Breaking it down

Andrew Glazer

Dressed in baggy nylon clothing, with tight muscles and bulging bravado,

they battle.

They roll, spin and flip on the floor, staring at each other -- a break

in eye contact shows weakness -- while crowds gather to watch the

spectacle.

“It’s about respect, becoming important to other crews,” said 19-year-old

Jesus Ramirez, called “Martian” by his friends because when he was

younger, he had a mole resembling a small antenna on his forehead.

Ramirez is part of the Naughty Boys crew, a group of break dancers who

meet each week at a community center to teach each other new moves and

practice routines.

Occasionally, the Naughty Boys challenge other crews in break dancing

“battles.” Crowds of spectators determine the winner by applauding the

showiest moves, most unique styles and the best teamwork.

Watching the Naughty Boys practice routines and exchange moves is

witnessing folk art -- dismissed by pop culture in the late 1980s as a

fleeting novelty or trend -- as it is passed along.

Break dancing was born in the schoolyards and street corners of the Bronx

in the 1970s. Its historians -- many break dancers, including Ramirez,

know hip-hop history like baseball fans know statistics -- say its birth

coincided with the development of rap music, graffiti art and deejaying.

But while rap music and deejaying thrive in mainstream, suburban America,

break dancing has remained relatively underground.

Spiky-haired Luis Mendoza, 13, was hanging out with friends at the Save

Our Youth after-school program when he saw, and was impressed by, the

break-dancing Naughty Boys. Six months later, after watching, practicing

and eventually dancing with the crew, he became its youngest member.

When Luis -- who unlike the other Naughty Boys, still looks like a boy --

arrived Wednesday, they all slapped his back and urged him to dance.

“Ya no puedo; I can’t now. I hurt myself,” he said, massaging his thigh

-- the site of a recent break-dancing injury.

But within seconds, he was spinning on the tattered linoleum mat like a

tea cup at Disneyland. Hip-hop music buzzed through the weak speakers of

a boombox on the floor.

“Oh, you almost got it. Try to get your hands out more,” said N.J. Fazai,

15, the charismatic, unofficial leader of the Naughty Boys. “Oh!, I like

that one!”

Next came Destiny Mercado, 14, who had been break dancing for only a

week. She peeled off her sweatshirt, rolled down the top of her shorts,

dropped to the floor and pretzeled her legs.

“Damn, fool! After seeing that, I don’t want to break any more,” N.J.

said, slapping “five” with other Naughty Boys. “Girls are naturals.”

For hours, the Naughty Boys watched one another dance, encouraging

fanciful moves, but with fatherly restraint.

“Don’t do that, fool. You’ll get hurt!” N.J. warned Edwin “Kid Twist”

Bonilla, who tried spinning on his head.

But the true communal spirit of the Naughty Boys was most apparent when

they danced together. N.J. and Ramirez flipped one another around the

mat, splitting from each other to dance independently, then rejoining,

like an amoeba.

Ramirez wiped sweat from his forehead after the exercise, slapping his

partner the obligatory “five.”

“I just like to express myself,” he said. “I’ll keep breaking until my

bones break.”