ILL WHAT THE FUNK?! CREW......

My first student/crewmate/partner/brother from another mother killing beats where we've met.

2009. Thats when I first met him. He didn't know anything. Just a fanboy of Nam Hyun Joon.

Now he is consistently learning, developing, and trying to evolve the dance using his individuality.

Still a LOOOOOOOOOOOONG way to go till he gets to the point where he wants to go.

But even with difficulties, I know he NEVER gives up. He will consistently work to improve.

My brotha

iLL of What The Funk?! Crew.

Electric Soul Satisfaction Part 3: Workshop and traveling back

Part 3


Once again, after a long night, we slept until 9 AM.
Surprisingly, my body wasn't sore at all. The training I've been doing must've helped me.

We got ready, had a Pizza as a breakfast near the studio where the workshop was held.

James and Ilya

Jazzy J

Time was closing in. Funny thing is, Jazzy didn't realize that he was doing a Locking workshop, not a popping workshop until the very last minute LOL

But of course, its Jazzy. To him switching his mindset between styles is not a problem at all.

Again, surprisingly, Gwo and Carlo was running late. I guess those guys were having too much fun with the judges this time LOL

We waited for an hour before the class began. Finally Carlo called and James began to organize the workshop.

Within the next 15 min, Carlo arrived with other judges. 
The workshops began about an hour and 15 min late. Our initial plan of going back to NYC was gradually being pushed back.  I was getting nervous because I was worried about going back during rush hour. Plus, we all had plans early in the morning the next day.

Luckily me and ilya had fun talking with Dickson, Bionic, and couple other dancers to ease our stress off.

After Jazzy's workshop, we drove to Gwo's house to pick up Fayzah Fire, who was taking a private class with Jr boogaloo.




Here, seeing how Jr Boogaloo interacted with Jazzy, I've realized how much respect he has on the West coast popping community. I say this because as we were leaving, Jr Boogaloo looked at Jazzy and sincerely said "west coast is waiting for you" with a respectful manner.

Seeing such an amazing dancer that represent the West Coast popping internationally for more than a decade to show such respect to him made me realize how great Jazzy really is.

Of course to me, he is my sensei, mentor, and dance name god father (My real name is SUGURU. He couldn't pronounce nor remember my name at all for few month. Finally, he got tired of trying and just decided to call me SUGALOO because it sounds similar lol) and I have high respect for him.

Jazzy relaxing his foot while I pump some gas lol

 


But I also know his funny and teenage like personality that makes me feel like he is a great funky old friend. However, seeing such interaction between him and Jr Boogaloo reminded me how lucky and fortunate I am to learn under him.








When we began driving back to NYC, it was around 3:30 PM.




Going back to NYC was HELL. Especially for me.
Because I was the one driving back!!! 
I drove back all the way without making any stops because I wanted to go home as quick as possible since we were already way behind out initial plan.

But of course we were going back during rush hour.

I hit 4 traffic.... What a night mare. I ended up driving 5~6 hours. My back was KILLING me.....


Anyhow, that was the end of my first summer trip.
To me, it was a great start. But as a crew, I wish we could've done more.
This is because I know how much my partner has challenged himself to improve this summer. I want him to receive results and accomplish the goals that was training for.


But I'm sure this will happen soon. Because our next trip was a life changing experience :D

Finally, to Carlo Manabat, Gwoping Yang, and James Wu.
I know I've said this many times, but THANK YOU FOR DOING THIS EVENT.
You guys always bring one of the best and/or the most interesting poppers out to the East coast.
I believe your dedication towards the community is doing justice. I thank you so much for taking such action.

I WILL follow your footstep in the future so I too can help support the growth of the East coast community.

Once again, I truly enjoyed the event, and thank you for giving me the opportunity to battle A.K.A Kin. With out you guys hard effort of bringing him over from across the sea, this would've never happened.

Peace and God Bless to you all.

ok, my next summer trip destination was.......

 MY MOTHERLAND, JAPAN!!!



Continues.....

A month of training.

Since 7/3/2012, ilya moved into my new house and we began our summer training.

The idea was simple.

We just wanted to be a bad ass popper and a great popping partners/crewmates just like the ones we look up to like Jsmooth and Kid Boogie, Crazy Kyo and Popping J, Gucchon and Kei, Mosta Pop and Venom, Rasshard and Future.

I had a glass and got knocked out lol

Those guys are dope as an individual popper.
But when they go on the stage together, chemical reaction happens and destroys the floor.

We wanted to know how they do it.
And from a shallow resource, we just assumed that they train together often and in some cases live together.

We just put that into action.

Our goal was to strengthen our body and get the basics solid.
This is because we are going to LA from 8/19-25th and we wanted to be ready to learn and absorb as much technique as possible when we get there.




Therefore, we focused on working out, diet, and drilling.

We both worked during the day. And since I have two jobs, sometimes I came home after midnight. So we decided to go to the gym to workout in the morning.

We woke up at 4 am.
First thing we had was oatmeal + whey protein shake.
Than we got ready for the day and left the house at 5 am.

What I enjoyed the most about getting up early was to see how the sunrise colored the cloud.
Taking pictures of the cloud using iPhone is actually starting to become my new hobby lol

82nd St Station

By 5:45, we got to the gym. Planet Fitness was a little far from my house, but its only $10 a month and the tools are easy to use. On top of that, it was open from 5 am, and when we got there, it was almost empty, allowing us to use the equipments and machines freely.

Planet Fitness

Both of us had our own training routine. I'm not sure what Ilya's workout routine was but I stuck to the Brad Pitt work out I found online.

After the workout, we had another protein shake and off to work.


Ilya's job ended by 5 pm. However, I have two jobs so when I had double shifts, I came home late.

Therefore, when I had double shift, Ilya worked on the drills alone at home while I tried to drill a little on the train back home :D lol

When I ended my work by 5pm, we drilled together.


Like I said, we didn't do anything intense. We did basic drills with intensity.

Since we needed at least 5 hours of sleep, we slept by 10:30-11 pm.

We ate healthy too.
I made the meal and we packed it into the neat lunch box I got from Wal-Mart.

Other than the protein shakes, we had the meal (picture below) on lunch and dinner, had snacks between breakfast and lunch, and between lunch and dinner.

Rice (white/brown), Chiken, Green Salad

It was not easy to do all this. lol

I mean we were awake and active for almost 20 hours a day.

But we kept going, believing one thing......

I mean if you can't believe in yourself, how can you keep on improving for the better?

Of course we had arguments as well.

I mean our lifestyle were pretty repetitive. It wasn't really fun lol
Especially when you don't see that much of a progress, it was very stressful.

So we talked a lot. A LOT OF TEXTING during work LOL
We discussed about many different topic. Dance, work outs, diet, videos, jokes, girls, mentality, inspiration, life etc.

The conversation made us understand each other as a person more than before.
And kept pushing ourselves to keep on going.

I felt all of this was worth doing when I went to events with Ilya, especially at Electro Soul Satisfaction (waiting for the organizer of the event to upload the video. Review of the event will be posted once the vids are published).

Having Ilya aside when I was battling influenced me more than I could ever imagine.

Since I got into this dance battle environment, I've always been alone.
I had a crew, but I've always lead the crew. Therefore, when I battled, I got prepared and pushed my ass up to go against someone.

But this time, I had a partner that slapped (more like slammed lol) my back to get me prepared physically and mentally.
Not only that, I had someone who knew what I should do or should've done and I can ask for advice for the next battle.

This was very new to me
But having a crewmate that I can rely on gave me strength.

Now we are a part since I'm going back to Japan for a week before visiting LA.

Our summer training is not over yet.

But I just wanted to summarize what we've done till this point.

 LA is going to be AWESOME.

We will keep striving to evolve as a human being, dancer, popper, and crewmates.

Kamikaze What The Funk?! Crew

Training with consistency to gain the power to bring destruction on the dance floor!!! 

Peace and God Bless

SUGALOO

Day 12: What is What The Funk?! Kamikaze?

So on Tumblr, someone asked the meaning of sugaloofujinfunk.

Well, this is the original blog post I made when we actually made the name and custom hats!!! lol

So here it goes....

_________________________________________________________________________________
Blog from What The Funk?! Crew

The idea sparked from SUGALOO and Poppin iLL talking about becoming a 2 man battle team of our crew since we've been battling together at events constantly.

We chose the name 神風(Kamikaze) because we want to become battling poppers that destroy everything that stands in our way (opponent)to reach the goal(winning the battle) and also to bring new flavor to the scene.

According to the ancient story of Japan, Kamikaze is formed by two gods know as Fujin (風神）god of wind and Raijin（雷神）god of lightning.

They are also one of the most well known gods in Japan because the painting by Tawaraya Soutatsu titled 風神雷神図 Fujin Raijin zu(picture below) is preserved as a national treasure in Japan.




To make this vision and hope to life, I created a customize hat and shirt.

he hat is done and here it is



RAIJIN/God of Lightning (Poppin iLL)









...................................................

































nah this is it LOL

RAIJIN/God of Lightning (Poppin iLL)



FUJIN/God of Wind (SUGALOO)




"Raijin and Fujin of kamikaze on the mission to amaze, create craze, taking over the dance floor that is our door to fame. What The Funk?! Crew for life!!!"

Peace and God Bless

Battle Team, 神風(kamikaze) of What The Funk?! Crew.

The idea sparked from SUGALOO and Poppin iLL talking about becoming a 2 man battle team of our crew since we've been battling together at events constantly.

We chose the name 神風(Kamikaze) because we want to become battling poppers that destroy everything that stands in our way (opponent)to reach the goal(winning the battle) and also to bring new flavor to the scene.

According to the ancient story of Japan, Kamikaze is formed by two gods know as Fujin (風神）god of wind and Raijin（雷神）god of lightning.

They are also one of the most well known gods in Japan because the painting by Tawaraya Soutatsu titled 風神雷神図 Fujin Raijin zu(picture below) is preserved as a national treasure in Japan.




To make this vision and hope to life, I created a customize hat and shirt.

he hat is done and here it is



RAIJIN/God of Lightning (Poppin iLL)









...................................................

































nah this is it LOL

RAIJIN/God of Lightning (Poppin iLL)



FUJIN/God of Wind (SUGALOO)




We will be rocking those to events starting Boogie Nation 2011!!!

If you are going to the event, we will see you there!

Peace n God Bless.

P.S For people interested in Boogie Nation, here is the Facebook information.

Place: Club 412
412 8th ave ( 31st Street ) Next to MSG / Penn Station
New York, NY

Time: 9PM-2AM

Hosted By: NYC Popping Academy

Boogie Nation NYC 2011 1 on 1 Popping Championship

$10 with flyer or RSVP
$15 with out
( so its really only $10 because why would you not rsvp nor have flyer printed ? )

Part of NYC popping dance week 2011

Hosted by Tommy Hypno Chan

DJ
Break Easy
Spinning all your popping music all night

Judge
Tiny Love
Big Mike
The people there! - Boogie Nation style


1 on1 Popping Battle
Group round if we have alot of people
If we can get everyone there and have the battle starts at 11pm then we can do 2 rounds each even if we have 16 people.
However we always want to keep the battle low # and short so there is more time for just open music.

King Tut Contest - only 4 to 8 dancer max .You get 1 min or 2 to do your thing. ( One round )

Come early because this not that long of an event. Event starts at 9.30 then come at 9.30

Have your $10 bill - we don't have change !

Bring your own water and have fun!