Perhaps this is one of the many reasons why Capoeira is flourishing around the world because it allows people to be themselves and work at overcoming their physical and mental limitations which they may have or others may have placed on them. Its unique and graceful movements have defied categorisation such that it cannot be strictly pigeonholed as a sport, combat art or a performing art per se (leaving authorities very befuddled when trying to define it). Yet this 300-year-old art form is instrumental in giving birth to one of pop culture’s greatest phenomenon - breakdancing - which takes movements from Capoeira and modifies them accordingly.

Capoeira is a street game. So it is not surprising to find Capoeiristas playing Capoeira on the sidewalk or at street corners. Onlookers witnessin a street roda (pronounced as “hor-dah”) meaning “circle” may think that the two capoeiristas are duelling, fighting or dancing. They are right. And they are also wrong. They are witnessing a physical chess game, an elegant display of physical and mental prowess, where players strategise their games, outwitting each other with movement.

Capoeira movements are at its most elegant home depot holiday hours when two seasoned capoeiristas jogar (play) within the roda, embroidering their movements, counterattacks, takedowns, floreios (flourishes) and acrobatic tricks with wit and cunning.

All that is done to the rhythm of the berimbau that dictates the speed and style of the game. The berimbau is usually accompanied by the pandeiro and atabaque.As such, it is de rigueur for a capoeirista to learn how to play all the instruments in a bateria because without music, there is no Capoeira or roda. Students are further trained to not only listen to the natural rhythms of their bodies but to play and mentally gather positive energy from the traditional music of Capoeira, whose rhythms dictate the flow of games and passes on generations of Capoeira stories.