stream kind of feel t way, but more underground when they think of hip hop they are like “yeah he is a b-boy.” I love the competitiveness about it; I love the idea that when you learn something new you feel accomplished. I still the remember when I learned my first air flare I felt accomplished like I was on top of the world even though it took me 2 years to get one but it was the best feeling in the world. And also the other thing that I love the most is since now a days like I stated before mainstream hip hop is a lot different to what it is now so people that are doing it true to heart they have to be the ambassadors of hip hop they have to teach it the correct way. With the classes that I teach I teach them correctly, I teach the history of where it came from. I basically teach them that hip hop is about peace, love and unity. The thing that motivates me to get better is for me to be the best that I can. A lot of people want to be the best in the world; they want to be the number 1b-boy in the nation. For me I want to be able to reach a point where I know that I’m happy and reach my standards. People say you are the hardest critic so if that’s the way for me to keep myself motivated I’ll never get to keep myself satisfied Describe your fashion and how has it changed? I remember when I used to break back in the day, I used to always wear those Adidas swishy pants that made all kinds of noises all the time. At one point I wore UFO pants even though it had nothing to do with breaking they were cool to have with a bunch of strings hanging off your pants. Now my fashion sense when I’m b-boying is that I try to keep it simple and comfortable at the same time, because
I want to look fresh but I’m not trying to get to the point where I can’t do a move because I’m wearing certain clothes. The big thing I wear are Dickies pants. They are the best breaking pants I have ever worn. I can do so many moves and still be comfortable. Clothing wise spin jackets were always the best thing for me; I do a lot of ground power and at jams you never know if the floor will be sticky or slippery so you have to justify it with a spin jacket. When I break, I never wear a hat. If I’m doing all footwork I will wear a hat but if I’m doing any power I usually don’t use a hat. To some people, it may seem awkward because a lot of people that do power seem to always wear head gear. I just can’t because it really ruins my whole momentum. Other than that, outside of breaking I’m still pretty simple. I’ll wear a simple pair of jeans, and the biggest things for me are the shoes and hats; they always seem to go real well together. I would rather wear a pretty bright shirt, nice shoes and a nice hat, but if I wear a really dope t-shirt, then I’ll wear a plain black hat and plain shoes just to keep it simple. I’m very simplistic. How did you get involved with Culture Shock DC? It’s a funny story why I joined. The reason I did Culture Shock was surprisingly for a girl. [Laughs] I mean we are really good friends it was never like that, I have another girlfriend now who I truly love! Culture Shock DC has a freestyle and a choreography team. Obviously choreography wise being a b-boy for years, I did no choreography, no popping, no house or anything like that. I actually auditioned for the choreography team and I definitely
did horribly bad the first time. But the freestyle it was second nature to me so I made it through that. Being on Culture Shock has really taught me a lot of other styles. Choreography has taught me more about how my body moves. They have taught me a lot about funk styles. Before that I thought popping and locking was generally hip hop, but I then learned that they are a funk style they are just under the umbrella of it. Being a freestyle dancer how was the transition to choreography? Oh man getting use to choreography I mean till this day I can’t say that I’m decent, I mean I’m getting better and I’m improving, it’s just cause I don’t like sucking at anything but its totally different the biggest thing is learning the groove. A b-boys grove is a totally different than a social groove. The running man was the hardest thing I learned in Culture Shock [laughs] but now I mean I can do it but I couldn’t do it naturally. Choreography is fun I mean a lot of b-boys tend to hate on it, I can honestly say back in the day I was one of those b boys. After I experienced choreography and met the people, it was totally different. They were all friendly and helping each other get better. Breaking nowadays people are really egotistical. They are just out there to be better than everyone and when they go to jams they just want to be the best one there. I’m still out there to smoke who ever I can but I would rather do it on a friendly basis.
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