In Beijing there is a funky little bookshop with giant ambitions run by an ex pat named Alex Pearson. Our librarian friend and hostess Trish suggested that we might like scoping the place out so Sara and I swung by and had a look around and a bit of lunch at The Bookworm. well as we perused the upcoming events at the joint we saw that a troupe of Polish performance poets were coming into town as part of a Spoke n Word tour. I mentioned to Trish about how sometimes Sara and I forget about our adult poet voices when we are on the road visiting schools. We get so wrapped up in making sure we provide good lessons for the kids that we never think to look for performance opportunities for ourselves in adult venues in the cities we visit.
Well Trish hopped on this and called her friend Alex which led to a dinner date for all four of us at the bookstore. Alex told us that the Poles had hoped to invite some Chinese performance poets to join their set but were unable to find any. we offered our services, she checked out our credentials and forwarded them on to the Polish bards who then said sure, they’d love to have us jump in on their set.
So serendipity baby – Sara and I landed a gig in Beijing. To top it off – a bunch of the teachers we met at the International School of Beijing made our reading the cap off to a gals day out in the city. It was fun for us to have the opportunity to perform some of our adult material for a change and to do so in the coolest bookstore in Beijing – well it just doesn’t get any better does it?
Check out the link to this bookstore and the literary festival that Alex puts on – it’s pretty amazing. in the meantime here are some pics from the reading.
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