YOUR SPACE: Master of belly dance

Frank Farinaro is 23, 6-foot-3, with a washboard stomach.

It’s what he does with that stomach that separates him from most of mankind.

After all, not many guys are professional belly dancers.

“People aren’t sure how to react,” he says. “People say, ‘Are you a stripper?’ I say, ‘No, my clothes stay on, even though I might be scantily dressed.’”

He has the body of a Greek god and the elasticity of Gumby. (Check out YouTube videos under his name.) When not performing or leading workshops across the nation, Frank is a belly dance instructor/pipefitter at 40 Thieves Hookah Lounge, 1524 N. AcademyBlvd.

He credits his background with just the right wiring for belly dance: His mom is Mediterranean and his dad East African. He did varsity sports and ethnic dance.

Still, it was intimidating to segue into a women’s sport. “I was very nervous at first. I created a masculine aesthetic and pulled from my athletic background. To be true to the art form, you have to dance like a man.”

He wears skimpy dude clothes — dark, flared sarong pants and short vests. “I have about 20 to 30 different costumes that I wear,” he says. “I have enough jewelry to fill up a suitcase.”

That, and the brass finger cymbals give him some explaining to do at airport security. “I say, ‘I’m a belly dancer.’ They say, ‘But you’re a man.’ ”

It’s an opportunity to educate people. “I want this art form to get the respect of ballet, or modern or jazz dance. I’d like to build up the strength of the belly dancing community, get more male belly dancers.”

Those staccato hip moves, arm waves and rib cage circles can buff a guy up. “It works countless core muscles: the abdominals, obliques, glutes and thighs. I’ve pulled out my back.”

His recent Facebook post sums it up: “I think my back & my (butt) are getting a divorce, but they’re not ready to tell my thighs yet.”

Dangers lurk off the floor as well, as he discovered at a show he did in Vegas.

“This one lady was really drunk and she bit one of my hip piercings off. She just came up and bit it,” he says. “Yeah, it hurt. A lot. I’m not sure if it hurt her. She was feeling pretty good.”

Franks says anyone can learn to belly dance. His students have included a 4-year-old boy, an elderly lady with arthritis, a 300-pound man.

No need to tone up.

“Dancers who are leaner have cleaner muscle isolation, but dancers with more body fat have fuller shimmies,” he says. “So if you’re skinny you have to fight for your shimmies. If you have more belly, you get better shimmies.”

All the more reason to have another Twinkie.

—

Got a story?

Go to gazette.com/yourspace