Hi, long time lurker here that decides to come out of the shadows and finally join the tribe where he belongs.
So basically I have been juggling for close to a year, focusing mainly on balls and specially siteswaps. We could argue that all toss juggling has siteswaps at its core but the kind I'm talking about is raw, pure, 'robot-like-juggled' siteswap, with the least flourishing possible (no bxx, pirouettes, weird catches...). Since siteswap combinations are easiest juggled (expressed?) with balls, that makes them become the prop of my choice. The video "Siteswap Montage" by Phil Thompson gave me goosebumps first time I saw it, amongst my favourite jugglers there's Haavard, Matan Presberg, Phil himself and the likes if that helps explaining how much I fancy siteswaps over anything else in juggling. I also dig 3 ball stuff such as Andrew Olson's, Mike Moore and Pumpkineater's, but that stays more on a second term on my training sessions.
There's been a few turns of events that have felt like signs from above and made me seriously consider joining the edge during the last months:
- Last summer I casually met Eivind Dragsjo's older brother and had the pleasure of hanging out with him and juggle together on a regular basis for a couple of months. Meeting him really pushed my juggling and he gave me very nice advice in terms of technique and in general. I got a set of Norwiks through him that I have been juggling with ever since (6months-ish total).
- I have spent this winter in Canary islands and one of these days during a training session in the island of La Gomera a guy approached me, we started chatting and he told me he used to juggle too back in the days. As we dig deeper it turns out he also was a siteswap maniac so the conversation became more interesting and really enjoyable (to both of us I'm pretty sure). In the end he said he was a member of this site, non other than C*C*K (Christoph)! That was really exciting as he encouraged me to not give up and gave me kudos for keeping the training up. We hung out and jam together for about a week and it was really nice as aside from a good juggler he's also a great human. *I believe he is not active anymore but in case you are reading this shoot me a PM and let's catch up!*
- As I said, siteswap is the main focus of my juggling but during yesterday's session I tried a 5b 3up 360 out of the blue and it felt surprisingly at reach. Now, I have never done any 3b nor 4b pirouetting and my spinning technique could definitely use some improvement but regardless, I decided to keep pushing and see if I could qualify the trick cleanly which I eventually did. I was pretty stoked because the learning curve on this one has pretty much been a vertical line! I said screw it, let's join the edge :D.
This summer I plan on hitting conventions left and right around Europe. Ejc, the National French one and Brianza Convention in 10 days (Italy), for instance, are amongst the ones I have already booked tickets for. In 2 days I fly to Madrid as there's a 4day circus meet up (Eucima) and it's gonna be my very first contact with
big festivals and the one kicking off what's hopefully gonna be a summer flooded with juggling. I'm very excited about it all and can't wait to meet and share juggling with like-minded people!
Roger
Mike Moore - - Parent #
Welcome, ball juggler! Sounds like you've had some exciting encounters with jugglers.
Roger Bananas - - Parent #
Thanks Mike, I only wish for them to keep coming. Those particular two I mentioned came at a point where I needed a motivation boost and they definitely delivered, hands down. Maybe what I need is to feel demotivated again and Anthony Gatto will just bump into me?
Little Paul - - Parent #
If Anthony Gatto bumps into you, try not to fall over into the wet concrete
Good to see i'm not the only new member today!
In my continuing obsession with different balls, I'd love to give Norwiks a try some time - perhaps i'll bump into you at a convention!
Roger Bananas - - Parent #
Hey definitely! I've said it numerous times but I'll be out and about in Northern Europe this Summer (Germany, France etc..) so if you plan on attending fests say so :D
What is your current go to ball of choice for your sessions? Does it depend on what you plan on practicing?
I doubt I'll be venturing outside of the UK too much this year myself, but the European fests look great so I hope you enjoy!
Favourite balls (at the moment...) are the uglies bags/balls, but I picked up some of the 130g Pro Sport balls at BJC and I've been getting along pretty well with those. I'm finding the increased weight helps keep my throws a little more controlled when I'm trying for clean runs of five balls.
That said, I end up getting longer runs when I switch back to the uglies though - probably just having warmed up a bit more by then.
I end up doing quite a lot outside even in autumn/winter, so I find the MMX and Sil-X styles are good when the ground is wet/muddy, but I've only ever had a small play with Russian-style ones so they're still intriguing to me.
Generally the type I use depends more on WHERE i'll be juggling than what i'll be doing!
Roger Bananas - - Parent #
Hey! Catching up after Eucima in Madrid. IT. WAS. A. BLAST! :D Met tons of really cool people, some siteswapers too, weather was great and the gala was remarkably good (Wes Peden, amongst other veeery good artists, was on it btw!). Aaaand... I ended up 1st on the standing in one leg combat in the games and won a cool 10mm SIL-X contact ball, as well as a pass for another fest in Spain. I was definitely not seeing that one coming!
Loving the implication that siteswappers aren't cool people!
How many people roughly attended Eucima? The website suggests it is a pretty big event, & the gala show looks as if it was pretty amazing! I'm not sure if anyone has told you but this is a standard length festival review that we expect here on the Edge. :P
Also what's the name of the festival you won a ticket for? I've not got any events in the database for Spain this year (I've just retrospectively added Eucimna 2018).
Roger Bananas - - Parent #
Siteswapers definitely deserve to be put in a different category, they have a special place in my heart! :)
The organization of Eucima guesstimated that there was up to a 1000people at the festival, which at naked eye seemed like a reasonable amount. Will look into the review standars and probably fill a proper one later on today or tomorrow, that will be fun... :P
The festival I won tickets for is taking place in Pradoluengo, situated in northern Spain, during 15-16-17 June. I had the Berlin juggling convention in mind so I'm likely going to give away the pass to any acquaintance that would wanna mission up there. After speaking with the representative of Pradoluengo's festival at Eucima he said it was fine if I did that. I also struggled to find a website/fb event about the festival, just some random posts mentioning it so I guess it's under preparation.
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