose. Photo by Stereo Vision Photography/Stereovisionphotography.com

Are there specific meanings attributed to the body motions and movements?

Dancers will at times make gestures, such as pointing to their heart, but belly dance movements themselves are not imbued with any particular meaning.

What are some popular misconceptions about belly dancing?

One common misconception is that belly dance is inappropriate for certain audiences. Belly dance is fun for the whole family. Kids in particular love the joyful nature of the dance and often get up and try to dance along. Another is that the dance is derived from some mystical fertility dance. Belly dance as it is today arose out of the social dances of the Middle East, which were then stylized for the stage.

What’s your favorite dance move, and why?

“The Shopping Cart” because it’s awesome.

What do you find the most challenging about belly dancing in general?

A lot of the movements require you to isolate the lower abs and obliques, muscles that we don’t consciously use in our day-to-day life. It can be difficult, particularly at first, to access these muscles. After their first belly dance class, many people comment that they can feel muscles they never knew they had!

Do you think belly dancing offers benefits that other types of dancing don’t?

Belly dance offers the same benefits as other types of dance—a great way to get moving and increase strength and flexibility. Belly dance is also a very accessible, low-impact form of dance. Dancers are often very grounded and movements are usually within the body column so it is not as stressful on the joints as other dance forms. Plus, in any city of decent size, there is often a friendly, supportive dance community.

And are you limited in the type of music that you dance to?

Dancers who choose to perform a very specific folkloric style of dance would be limited to the culturally appropriate music for that dance, but many belly dancers–particularly American belly dancers–dance to a variety of music, including Middle Eastern traditional music or pop music, Western pop and rock or the Muppets’ “Mahna Mahna.”

What kind of dances should the audience expect to see at Asia After Dark?

Barakaat has prepared a modern sword fusion piece; we’ll also be improvising with drummer/DJ Turbo Tabla. It’s going to be a great night!

Asia After Dark takes place this Thursday, July 28, from 6:30-10:30pm, at the Freer and Sackler Galleries. Tickets are $22 in advance and $25 at the door. Purchase them here.

A ward in Carver General Hospital, Washington, D.C. Photo courtesy of the Smithsonian Resident Associates Program.

The discovery of anesthesia dates to right around 1842, says Judy Chelnick, a curator who works with the medical history collections at the National Museum of American History. But at the start of the Civil War in 1861, effective techniques of administering drugs such as ether had not yet been perfected. Many patients may have died from receiving too much ether, Chelnick says, while others woke to experience the painful procedure.

Chelnick is standing in a room full of fascinating objects behind an exhibition on the third floor of the museum. It’s a place few tourists ever get to see, but the tools we’re discussing will be on display for visitors attending the Resident Associate program’s Civil War Medicine at the American History Museum event tomorrow, July 26.

I ask about a scary-looking curved metal tool with a sharp point.

“What’s that for?”

“You don’t want to know,” Chelnick responds.

She explains, but it turns out that no, I really didn’t want to know that that tool was used for puncturing the bladder directly through the abdomen to relieve pressure on the organ. I cringe involuntarily. Yes, I could have done without that knowledge.

As we continue our survey of the tools, most of which are still surprisingly shiny but have old wooden handles (“This was before germ theory,” Chelnick says), we come across many other objects that you probably don’t want to see in your next operating room. A brutal-looking pair of forceps that Chelnick says were used for cutting bone, some saws that look just like the ones I used in wood shop in high school and a terrifying object slightly reminiscent of a drill that was used to bore holes in the skull.

The sets of tools are incongruously packaged in elegant wooden boxes with red and purple fabric lining that I suspect is velvet. I can’t help thinking that those are good colors, because blood probably wouldn’t stain too badly.

Chelnick lifts up a tray of knives in one of the kits, and reveals something really amazing. It’s a set of cards, matriculation cards, Chelnick says they’re called, belonging to the doctor who owned this particular set. They’re from his time in

Surgical kit made for the Union Army during the Civil War by George Tiemann & Company of New York City. Courtesy of National Museum of American History, Kenneth E. Behring Center

medical school (only two years were required back then), and they list his name (J.B. Cline) and the classes he took. It seems that Dr. Cline studied chemistry, diseases of women and children, pharmacy, anatomy and surgery, among other topics. For the sake of the Civil War soldiers he treated, I’m glad this was an educated man, but I still wouldn’t let him near me with any of those knives.

All in all, it’s enough to make anyone uneasy, but Chelnick says that’s part of the point.

“I think that a lot of times people have a romanticized vision of the war in their head,” Chelnick says. “And so I think the medical equipment really brings out the reality of the situation. It’s a reminder that there are consequences–people got hurt, people got killed.”

She adds that gunshot wounds and other battle injuries were not even close to the greatest killers during the Civil War. Rather, most fatalities occurred from diseases or infection spread in the close quarters of military camps.

I point out another tool in one of the kits. Chelnick restates what has become a frequent phrase in our conversation: “You don’t want to know.”

Owney on a mail bag, courtesy of the National Postal Museum

Monday July 25 Harry Potter Time

Make this Monday magical by coming to the Air and Space Museum Udvar-Hazy Center‘s Airbus IMAX Theater for a trip into the wizarding world. Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows: Part II has come to the Airbus Theater, presenting the Chosen One in all his wonder on a sky-high IMAX screen with six-channel digital surround sound. Join other Muggles as you watch Part 2 of the epic battle between the good and evil forces in the wizarding world. Will Harry defeat Lord Voldemort? Will the wizarding world be safe again? The stakes have never been higher as the Harry Potter saga comes to its close. This film plays daily at 4:30, 7:15 and 10. Tickets can be purchased at the box office prior to the show or online.

Tuesday July 26 Portraits Alive!

Try something new this Tuesday at National Portrait Gallery, head out for Portraits Alive. Meet in the F Street lobby at 2:15 to begin this new twist on portrait viewing. Watch as local teenagers lead a theatrical tour that brings the Portrait Gallery’s collections to life through an original, student-written play. Made possible by DC’s 2011 Summer Youth Employment Program, the teen guides take visitors on a memorable journey incorporating a variety of portraits throughout the gallery and perform biographical portrayals of the subjects represented in the photographs, paintings, drawings, sculptures and prints of the museum. This event is free and fun for the whole family so don’t miss this opportunity to learn about the subjects in the Portrait Gallery.

Wednesday July 27 Celebrate Owney the Postal Dog

At the Postal Museum this Wednesday, there is cause for celebration. Beginning at 11, check out the First Day of Issue Ceremony for Owney the Postal Dog. Owney became the unofficial mascot of the Railway Mail Service in the 19th-century when the scruffy pooch climbed aboard a rail train and traveled the nation for nine years, garnering fame and glory.  Now the U.S. Postal Service and Postal Museum are celebrating the issuance of a Forever Stamp in honor of Owney. Join museum staff and supporters at 11 for the First Day Issue Ceremony and remarks. Then at noon have some fun with the Owney Festival. Enjoy hands-on activities including making an Owney tag, sorting mail in the Rail Way Post Office, creating a stamp collection and more. At 2 join Dirk Wales, author of A Lucky Dog: Owney, U.S. Rail Mail Mascot, for a book talk. Afterwards be one of the first museum visitors to see Art of the Stamp: Owney the Postal Dog, featuring the original stamp art and Owney himself, newly conserved and ready for the spotlight. This is a free event that the whole family can enjoy. 

Thursday July 28 Take Me Out to the Ball Game

Get out of the heat this Thursday and come to the Anacostia Community Museum for Part 1 of “Stories from the Negro Leagues.” Come to the museum’s Program Room at 10:30 for a presentation by David Haberstich, curator of photography in the American History Museum’s Archives Center, and Dwayne Sims the founder and CEO of the Negro Leagues Hall of Fame. The first Negro League was formed in February of 1920 in Kansas City, Missouri. The appeal of the Negro League soon spread throughout the country as leagues were created in the Midwest and the South. Listen as Haberstich and Sims lead a discussion about Addison Scurlock‘s images of Negro Leagues figures and Howard University sports. After, explore the related exhibit Separate and Unequaled: Black Baseball in the District of Columbia. This event is free and family-friendly.

Friday July 29 Meet an Astronaut

Come out to the Air and Space Museum this Friday for a chance to meet Al Worden, one of the astronauts of Apollo 15. Visit  the Moving Beyond the Earth Gallery, gallery 113 on the first floor of the east wing, at 11. Listen as Worden discusses and signs copies of his book Falling to Earth: An Apollo 15 Astronaut’s Journey to the Moon to celebrate the 40th anniversary of the Apollo 15 space flight. Apollo 15 was the ninth manned mission in the American Apollo space program and the fourth mission to land successfully on the moon. It is considered by NASA as the most successful manned flight ever achieved. Join Worden at 11 for a book talk moderated by space history curator Allan Needell. A question-and-answer session will take place following the discussion as well as a live webcast. Beginning at 12:30 Worden will host a three hour book signing and festivities will end at 5. This is a free event and copies of Worden’s book are available for purchase in the museum store.

For a complete listing of Smithsonian Institution events and exhibitions visit the goSmithsonian Visitors Guide.

Doing the Ring Shout in Georgia, ca. 1930s Members of the Gullah community express their spirituality through the “ring shout” during a service at a local “praise house.” Image courtesy of Lorenzo Dow Turner Papers, Anacostia Community Museum Archives, Smithsonian Institution

The Anacostia Community Museum is sadly at the end of one of its most visited exhibitions in recent history—the show “Word, Shout, Song” was so popular, it had been extended for four months. This weekend the show closes. But don’t worry, it it is slated to make a reappearance as a traveling exhibition.

“Word, Shout, Song” traces the social and linguistic history of the Gullah people back to their ancestral homeland of Africa, following the work of 20th-century linguist and professor Lorenzo Dow Turner.

Turner became fascinated by the language of the Gullah people, which was previously dismissed simply as “bad English,” and discovered that the dialect was actually a mix of 32 diverse African languages. The Gullah people have their roots among the 645,000 Africans captured, enslaved and brought to America between the 16th and 19th centuries.

On Saturday, July 23, the museum will hold a special event celebrating the final days of the exhibition. “Family Day: All Things Gullah” will include everything from storytelling to food, music and crafts. Around 3:30 p.m., the Geechee Gullah Ring Shouters and the Santa Barbara Shout Project will attempt to lead the crowd in an attempt to break the record for the world’s largest ring shout.

A ring shout is a traditionally religious African-American dance in which participants dance counterclockwise in a circle to the beat of clapping and a stick that is banged on a wooden surface. The stick takes the place of drums, said Griffin Lotson, manager of the Geechee Gullah Ring Shouters, because slaves were forbidden to beat drums on plantations in the 18th century.

“People really love it,” Lotson said. “For us, it’s basically about keeping the culture alive and pumping in some new life.”

Lotson said only a handful of groups that practice the tradition remain in the U.S., so his group does their best to preserve and protect the culture of the Gullah people, who today live in areas of South Carolina and Georgia.

He added that part of the reason the tradition has faded out is that after the Civil War, many Gullah did their best to adapt to mainstream American culture in order to better fit in, often abandoning traditions like the Gullah language of Geechee and rituals such as the ring shout.

“Being a Geechee was super unpopular–I was taught not to be Geechee,” said Lotson, who was born in 1954. “‘You’re too Geechee, boy,’ they’d say. Because it wasn’t mainstream, you couldn’t get the better jobs, you talked funny.”

Today, Lotson said, he and his group do their best to maintain what has been an unbroken thread of a unique culture within the U.S. through traveling and performing across the country. Lotson and most of his group are direct descendants of plantation slaves, and Lotson’s grandfather and mother were both involved in preserving the ring shout tradition.

“I think this exhibition is great,” Lotson said. “’It be my people,’ as we say in Geechee.”

The adorable red panda cub, photo by Mehgan Murphy, National Zoo

Today, the ATM blog team has some bad news, some good news, and some better news. The bad news is that Mei Xiang, the Zoo’s giant panda, has been experiencing a pseudo, or false, pregnancy these past few months meaning we will not be having a baby panda cub this year. More bad news is that it’s scorching hot outside. And freezing cold inside. The good news is that it’s also Friday, which gives most people a reason to smile. The better news is that there are four new red panda cubs at the National Zoo and they are adorable.

Last month, on June 17, Shama, the female red panda, gave birth to two cubs in her den at the National Zoo’s Asia Trail in Washington, D.C. This was a few weeks after Lao Mei, the female red panda at the Zoo’s Conservation Biology Institute in Front Royal, Va. gave birth to two female cubs on June 5. After the cubs were born, Zoo staff left the mothers alone to bond with and care for their cubs, confirming the births only about a week afterwards.

Getting weighed. Photo by Mehgan Murphy/National Zoo

It’s been a little over a month and Zoo staffers are still having minimal interaction with the cubs at this critical time, performing health checks whenever possible. They report that “all four newborns are steadily gaining weight and appear healthy.”

The red panda exhibit is currently closed to visitors to ensure to safety of the well-being of the mother and her cubs, but they expect Shama will allow the cubs to venture out in early fall. As they watch the cubs grow stronger, staff will then decide when the exhibit can be reopened to the public.

A wider view of the baby cub. Photo by Mehgan Murphy/National Zoo

More than 100 surviving red panda cubs that have been born at the National Zoo facilities since 1962.