Women in action

Author: Grace Duggan

Last Friday, a crowd gathered in the Dance Theatre in the Mahaney Center for the Arts to watch a performance by the women of Compas de Nicaragua (Friends of Nicaragua), a non-profit organization that works to promote cross-cultural exchanges. The quartet of women, down to three because of an emergency that called one of them away, performed a range of traditional Nicaraguan dances while wearing beautiful multicolored dresses. The women mixed somber pieces with more upbeat ones, dancing sometimes as a trio and in solos as well. For one dance the emcee encouraged the audience to respond like Nicaraguan audiences, i.e. to applaud and cheer on the dancer during the performance.

Interwoven between the dances were segments designed to inform the audience about Nicaragua's culture, resources and socio-economic situation. The main project of Compas de Nicaragua formed five years ago. Called "Mujeres en Acción" (Women in Action), it is comprised of forty women working to improve living conditions in La Primavera, an impoverished neighborhood in Managua, Nicaragua. Their projects include a gourd art collective, soy food program and a community store. Additional information on Compas de Nicaragua and its projects can be found on their Web site, www.compas1.org/.