My first Capoeira test

I've been taking Capoeira for over two years now, but until last night, I had never been tested. I'd never been tested simply because my first instructor never had tests because it was a UD club and not a formal class and my second and current instructor really could give less of a shit about structure like that. I was sort of vaguely tangentially involved with an actual school, but as I studied with those guys all of never, getting tested or going to a Batizado never happened. My current instructor got involved with another school and I got a third instructor who is actually a mestre, a master, and as I started taking classes up through the UD group I'm still involved with, I was invited with the UD group to participate in their Batizado.

What the hell is a Batizado? Well, according to Wikipedia it's a yearly event thing where students are baptized and officially recognized as students of a school. It's also, according to hearsay and my other research on the Internet, basically a Capoeira party. Also, someone is probably going to knock me down and baptize me with the floor. A, that's really entertaining and, B, after my test last night my mestre basically threw me at the floor, so at least I have experience with being baptized by the floor.

However, as I found out last week, the test isn't the Batizado. No, the test is done before the Batizado, usually with little warning. That may just be my luck, it may be a thing, I don't really know, all I know is I had been training my ass off for this test expecting it to be a lot later than it actually ended up being. So though I was fairly prepared, I could have been more prepared. Moving on.

Given that Capoeira is generally very laid back, the testing itself is actually laid back as well. I've been to many other tests in several other schools, and none were close to as laid back as this. However, don't even begin to imagine that it was easy. Crotch no.

Here's how it went down. I showed up, I was told I was testing, I warmed up a little, then me and the guy running the test went to a corner of the classroom and I got my test on. My tester said do ginga. I started to ginga. I didn't stop my ginga, other than for a few seconds at a time, for the rest of the test. I couldn't say exactly how long the test was, but try doing a ginga for five minutes and your legs will burn. The test was at least forty five minutes long, and the ginga was the easiest part.

To prep for this test, I had been given a sheet for the beginner, level one, and level two tests and as I was going to level two, yellow cord, I had been studying that sheet and was fairly confident with most of it. Unfortunately, as this was my first test, I had to do everything on all three sheets once on my left side and once on my right side. No pressure.

So the test was basically kicks, acrobatics, movements (called floreios), and combinations. Ok, there was also singing and playing music, but that was the cake walk. So for kicks I had to do all the kicks I'd learned, around fifteen of them, but not just the simple kick! No no, I had to do multiple variations of each kick. Acrobatics? A cartwheel is the main one, except that I know at least a dozen different varations. Of course the various cartwheels can be worked into the florieos of which can easily be combined into dozens, if not hundreds, of different movements. That wasn't even including the combinations! There were fortunately only like ten combos to do, but they could include all of the shit I was being tested on, so they got a little nuts. And all of this was done between ginga steps.

In terms of difficulty, I sweat so much that I had to wipe down the floor three times, and eventually, after nearly killing myself by slipping, my tester took pity on me and we found a carpeted area for the flying, spinning, jumping, flipping end of my test. I say in jest that I sweat out a gallon, but I'm not sure how much of a jest that is because my shirt was disgusting by the end of the test. Also, though I had prepared greatly, I still didn't know like five moves, so I had to figure them out during the test. No pressure.

All told, though, the test was within my bounds. It was intimidating as hell, but I stared it in the face and did my best and I passed. All that's left is the Batizado. So I go to a party and get my belt? Oh, yes, it's so easy. Except for that little minor detail thing where the Batizado is actually spread over many days, with lots of other workshops, music, and dance lessons.

I love Capoeira... but sometimes it loves me back a little too much.