DB: Im delighted to be able to interview you, Samuel. I truly admire what Ive read and heard about your work in helping people open to inner awareness through movement and mime. I think it would be helpful to start with a thumbnail sketch of where you were born and raised and how you got to where you are now.

SA: An outline? That could fill books! Ill try. I was born in Morocco, in a simple religious Jewish family with traditional, old-ways. Part of my mothers and fathers families are descended from Castile, from refugees to Morocco after the expulsion from Spain in 1492. We grew up in Morocco in a very humble way, in the Sephardi Jewish tradition.
The way I remember my childhood, it was beautiful, but there was one dark cloud around it. At that time all the boys in Jewish schools had a black and red uniform as a sign of mourning. We grew up during the Holocaust. Our Rabbi hinted at things, such as, A lot of our people are being burned right now in Europe. Thats why before we began class we had to pray a special prayer. I remember that very well.

DB: In what grade was that?