Book Two. This item is unavailable.Book Two

In Book One, Lang Maria Liu’s found herself immersed in the vibrant world of Bahian capoeira, struggling to find her bearings after the dissolution of both her marriage and her capoeira school. In Book Two, she journeys once more to Brazil, hoping to deepen her knowledge of capoeira. Is there a common essence that unites this art form in its myriad manifestations? Can the spirit of Bahian capoeira be found in other parts of Brazil? We are plunged from the colourful streets of Recife’s Carnival to a steaming Amazonian shantytown. Salvador, the cradle of capoeira, has become more familiar, but with deepening relationships comes greater responsibility. Evenas the author struggles to define her practice of capoeira and give shape to her research, a danger looms over her. She embarks on an impossible love story -- one that threatens to destroy her.

Lang Maria Liu Ph.D. was born in Montreal in 1971 of Chinese and French immigrant parents. She grew up in the countryside south of Ottawa before moving to Toronto for university studies. Here, she embraced the cultural diversity of the city, a rich stew of influences that made her hungry for more, and prompted her to explore the boundaries of personal identity. From the disco beats rising from the neighbours’ stereo through the floor of her family’s living room when she was five, to her teenage obsession with Michael Jackson’s Thriller, African-based rhythms stirred a deep longing within Lang. That longing drew her slowly, but inexorably, to Brazil in 1996 and sparked a long love affair with the Afro-Bahian culture. And thus were the seeds of her involvement with capoeira sown. Lang is a Bowen Therapist, teaches capoeira in her Toronto-based school, and offers classes in primal posture based on the Gokhale Method.