Moment 77 - Fire Dancers

During my recent trip to Puerto Galera in Oriental Mindoro, I happened to watch a fire dance.  That was my first time to witness a fire dance and I must say that it takes a lot of practice and patience in order to perform it well.

Prior to the first spectacle of performance that night, I approached one of the performers who was preparing for the show.  It was an informal kind of interview and my bad because I was not able to introduce myself and ask his name, likewise.  I simply approached him and asked some questions right away.  I knew I had to make the most of his spare moment because they will perform shortly.

I learned from him that he has no formal training of the fire dance.  He simply mimic those who performed before in that place and he is already doing his own stunts for over a year now.  As a fire dancer, he knows that he has still a lot to learn and he continues to improve his craft.  They are given the privilege to perform in a free style manner, thus, they can openly do their own thing.  Since he is performing for a particular establishment, he has a daily allowance. And whatever they can collect from the tips of the spectators, the amount is equally divided among the performers.

I also watched another group of fire dancers.  They are just teens and at a young age, they are already earning their living as fire dancers.  They hailed from another town of Oriental Mindoro and travels to Puerto Galera for their nightly performance.  The group is composed of 10 members but that night, there were only three of them.

They said that they had been trained by someone from Boracay and for quite some time, they are already showcasing their talents.  From time to time, they get burned.  Yes, if you don't want to get burned, don't play with fire.  But since it is a good source of income, they have to live with it.

I asked about their routines because that night, it seemed that it was a sort of free for all performance.  They said that they actually have their routines but since there were only the three of them and that was their third and last performance for the night, they opted to break away from their usual routines.  And the moment they saw their pictures, they were delighted seeing their performance being captured.