tangocherie

The Church of Tango: a Memoir, published January 21, 2012

2012-01-24T09:38:00.000-03:00

Finally.

I started writing this story at the time it began--in February of 1992, when I was so depressed after my husband's death I wanted to swallow all of his left-over meds and follow him into the beyond. So what began in a way as a journal or diary became the chronicle of my road to survival in four countries. And once I made that decision to live no matter what tragedy came my way, I plugged on, through one tremendous loss after another, by dancing. No, not yet had the tango found me, but whatever dance there was at the time came to my rescue. I had always been a dancer, and now I knew dance could save me from despair.

As my adventures unfolded, the manuscript grew and grew. I had to make cuts in events, characters, reflections and realizations. That was the hardest part of bringing this story to fruition. There is so much left out. Who knows, maybe I'll write The Daughter of the Church of Tango, or a prequel one day.

Our students come from all over the world: China, The Philippines, Australia, Viet Nam, New Zealand, Hawaii, South Africa, India, Nepal, Finland, Russia, Israel, Scandinavia, all over Europe, Chile, Brazil, Colombia, Ecuador, Mexico, Canada and the U.S. And one question almost all ask me is, how did I end up teaching tango in Argentina?

This book is my answer.

Lots of women have come to Buenos Aires for tango, stayed a while, and went home and wrote about their experiences. There are a couple of tango histories available in English, as well as a couple of Buenos Aires milonga guide books. There are self-help books using tango as a way to better interpersonal relationships. There are some novels about tango in Buenos Aires.

My memoir is not like any of them; it is not a "tango book," but a story of survival that cuts across death, cancer, Alzheimer's, loss of home and homeland and cherished heirlooms and possessions, loss of shared histories, of hope for one's children, of hope for the future, of love. But it's also about finding love and unexpected joy. And about listening to the music and dancing.

It can be ordered from the printer online: https://www.createspace.com/3733773

Now available on Amazon and soon as an ebook for Kindle.

La Confiteria Ideal--the Soul of Tango

2011-12-06T14:29:00.001-03:00

La Confitería Ideal is the iconic tango salon of Buenos Aires. When tourists and dancers alike pass through the double doors on Suipacha near Corrientes, they feel in their gut they are entering the historic soul of tango.

However La Ideal spent almost all of its life since it was built in 1912 as a pastry shop and salon de te´, and it wasn't until the 1990s that tango dancing became its raison d'etre. The original owners were pastry chefs and entrepreneurs from Spain, who required that the building be constructed of expensive materials from all over Europe.

The French Fleur de Lys became the enigmatic emblem because at that time all of the expensive buildings in Buenos Aires were influenced by French architectural design, albeit La Belle Epoque of a few decades past. For that reason the premises seem much older than a scant century, and also because it is now derelict and decrepit. The gorgeous cage elevator hasn't worked in decades, and the iconic stained glass pastry quiosco glorieta empty but for the occasional tango shoe display.

The gorgeous elevator that hasn't moved in decades

Emblematic empty display case

I will never forget walking up its marble staircase for the first time, smelling the mustiness, the cat piss, the burning incense lit to hide the odors of a building past its prime. I was a beginning tanguera in a culture that had seen very few tango tourists up to then. The milonga habitués looked upon our tour group from America as exotic creatures from another world, as I suppose we were. That's how we viewed the salon and the dancers of La Ideal.

All of this adds to its faded glamor.

Through the decades it was the place to meet your friends for afternoon tea, particularly after work. It became de riguer for the bourgoisie of Buenos Aires (especially the English) to meet there and have their private parties on Saturdays.

The upstairs ballroom was used for special occasions; the ground floor for tea, coffee, and the delicious pastries La Ideal was famous for, as well as live music. It's said that the miga sandwich was invented there as a copy of English finger sandwiches.

Between 1979 and 1981 it was converted into a café-concert with all types of live music, including a famous all-girl orchestra and The Five Latins. The salon has been visited over the years by many celebrities, such as Maurice Chevalier, Charles Aznavour, Mirta Legrand and Daniel Tinayre, Jorge Luis Borges, Ernesto Sábato, Yoko Ono, Sting, Charly García, Diego Maradona, Julio Bocca,Moria Casán, Willem Dafoe, Robert Duvall, María Félix, Dolores del Río, Vittorio Gassman..
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It also has been used as a location for all of the tango movies, so first-time visitors feel a déja-vu, of having dreamed this place. As indeed it is the stuff of dreams--many scenes in my memoir, The Church of Tango, take place in La Ideal.

Lots of rumors surround La Ideal, and no one seems to actually know who owns it--some say the government--but the truth is that it is owned by a private organization that receives no government help to maintain this historic structure. (It is managed by Jorge Vieites Rouco.) Unfortunately, it is falling apart before our eyes, even though it is now proclaimed an official Bar Notable. I wouldn't be surprised if one day a foreigner steps in to save it--in the manner of Versailles in France. Sometimes foreigners value a place's heritage more than the locals.

Several years ago the gigantic central chandelier below the skylight on the first floor, worthy of the Phantom of the Opera, crashed to the floor, and I presume never to be seen again.


My photo from '97: see the huge chandelier? Now gone.

And on Oct 12, 2008--the ceiling falls:

Once upon a time there was the Gran Ciné Ideal (recently a porno theater) next door which insured that the confiteria was even more heavily used before and after film showings.


La Confiteria is at the right of the theater.

And a story which I find fascinating: originally the ceiling of the ground floor was open in an oval shape matching the skylight, and upstairs was a gallery around this opening for people to look down, and for light and the skylight to be seen from below. Years later the stone dance floor was laid down.


Here you can see the oval on the ceiling of the ground floor that used to be open

When I first visited La Ideal and took my first tango classes in Buenos Aires, there was only one milonga there, the Friday afternoon dance of Diego y Zoraida. Now there are more than twelve milongas every week in the same space, with classes from different teachers every day. Another recent change is that Suipacha has recently been made into a pedestrian street.

A visiting tourist might not actually know what tango is, but feels certain that the tango was born at La Ideal, although tango didn't arrive there until the middle of the 1990s, just shortly before I visited for the first time in 1997. I too thought I saw the ghosts of tangueros of dusty years past in the mirrors lining the walls. The building itself has a haunting presence and a life of its own. May it live forever.

The BBC Documentary

Read more: La Confiteria Ideal

Annual Thanksgiving Post

2011-11-21T12:11:00.000-03:00

Just like Art Buchwald used to do with his Thanksgiving column explaining the custom to the French, here is a republishing of my annual Thanksgiving post. Happy Thanksgiving to everyone, even if this coming Thursday isn't your traditional day. We all have much to be grateful for.

Each autumn when the harvest is brought in, the people of the world throw a party. Here in Argentina the grape harvest is celebrated in March in Mendoza. But at any time during the year, somewhere in the world people are giving thanks for their blessings.

The biggest holiday in the U.S. is celebrated on the fourth Thursday of November, and is also a harvest festival. Bigger than Christmas or the 4th of July, it is Thanksgiving Day. No matter the culture, race, or religion, on this day the salad bowl of American people are united by one tradition: a family feast of traditional foods (with ethnic specialities often added), and then football on TV.

Did you know that eight nations of the world have official Thanksgiving Days? -- Argentina, Brazil, Canada, Japan, Korea, Liberia, Switzerland and the United States. (But try as I might, I could find no information on Thanksgiving in Argentina.)

The ancient tradition of declaring a special day or period for giving thanks goes back to the time when our ancestors hoped that an ostentatious display of gratitude would placate their capricious gods - thus ensuring continued bounty. But these days of thanksgiving were also occasions for celebrating the year's plenty with feasts and joyful gatherings.

Proclaiming days of Thanksgiving for various reasons - success in war, a bounteous harvest, the recovery of a king from illness - was part of European tradition for centuries.

Modern North American Thanksgiving lore is associated with the Pilgrims. In 1621, a year after arriving in the new world on the Mayflower, and following a severe winter in which many of their numbers had succumbed to disease, the colonists celebrated their first successful harvest by organizing a thanksgiving feast to which they invited the neighboring Native Indians. On the menu for that first American Thanksgiving were almost certainly some foods that are staples of the holiday today - turkey and pumpkin - along with other wild fowl, venison, oysters, clams, fish, corn cakes, and wild fruit and nuts.

But enough about history! What's for dinner?

On most North American tables, a turkey still holds pride of place for the annual Thanksgiving feast. In the US alone, over 40 million turkeys are consumed on this holiday weekend each year!

In November 1997 the United Nations General Assembly unanimously declared the year 2000 as the official International Year of Thanksgiving.

That same year, an English writer and director, Gurinder Chadha, came out with the quintessential American Thanksgiving movie, called, WHAT’S COOKIN? In it, four families in Los Angeles, my hometown, celebrate Thanksgiving Day. The families are Mexican, Vietnamese, Jewish, and black, and show the dysfunctions and problems that all families have in common. On Thanksgiving Day, their commonality is also thankfulness.

We all have something to be grateful for, especially we expats, even though it's hard to be far from home and family on this most American of holidays.

Springtime in Buenos Aires is not turkey time, and last year we had a delicious Argentine barbecue on our terrace, but still, on Thanksgiving Day and every day, I am thankful for you, dear readers!

Thanks for the Memoirs!

2011-11-19T10:56:00.001-03:00

Just as my own memoir, The Church of Tango, is readying itself for publication, there is yet another woman's tango memoir soon to be published in the UK. I guess that proves there is an audience out there. Where are the tango memoirs written by men? There are a couple of excellent books by men, Long After Midnight at the Nino Bien, kind of a non-fiction novelized travelogue by yanqui Brian Winter, and Here At the End of the World We Learn to Dance, a well-written novel by kiwi Lloyd Jones, a prize-winning author.

Now there is Twelve Minutes of Love by Kapka Kassabova, a Bulgarian who currently lives in Scotland, which is beingpublishedthis month by Portobello Books. Here is the artistic trailer for the book, featuring oil paintings by animation artist Em Cooper, music by Piazzolla, and stage tango moves.
Do I have a dirty mind or are there ink blot references to a woman's anatomy?

I understand why there are so many tango blogs and memoirs, as people are trying to explain to themselves and others the profundity and emotional content of this dance that is inexplicable in words. Men write tango blogs, but as yet no tango memoir. I wish I were a psychologist so I could speculate as to why. And why women feel compelled to share their emotional tango journeys with others.

You can listen to a BBC interview with Kapka, as well as our own Sally Blake, author of Happy Tango: Sallycat's Guide to Dancing in Buenos Aires.

And now I'd better get to work on my video trailer for The Church of Tango! Any ideas for me out there?

B.A. Tango #209 Download Here

2011-11-15T19:42:00.001-03:00

The latest quarterly edition of the complete guide to tango in Buenos Aires. To better preserve the graphic definitions, the digital magazine is in three parts:

aBAT 209 Digital 1

aBAT 209 Digital 2

aBAT 209 Digital 3

Friends Forever or Acquaintances for Now?

2011-10-26T21:57:00.000-03:00

In the States, "everyone" is our "friend," even if we just met them. It's our culture and our language. We want to be friendly. We smile a lot and try to act friendly.

We talk about Man's Best Friend, we belong to the Friends of the Library, we are Best Friends Forever with someone for a week.

I'm a person who has few friends, but the ones I have are "cherce!" My current friends in Buenos Aires are not at all the ones I thought I had when I moved here permanently. I had met some local people on several vacation dancing trips since 1997, other foreign dancers like me, and of course, the milongueros. I enjoyed the company of these folks; I didn't feel so alone thinking I had friends here.

When I became a "local" myself in 2003 and people saw me every day, I lost glamour. I was no longer the exotic foreigner who came and went, bearing gifts. The milongueros became noticeably uncomfortable that I was always here, watching and comparing notes with others. They saw me like the local I now was. Many milongueros enjoy the fact that tourists hit and run, leaving them free to start a fresh seduction with someone new and innocent. The game can be more important to them than the conquest.

While I continued to enjoy "friendship" with local ladies, I realized that I felt used. People I hardly knew asked me to bring them all sorts of things with no offers of reimbursement. I had parties and invited these "old friends" as well as new ones I was making. But they didn't participate or reciprocate. One local did invite me to a party but then charged me for the food Ruben and I ate, despite our bringing wine and a gift. Others tried to profit off of my foreign friends, trying to sell them shoes, tango clothes, jewelry, tours, places to stay.

When I couldn't afford anymore to invite locals out to restaurant dinners as I used to, our relations changed. There is a common attitude of "foreigner = money" and there are certain expectations.

Many tango tourists do as I used to do and enjoy treating local dancers. Ruben and I love treating folks to an empanada lunch or an asado at our apartment. The error is to consider everyone our "friends." We throw that word around a lot in English, rarely using "acquaintance" as Ruben does to describe our relationships, but in Spanish, people don't often talk about "amigos." After all, real strong and enduring friendships are infrequent and not that easy to make. What do they say, a friend is someone we can call at 3 a.m. to take us to the emergency room? We shouldn't fool ourselves that everyone we know would do that for us.

Do we believe that all those friendly folks at the milongas are our friends? Do we even know much about them? We know how they dance and if they smell good and perhaps in what part of town they live in, but usually that is about all. Because we are not there to make life-long friends; we are there to have dance and fun. Sometimes knowing too much about a dance partner ruins the experience. It's wonderful to have acquaintances, "conocidos," too.

In searching for an illustration for this post, the "friends" images on Google were either of animals, children, or the "Friends" TV series. "Acquaintance" images were mostly cartoons, and posters for the Bette Davis movie, "Old Acquaintance."

In Spanish, the primary images for "amigo" are cars and electric wheel chairs (??!) For "conocido" it's pictures of men alone, including Jesus and Che Guevara. For "conocida," the female acquaintance, it's the Virgin, flowers, and fairies. Go figure.

My favorite theme of "Sex and the City" was the bond between the four women. The writing portrayed the quality of friendship as more important and enduring than a date with a man, as real life female relationships have tended to do the opposite: I'll spend the evening with you as long as a man doesn't call me for a date. Some of the moments with the TV women expressing love and caring for each other in difficult circumstances often brought me to tears. I didn't envy their Jimmy Choos, their apartments, jobs, or boyfriends--I wanted a circle of friends like that. But it wasn't reality. And there are certainly few real friendships in Tinsel Town. But the ones I have are "cherce!"

Intimo Maximiliano Guerra

2011-10-23T12:24:00.000-03:00

With the retirement of Julio Bocca, Maxi Guerra has become the #1 male superstar of Argentine dance. He's getting a little older now (over 44) and is broadening his horizons by being a judge on the TV show, Talento Argentino, and moving out of the strictly classical dance he is famous for.

Last week I attended a gala benefit for the hospital volunteer society, Damas Rosadas, in the gorgeous old Teatro Avenida on Avenida de Mayo, starring Maxi and the Ballet del Mercosur. He has donated much time and energy over the years to various charities and this program was no exception.

In this "Intimo" program of four short pieces, Guerra wanted to show the various influences on his life and career over time, an homage to his roots and culture.

The show began with "Ritual," a ballet to folklore music like the Zamba and Chacarera and also African folklore by way of Cuba. Reminded me somewhat of the Rite of Spring. Then Maxi and his fantastic ballerina, Julieta Saravia, danced an impressive pas de deux, "Requiem Urbano" choreographed by him to French music of the 60s. The third piece, "Cuando Bailamos," also choreographed by Guerra, was set to Emerson Lake & Palmer, and had ballerinas on point dancing disco moves. I thoroughly enjoyed this first half of the show despite the over-reliance on the smoke machine, which made it difficult to see everything clearly despite our excellent seats. I can only imagine what the dancers felt breathing it in.

After intermission, a tango piece by Mora Godoy closed the show. Unfortunately the choreography was uninspired, repetitive, gancho-heavy, and boring. And a waste of Maxi's talents, proving once again that a great classical dancer is not necessarily able to dance tango as it should be danced.

I applaud this generous artist of spectacular charisma and talent for tirelessly giving back from his kind heart. I enjoyed my night out with a good friend for a good cause, and we finished the warm spring evening on the sidewalk in front of Los 36 Billiards with huge drinks of vodka while a couple performed tango inside to live flamenco music (!)

Champagne, Blanco, Rosado, Tinto--en esta orden!

2011-10-10T09:49:00.000-03:00

Happy Camper!

Ruben and I were invited to share in the Anuva Wine Tastings at the Rendez-Vous Hotel in where else but the expat gringolandia of Palermo last week. I've had the affiliate link at the top right of my blog for quite a while, but didn't have first hand experience. Now I can wholeheartedly recommend a couple of hours in the company of Dan Karlin, the founder, and Sarah of Anuva Wines who teach and share their knowledge of hard-to-find Argentine wines, as well as sharing generous pourings of the wines in question.

We tasted five excellent wines from the lower priced portion of their wine list which all sell for around $20-25 usd a bottle. You can purchase the wines on the spot or have them shipped. There was little pressure to buy.

The favorite of the evening was the Mairena Bonarda 2006, a delicious red at $20. The others were Hom sparkling, Carinae Torrontes, San Gimignano Syrah, Caluna Blend.

The experience is definitely for tourists, especially those from the U.S., and recommended at the beginning of their Argentina visit so they can know a little more before imbibing throughout their journey. The tastings are primarily given in English, but a Spanish option is available by request. We were lucky that ours was bilingual because of Ruben and a Brazilian couple. The other guests didn't speak English, so Dan stepped up to the plate and did double duty.

I had read on the website that tapas would be served that go with each of the wines, but as you can see from my photo the food is not Spanish tapas of hot and cold dishes, but just small tasty bites.

The tastings are held in the small lobby of the hotel, and it was a cozy and comfortable ambiance. I think it would be great fun to organize a tasting for your own group, or even as a birthday party.


Hotel Rendez-Vous

The two-hour tasting costs $46 usd/person, which is too high for the locals, but as part of a vacation "splurge" for those who want to understand the Argentine wine culture, which is little known outside the country, it's probably worth it. These are not wines you can pick up in Coto or your local Chinese supermarket, but boutique wines from small wineries with limited distribution.

If you decide to make a reservation to attend a tasting, I would so appreciate it if you use the link here Anuva Wine Tastings or the graphic link up top. Thanks--tangocherie gets credit that way.

"Dark Tangos" Novel as a Free Download

2011-10-05T10:27:00.000-03:00

The starred review from BOOKLIST said, "Delivers its grim story line with artistic mastery....Short and precise, the novel uses the elegance of tango to radiate sensuality throughout. This is an absorbing and surprisingly action-packed tale based in the ugly truths of Argentina's history.'"

I'm reading the novel now and think it's excellent, especially the description of the tango and the milonga scenes.

You can download the free PDF file from the BoingBoing website--just click the book cover.

It's kind of discouraging because I'm getting my memoir, The Church of Tango, ready to publish. And Mr. Shiner is giving his ebook away for free. You can still purchase a hardback copy on Amazon for $23.10.

Pet Peeve

2011-09-26T14:24:00.000-03:00

I already did a series on the embrace: Holds and Embraces
and Learn by Looking where the woman's left arm is discussed.
The above photo is a recent one of the ever-increasing trend for the woman to grip the man's back like there's no tomorrow, with fingers spread and her shoulder raised. I think it looks hideous--either like she's trying to touch his ass or control him. I see it more and more in the milongas, especially by foreigners and young dancers. When our students ask about it, I say it's just a fad, while hoping it's nothing more than an affected passing fancy.

The milongueros don't like it, and it looks ugly. Why do more and more women adopt this death grip?

The other night I saw a tall woman dancing with a shorter man, and I swear she could have picked his back pocket had she wanted to. Kind of a reverse take on the canyengue posture, which legend has it was used to prevent the woman from lifting the man's wallet.

Canyengue-style embrace

I know styles change in everything. When I began dancing tango in 1997, it was the custom for the woman to look to her right instead of straight ahead as now.

When Ruben dances with someone who tries to "grab his ass" (just kidding), he doesn't let her; he flexes his right shoulder until her arm rises. A woman's left arm should be soft and feminine as it rests without weight or pressure on the man's shoulders.

When teaching the embrace to beginners, I tell them to embrace each other as if they were in love. To me and to most traditional dancers, this is the tango embrace. It doesn't matter if you know the person or not, if you like them or not--it is the position to dance tango.

John y Tania

Tango Lover's Guide to Buenos Aires

2011-09-08T14:19:00.000-03:00


Buy on Amazon

Tango tourism is a relatively new phenomenon in Buenos Aires. When I first came in 1997, it was a rarity. We 35 or so Americans were looked on as exotic, and many milongas and milongueros didn't know what to do with us. Luckily we had an expert guide (Daniel Trenner), and for many of us on the tour, it was a life-changing experience.

Since then foreigners from the four corners of the earth have flocked to Buenos Aires to experience the "real" tango in its birth place. Every serious tanguero eventually makes the pilgrimage.

But the milongas are a hidden world. You have to know where they are, which night of the week, what time. There are no neon signs outside saying, "Tango Here Tonight!" That's part of the charm.

But sometimes foreign tangueros get lost. They don't know where, when, what milongas to attend, even if they have a list of them, even if they have all of the free tango magazines in hand.

Because it's important to know what style is danced, the age group, the ambiance, I'm surprised that more tango guides for foreign dancers have not been written. No matter what anyone claims, we all need help to figure out how to spend our time and our pesos when we visit Buenos Aires.

Migdalia Romero has written the Tango Lover's Guide to Buenos Aires: Insights and Recommendations to help the tango tourist make the most of their vacation. One thing I especially like about her book is the Table of Contents, but more importantly the Index, so helpful in finding the information you need that is buried in the middle of the book.

To help keep the information current, she publishes monthly an online guide to changes and special tango events.

Also included is information on tango shows, cultural centers, shopping, restaurants.

Another resource to add to Sally Blake's Happy Tango.

The Only Champion is the Tango!

2011-09-01T00:04:00.001-03:00

Ruben and I Dancing Final Round at La Rural in 2006

Two days ago the World Champions of Salon Tango 2011 were chosen at the huge venue of Luna Park in Buenos Aires.

The premier five winners are:

1st Place: Diego Julian Nenavidez Hernandez and Natasha Agudelo Arboleda -- Colombia

2nd Place : John Erban and Clarissa Sanchez -- Venezuela

3rd Place : Brian Nguyen and Yuliana Basmajyan -- USA

4th Place: Mauro Zompa and Sara Masi -- Italia

5th Place: Cristian Andres Lopez and Naoko Tsutsumizaki -- Japon

Unprecedentedly a tie between first and second place caused an exciting Dance-Off to pick the Champions. Here the two couples from Colombia and Venezuela dance three extra tangos at the end of the competition:

Also for the first time in the history of the Campeonato Mundial del Tango del Salon, no Argentine was among the first five.

The judges for the Tango Salon Finals were Maria Nieves, Miguel Angel Zotto, Eduardo Arquimbau, Julio Duplaa (organizer of the milonga Sin Rumbo), Carlos Borquez, Guillermina Quiroga and Jorge Torres. All but Julio Duplaa are known for performing on stage, choreographing, and touring. In fact, Eduardo Arquimbau was in the first tango show I ever saw, Tango Argentino, in the Pantages Theater in Hollywood in the '80s. And then on my first trip here in '97, I saw him perform at the Michelangelo in San Telmo with his wife, Gloria, and also took group classes with them at La Ideal. Maria Nieves, ex-wife and partner of Juan Carlos Copes, is a tango superstar. Guillermina is famous for her work on stage and in film.

The tango championships were created in 2002 to bring more attention to the art form and to bring money and business and more tango to Buenos Aires. It was only in 2001 that the country suffered a debilitating and traumatic economic crisis. "What shall we do to get the country out of the doldrums? I know, we'll have a big fiesta about what we know and do best--along with beef and red wine (and sometimes football.)" An influx of business and tango tourism could only help. And it did.

It began small and standards were lower and fewer. Dance rules were posted but not insisted on. Fewer pesos were awarded. Winners were older.

Then Argentine associations in several countries began to sponsor competitions on their home ground, the winners to get free travel to Buenos Aires to compete in the Mundial. Competitors figured out that it was "good" for them to come early and study with the judges on the panel. Beautiful young women figured out that flirting with the judges while wearing scanty clothing couldn't hurt either. Judges awarded prizes to students, favorites, and sometimes even family members (Maxi Copello the year we competed in the Metropolitano.) Everyone knew that the judging was prejudiced.

Soon the government realized what a great marketing and PR jewel they had in the tango contests, and advertized for participants around the world to come to Buenos Aires to compete. A Tango Festival was added, with free concerts, milongas, lectures, and classes to sweeten the pot. Venders paid to show their wares. It was a win-win situation for everyone. Tango tourism bloomed in August, and local citizens got free entertainment.

This year the pot turned a little sour for some. There was a big fracas in May over whether or not foreigners could compete in the Metropolitano, previously only open to residents of Buenos Aires, a law suit was brought by disgruntled Americans, and the whole city championship nullified. I didn't understand the problem as anyone could compete in the World's in August no matter where they came from.

And then out of 40 finalistas, of which 18 were Argentine, no Argentines finished in the first five of the traditional Tango Salon championship! While all the finalists were beautiful dancers and did a great job on the stage at Luna Park, it's very hard to believe that none of the competing Argentine dancers couldn't do as well. Salon tango has to be improvised, but certainly the three tangos danced in the above video--to popular recordings of famous tangos by Di Sarli, Fresedo, and Rodriguez--were practiced and choreographed, not led. Sorry. Take a closer look.

Diego Hernandez, the Colombian First Place winner, was overheard in an interview saying (smugly) it's as if an Argentine won the Cumbia Competition in Colombia. "Like there's no way in hell that's ever going to happen."

Some of the tangueros and milongueros of Buenos Aires felt like he gave them the finger. (Colombia is famous for its variety of musical styles and high-quality of dancing. Colombia music genres)

And many Argentine dancers feel that the government is giving away their tango. Or rather, selling it.

If Buenos Aires becomes no longer the Mecca of tango, if people can study in Bogota or Los Angeles or Tokyo with world tango champions, why should tango tourism continue to rise along with the high inflation?

From my point of view, Argentina never thinks or plans long-term; get it while you can seems to be the prevailing philosophy of everyone from the lowest to the highest. Planning and saving has never helped them in the past. So they go for the gusto.

'The good news is that this is growing fantastically year after year," a delighted Mayor Mauricio Macri said. Maybe he should think ahead a few more years?

In 2009, tango was declared by UNESCO to be a World's Intangible Cultural Heritage of Humanity by the United Nations.

From the Huff Post:

The 24 members of UNESCO's Intergovernmental Committee of Intangible Heritage granted the tango dance and its music protected cultural status at its meeting in Abu Dhabi.

The designation may make Argentina and Uruguay, which both claim to be tango's birthplace, eligible to receive financial assistance from a specialized fund for safeguarding cultural traditions. It will also help both governments justify using public funds to preserve their most famous export after beef.

This article is illustrated by this one photo only--stage tango, or Tango Gringo. Is this the dance and music (Gotan Project, Piazzolla) that UNESCO aims to preserve as the cultural heritage of Uruguay and Argentina?

I'm wondering what "protected status" means. Here's what Tito Palumbo thinks.

He writes about the UNESCO designation in Patrimonio Cultural Inmaterial, in B.A.Tango, November 2009:

Money seems to be the reason.

It was considered that Tango is seen as extravagant and exotic
The Minister of touristic culture of the City of Buenos Aires must have lobbied.
A Tango Dance School is mixed up with the milongas.

The tango phenomenon is very widespread. Luckily, its extinction is not expected in the short or medium term. What appears in this declaration is an interweaving of interests among politicians, individuals with privileges and tango merchants with the intention of increasing their power and filling their pockets at the expense of not only local tax payers but also the entire world's population. The following step will be asking the United Nations for funds. It's none of our business; tango exists and remains despite their ploys to live on its fame!

In a wrap-up article today, La Nacion wrote, that the only champion is the tango:

...the final feeling was that, judging by the criteria of the jury, no

Argentine fell short of the most important category of this competition,

the Salon Tango category, which is the style (along with the "milonguero")

that locals dance with passion, frequency, and some skill in the vernacular milongas.

How is it that no one has won anything?, Ask the most outraged... and... no.

 

Of course, the Colombians deserve the prize, but that does not mean that

 the level of local dance has declined or that we are losing the throne.

 What hurts a bit, I think, is that two strangers will see the world

 with "our" flag, because, tango, despite of being a world heritage

 possession, Argentines still feel entitled to maintain custody of

 this beautiful creature which is leaving large dividends for those

 involved, directly and indirectly with it.



As a friend told me, perhaps it is a feeling a bit childish, but

 is something like an "I lend it to you, but do not break it."

As for my personal opinion, I quote these Argentine sources because I'm a little uneasy to criticize the country of which I am a guest, and the field in which I and my milonguero partner make our living. I am an outsider in Argentina but after so many years and so much attention paid, I must offer my point of view on this huge endeavor, the Campeonato Mundial. ( This post only refers to salon tango. Tango to me is about improvisation, emotion, connection, the embrace--ingredients of traditional social tango de salon, or tango milonguero.)

Money does seem to be the reason. But in the long run, yes, the only champion is the tango!

Everything's Beautiful at the Tango Club

2011-08-20T10:21:00.000-03:00

On Fridays when I lived in Los Angeles, as I wrote in the previous Tangofoot, my friends knew that if I'm not out dancing, they should check the morgue. The year before I had a shot of cortisone directly into the ball of my foot at the podiatrist's on Friday afternoon. So painful. I had been suffering from "dancer's foot," the official diagnosis.

By the time I hobbled into my apartment with my left foot in thick fat bandages, the painkillers had kicked in, and actually I felt pretty good. The pain in my foot was gone for the first time in months. I went next door and borrowed some heels from my friend Marita whose shoe size was larger than mine, stuffed my bandaged foot into the left one and wore two socks on the right and I went to dance.

Nuevo Chiqué

Later that night at the milonga, I looked around and saw many familiar people, the same ones I see at all the clubs and dances in L.A. They all had smiles on their faces. Especially when they were dancing. Because I had known these folks for years, I was acquainted with their backstories: the private hurts, anguishes, jealousy, rejections, liaisons, gossip, and backstabbing.

You couldn't tell by looking. People were mixing and dancing and chatting and listening to the great band and tapping their feet and laughing. Me too, my cortisone shot and my funny-looking feet were forgotten as I burned the floor.

Maybe some of us have had bad moments with each other over a period of time--bad dance experiences, some not-so-great personal relationships with friends and the opposite sex, slights both real and imagined--but when we all come together under one high ceiling and the gorgeous umbrella of music, we are one. Like family. We are all worshiping at the same church.


Milonga de los Consagrados

We might kick each other around occasionally, both literally and figuratively, but when the music's hot and the dancing's smoking, we are all in love. At least for five minutes.

B.A. Tango Guide #208 Download Here!

2011-08-15T11:44:00.002-03:00

B.A.tango 208 Digital

Lucky 7 Posts

2011-08-13T13:58:00.002-03:00

Lucky number 7, baby! Katie at Seashells and Sunflowers tagged tangocherie to participate in My 7 Links, a project organized by Tripbase. This post here fits in nicely because it is my Lucky 700th!

Katie writes: The chronological nature of a blog means that quality posts continually find themselves getting buried deeper and deeper in the archives with the passage of time. The idea behind My 7 Links is to dig up some of those posts at the bottom of the heap so that readers can discover "new" material or get reacquainted with old posts they'd forgotten about.

[1] My Most Beautiful Post
Una Tanda Mas

[2] My Most Popular Posts
The Circle of Tango, but Vettriano and His Secrets surprisingly comes in a close second. And any post about tango shoes is immediately popular. (The classic all-time favorite post is the page about Ruben y Cherie's Tango Lessons.)

[3] My Most Controversial Posts
Woo--ee, I opened a can of worms with this one: Passion, Love, Tango
After this post and my bits on TV's Bailando Por Un Sueno, and Dancing for Marcelo, I am very careful not to use "those" words that people are Googling at 3 a.m. Call me crazy, but I don't want "those" people to come to my blog for the wrong reasons! (Why do I care, right?)

[4] My Most Helpful Post
Probably my most practical post was Tangofoot, but since I just republished that one, I'll pick another. Actually, looking back through so many posts I think all of the ones on the etiquette and codigos in Buenos Aires have been most helpful, judging by the comments. But I'll list this one as also useful:
Seasons of Tango.

[5] The Post Whose Success Most Surprised Me
What Happens in BsAs Doesn't Stay in BsAs

[6] Posts I Feel Didn’t Get the Attention They Deserved
Mucho Macho
I Blog Therefore I Am
Piropo

[7] The Post That You Are Most Proud Of
Hero Worship/False Idols

And here I'm going to add another category: the posts I had the most fun writing. And guess what? They are all about Ruben!
Hoppy!
The Face of Pagliacci
El Negro y La Novia
Secrets of a Milonguero
The Milonguero Way
Timing is Everything! Part I

Excuse me for indulging myself, but then you only have Katie to blame!! Gracias, linda, for giving me a reason to ponder and review so many years of blogging!

And now the part where people hate me for tagging them. I nominate the following bloggers to carry the torch, if they feel like it:

Elizabeth http://elizabethbrinton.blogspot.com/
Candice http://notes-fromabroad.blogspot.com/
John http://tangocommuter1.blogspot.com/
Ampster http://ampstertango.blogspot.com/
Irene http://ireneandmanyung.blogspot.com/
Mark http://tango-beat.blogspot.com/
Patricio http://lamilongadel126.blogspot.com/

Now Why is That, Again?

2011-08-09T18:50:00.000-03:00

Now is the beginning of the Tango Tourist Season, and foreigners have swooped into Buenos Aires for the World Championships (now there is even a special category for foreign dancers) and this week is the Milongueando Festival.

We went to the opening milonga last night where the Orquesta Sans Souci with El Chino Laborde sang. (I loved that the first violinist is a girl!)

The apertura milonga of the Milongueando Week was in the Region Leonesa, my favorite salon in all Buenos Aires. The floor was jammed and still all the tables and chairs were full, very Buenos Aires. But everyone was speaking English, the floorcraft was sketchy with either no movement along the ronda or zig zagging around the floor, adornos and embellishments ruled, no cabeceos, and the dancers were all either foreign or touring teaching "celebrities." At times I thought I was back in the States!

I would have loved to ask some of the attendees why they spent all that money on air fare and were dancing with folks from home instead of at a traditional milonga down the street, like Gricel. But anyway, we all were having a good time, which is what counts. (Except when the top of Ruben's foot was stilettoed.)

But today I thought it might be worthwhile to revisit the posts below that addressed the phenomenon a few years back.

If you have an opinion, I'd love to hear it.

Why Indeed Come to Buenos Aires to Dance?

Why Do Some Dancers Bother to Come to BsAs?

The Buenos Aires Glow

Futuro Tango

2011-07-22T15:16:00.000-03:00

Last night in the milonga Nuevo Chique, a group of kids on their winter break from Comodoro Rivadavia (very south of Buenos Aires) danced an exhibition, showing indeed, that the "future of tango" is bright. Well dressed, well danced, with a lot of respect--bravo Futuro Tango!

Critique the Beginning of My Memoir

2011-07-21T14:26:00.000-03:00


Painting of my tango shoes by Mexican artist Santiago Corral

Please help me by critiquing the beginning of my memoir, The Church of Tango: Death, Dance, Destiny

by reading the first chapter here and commenting:
Create Space Preview
https://www.createspace.com/Preview/1085242

Be honest. I appreciate it.

Milonguero

2011-07-13T17:33:00.000-03:00

Lots of time is spent discussing and arguing in English over various terminology in tango--especially by Americans, and especially on the internet via tango blogs or tango mailing lists.

What style is danced: nuevo, apilado, orillero, Villa Urquiza, del centro, club, milonguero, de salon? To me it's like the monks in the Middle Ages arguing over how many angels can dance on the head of a pin.

When students are learning a new move, the men often ask, what is the name for this? The tangueros of Buenos Aires don't worry about the names of things--is it ocho cortado, ocho milonguero, or ocho arrepentido? What is important is only how you dance the movement, call it what you like.

And so what/who exactly is a milonguero? Besides a term that is thrown around casually, derisively, or as an honorific?

In other cultures the term milonguero is used almost interchangeably with tanguero--a man who dances tango. But here in Buenos Aires, milonguero has a special meaning: a man who is married to the milonga. He probably has some kind of menial day job--usually in a factory, or in an auto garage, or as a taxi driver--but every night he is found in the milongas, where he comes alive. He is not a stage dancer, nor a tango teacher--unless he has been coerced into instructing for lack of funds or by (usually) foreigners who want to dance like he does. And he has never taken a tango lesson himself. Tango is his life, not his work. He is famous for using his dance skills to conquer women. If you ask him if he is a milonguero, he will deny it and say he is a bailarine, a dancer.

Milonguero used to be a pejorative term, an insult, as in, "Oh, he is nothing but a milonguero!" Meaning the man hangs out in dance halls, seduces women, and has no real education or profession. A milonguero isn't a doctor, lawyer, engineer, or college professor who dances tango as a hobby. A milonguero is more the dance equivalent of a bar fly--a man who lives to dance, who gets drunk on the tango, and can not live without it.

Ruben Aybar, milonguero de mediana edad

Because of the history of the word, you can't really call a tanguero in New York or London or Sydney a milonguero, because he hasn't had time to be one, even if his culture allowed it. Most foreign tangueros are professional men with real careers and families and even if there were milongas all night long every night where they live, they probably wouldn't spend all their time dancing at them.

But nowadays, because the best dancers tend to be the ones who have danced the longest, the true milonguero is getting old, disappearing and unfortunately dying off. The modern world doesn't seem to have a place or time for a young man to loiter every night in tango halls, learning by watching the older men. And perhaps today's young men are not inclined to spend years waiting to be great dancers. So they take classes, and after a couple years of classes, they teach classes, because there is always someone who knows less than they do. And then they enter competitions to get a name, and then they take teaching engagements in other countries and are always touring, rarely are they in the milongas of Buenos Aires. No matter what style they say they dance, these men are not milongueros.

Today, to be politically correct, especially when the country's president is a woman, some people talk about milongueras, the female counterpart to the milonguero. But there really is no such thing. A woman hanging out in dance halls every night, meeting, flirting and dancing with strange men, has another name, and it has nothing to do with tango. So the correct term for a woman who dances tango is tanguera.

If you see a guy wearing this shirt, he is not a milonguero.

As times change, as the tango changes, as the milonguero viejo dies off, certainly the meaning of the word will also change. But while we still have real and true milongueros, men who grew up in the milongas and learned and followed the codigos and spent their lives dancing, let's not throw the word around lightly. A few decades ago it was an insult; now it is a compliment, and who knows what it will mean in the future. But while we still have the real live deal in our Buenos Aires milongas, let's save the term for them.

Tangofoot!

2011-06-26T13:57:00.001-03:00

(repost)

Before leaving on a trip to Buenos Aires in 1999, when I still lived in Los Angeles, I had been worried about my sore and painful feet. So much so in fact that I went to a podiatrist for the first time, and told him I was going to Argentina to dance, and he MUST make my feet stop hurting!

Thus I deserved the painful shot of cortisone in the ball of my foot. But with that and the skillful wrapping of my foot, going home in the surgical shoe was pain free and my only worry was about missing the local milonga that night. Which I didn't do, as I borrowed a bigger size of heels from my neighbor, one that would accomodate the bandages, and went and danced at the milonga anyway. There was a standing joke at that time that if Cherie wasn't there on Friday nights, I was either in the hospital or the morgue.

It was only later I learned the cortisone was temporary, and could not be repeated. So when I returned from Buenos Aires, I went to another podiatrist who specializes in sports medicine. He diagnosed my problem as--not bone spurs, arthritis, or bursitis as other doctors had told me--but “Dancer’s Foot.” Oh thanks. It’s genetic, and dancing ballet on my toes all my life hadn’t helped.

My foot is square and tango shoes are a triangle. A classical dancer must dance in pointe shoes and a tango dancer in pointy heels. Those are the working conditions. But if you wear only leather shoes and have them stretched (and you can do this more than once), it’ll help the squished toes problem.

It’s the women who mostly suffer from foot problems and it’s because of the high heeled shoes we wear. According to the L.A. Times (June 1, 1998), 87% of operations performed to correct acquired foot deformities, such as bunions and hammer toes, are undergone by women. In the United States, women visit the doctor for foot problems four times more often than men. In societies where people go barefoot or wear flat sandals, these problems are rare, and their frequency is the same in both sexes.

Luckily my new doctor was able to carve out supportive pads from my Dr. Scholls’ material, which really helped. My feet still hurt after three hours of dancing, but at least it wasn't agony.

For normal feet sore from dancing, wearing gel or cushion inserts in your dancing shoes can make a difference. Also using ice when you get home keeps the swelling down. If you’re injured while dancing, get some ice from the bar or use a cold can of unopened soda to rest your foot on. Taking your shoes off and massaging your feet every so often as you sit out a dance can give your aching feet a new lease on life. Then later soak them in hot water with plain or Epsom salt, and file down those calluses with a pumice stone. If your stomach can stand it, take anti-inflammatory medication such as Ibuprofen BEFORE going to dance.

Remember RICE--Rest, Ice, Compression, and Elevation for injuries.
I haven’t tried alternative medicine, but I have friends who swear by chiropractic, acupuncture, and Rolfing.

A professional dancer in Buenos Aires also gave me some exercise tips: flex and point your feet hard while you’re sitting down every day. And stretch out your toes by making a “fist” with the fingers of one hand in between the toes of one foot, and just holding it while you watch TV or talk on the phone. Then switch. When you get more stretched, try to use the fingers of both hands for one foot. Walking barefoot at home and on the beach is great foot exercise. Some people swear by expensive orthotics which are fitted to your foot by a podiatrist. But hopefully you won’t need them.

Usually it's the woman's right foot and/or ankle that is the most painful, because during the salida we spend quite a bit of time with all of our weight on just the ball of the right foot. In other steps as well--the cross, carousel, colgada--it's the right foot more often than the left.

But you know what? After dancing for so many years, now it doesn't bother me any more, even with the super spike heels I wear. Perhaps with the improvement in my technique, I've learned to handle it differently, I really don't know what happened. But I'm glad that here's one example of something that can get better with age.

Los Reyes del Tango!!

2011-06-24T23:52:00.000-03:00

The first time I heard them was in 1998 or 1999 in Torquato Tasso in San Telmo, and I went crazy. Now many years later I still am crazy for The Tango Kings, even though some of the orchestra's members have passed on, most notably José Libertella. But Juan D'Arienzo's fabulous music lives on through the eight-member players and singer of Los Reyes del Tango.

The occasion was to mark the Second Anniversary of the milonga Nuevo Chique, organized by Ruben y Marcela on Tuesdays and Thursdays at the Casa Galicia on San Jose near Alsina.

And celebrate we did! What a night for anyone who loves Juan D'Arienzo, and Ruben and I certainly do! People couldn't help dancing to the fabulous music, but I couldn't pry myself away from my front row center view of the musicians in action. The audience went crazy for them, and the musicians gave it back to us, with encores.

Me and The Kings

Marcela y Ruben

It was a super duper fabulous night, one which I won't forget any time soon.

Dancing With Cigars

2011-06-15T11:32:00.000-03:00


http://www.carascissoria.com/

I hate to mention it, but in all fairness probably Bill Clinton should be included in this collage.

I am overjoyed that I never had to dance with anyone smoking anything!

Book Crazy

2011-06-06T15:50:00.003-03:00

I am a trained information specialist, a librarian. I worked all my life with books and the organization of information. I have advanced degrees. Why then am I stumped with how to arrange the books in my one bookcase?


Showing half the biblioteca with Ruben and lovely student

Do I put them by size--the bottom shelf is the only one that will hold oversized art books. Do I put them by author? Those that are signed to me by the authors? Books that I've read vs books that I've yet to read? Books by country--I've got Argentina, Mexico, Cuba, France and Brazil--with a few about Italy, China, India, Guatemala, and Afghanistan. Books by subject--dance, writing, memoir, cemeteries (yes, I have lots of those), travel, art (generally the oversized ones), music, biography, children's, history (heavy on WWI & II), or as decorators sometimes do, by color?

I only have five shelves. If I get a new book, an old one has to go. Do I keep the really good ones I've read and hope to either reread or to pass on to someone else? If I can't remember I've read them, shall I read them again? If I haven't read them yet, what's the cut off time--how many months, years, decades should they hang around?

Today I emptied the five shelves to organize and to dust. Books accumulate dust like nobody's business and boy am I allergic.

Now I've filled the bookcase and there is still an equal number on the floor. Have they multiplied like coathangers in the back of a closet?

Bringing my books with me has been a tema in my life as a traveler and expatriate. Wherever I've lived there have been books in every room of my house. Just knowing they are there makes me feel good. Having collected books throughout my life, it was painful to pare down when I moved from Los Angeles. But there is nothing heavier than a box of books. And the books I have with me today I brought one by one on the plane with me each trip I made back for visits. I had to leave even more behind in my son's garage. But now he's moved, and I don't ask what happened to all of those books.

Some books I brought to Buenos Aires are quite valuable--so then what happens when I'm gone? No one here will know their value, or care. And realistically, why should I?

Since the living room is also our dance studio, the bookcase is the only area I have to display my tchotkes, and I've got a lot of those too.

No, I'm not ready to start over with a Kindle, thank you very much. But maybe one day.

Volcanic Eruption in Chile Affects Bariloche

2011-06-05T13:58:00.000-03:00

El Nahuel Huapi May 29, 2011

Timing is always everything, isn't it? And fortunately the timing for us to visit the spectacular scenic area of Argentina's Patagonia, was perfect. Because one week later it is a disaster of volcanic ash, polluted water, closed airports, and empty supermarkets.

So we were lucky to enjoy the clean air and waters, but the people there now, especially those suffering as I do from asthma and bronchitis, are paying big time for living in God's country.

I never worried before about Acts of God or natural disasters such as earthquakes, being used to them in Los Angeles; severe shakes as I'd experienced in '71 and '94 never frightened me.

However, after a severe earthquake I still had clean air to breathe if not any china dishes or antique pottery. Air is the number one ingredient for survival, and in a quake, if a falling building doesn't get you, you are probably ok.

I was always philosophical about Acts of God because, as insurance forms are quick to point out, they can't be helped and are nobody's fault.

One thing about living in Buenos Aires is that there are no earthquakes, tornadoes, hurricanes, floods, or volcanic eruptions. No Acts of God in particular, just lots of acts of people, for better but often for worse.

El Nahuel Huapi from a boat one week later

When I saw the videos on the news last night, of cars buried in ash in Bariloche, of day turned into night, of hospitals full of those who couldn't breathe--and with the week-old memory of the pristine skies and waters, I am heartbroken. My mind filled with images of Pompeii.

I believed that scientists could tell when a volcano was about to erupt, and people could be warned to leave the area. I guess not.

For nature, these events are not disasters, just things that happen in the scheme of the natural world. But for man--building his house on sand and damning the mudslides (as they do in Pacific Palisades, California), we need to have more respect. And appreciate when Mother Nature doesn't remind us who is the boss.

El Volcan Lanin, asleep for 3 centuries (it's covered in snow behind the green hill)

Patagonia--Land O'Lakes 'n Chocolate

2011-06-02T11:46:00.000-03:00

Plaza in San Carlos de Bariloche and Lago Nahuel Huapi

Pristine waters, snow-capped mountains, fresh, clean air, piney forests--I had been dreaming about it for so long.

So when DescuentoCity had a promotion for a week's trip for two to Patagonia and the Lake District, including air, at half price, we snapped it up.


Beef fondue just like in Switzerland

Our first stop was in San Carlos de Bariloche, the main town and the hub of most activities, including tango--we found a milonga downstairs in the Casino.

Espejo or Mirror Lake

We passed along the Ruta de los Siete Lagos on the way to San Martin de los Andes, a posh ski center with wonderful restaurants and ski and chocolate shops. (No one leaves Patagonia without a box of chocolates!)


The most famous and pricey of chocolates is Mamushka


Santuario Nuestra Senora de las Nieves, Our Lady of the Snows,	in Junin de los Andes


The windows all had scenes of local life


Lago Escondido

Being low season and between foliage a month ago and snow next month, it felt like we had all Patagonia to ourselves!

I had heard so much about Bariloche and its Alpine architecture and chocolates that I expected it to be kitschy and Disneyesque. Instead, the chalets are charming and the region indeed reminded me of the Swiss and French Alps, where I have spent a lot of time in the past. The landscape and flora are reminiscent also of Lake Tahoe and Taos, New Mexico, and, in places, even Palm Springs.

Villa La Angostura was our final stop for two nights at the luxuriously peaceful country inn on the lake shore, La Posada. The quiet little town doesn't have much of anything to do, and so finally we just relaxed.


Shopping arcade in Villa La Angostura


view from our room

We toured National Parks, ate lunch at a Mapuche lodge in the woods, and snapped away because every moment was a photo opp. We also picked up the occasional piece of trash to carry back to town, as the whole area is super environmentally conscious. If you fish (with a license, of course) you can only keep one fish per day. But the restaurants are full of trout and Patagonian lamb. The good food and the pure air made me feel wonderful.


Ferry

I can't wait to go back!

Milongueando en Bariloche!

2011-05-30T15:46:00.000-03:00

Ruben and I just returned from a fabulous week of nature and clean air, good food and relaxation in Patagonia.

But the first thing we did in San Carlos de Bariloche was to go to a milonga!

It's held downstairs in the Casino on Sundays, and the night we were there, there was live music from the Bariloche Tango Trio.


A glamorous atmosphere

Milongueros generally aren't that crazy about dancing to live music, because as in this case, valses are mixed with milongas and all sorts of tangos, and there were no tandas as such. Still, this group played very well--especially the violinist. A pleasure to listen to, if a bit difficult to dance to for some. The cabeceo doesn't exist there either.

We danced and had fun, and folks came up to us to ask if we were from Buenos Aires. I had a Caipirinha cocktail, whoo hoo!! (I do miss my cocktails, living in BsAs)


The fabulous violinist


Time to go--big day tomorrow!


The lobby poster

We were disappointed that there were not more milongas to attend while we were in town, but at least there was this one. It's the "off season" in Bariloche, but anyway, it's not a Mecca for tango. We spent the rest of the week enjoying many of the other attractions that Patagonia has to offer. And I can't wait to go back! Not for the tango but for the natural beauty. (More about our trip coming soon.)

B.A. Tango Guide #207 Download Here!

2011-05-10T20:20:00.001-03:00

The one tango magazine that lists everything tango in Buenos Aires from bandoneonistas and shoes and shows to milongas and teachers--and is bilingual. Unfortunately this digital edition features very low quality graphics and photos due to file size. Please come to Buenos Aires to pick up your free paper copy of B.A. Tango Guide.

BaTango Digital 207

Where Everybody Knows Your Name

2011-05-05T00:26:00.000-03:00

Sometimes you wanna go
Where everybody knows your name
And they're always glad you came
You wanna be where you can see
Our troubles are all the same
You wanna be where everybody knows your name
--Theme song of Cheers! (American TV series set in a bar in Boston, 1982-1993)

I especially "wanna be where everyone knows my name" because I live in a foreign country and my home and family are far, far away. I think we all want to be at Cheers! at certain times. So it's a great pleasure for me to walk into a milonga in Buenos Aires and feel at home.
Since I tend to go to the same milongas week after week for years, like most of the other habitués, we kiss each other hello (not goodbye), sit in the same chairs at the same tables, and watch each other get older. It's comfortable and wonderful.

Still, not everyone knows my name or me theirs. When we buy our ticket at the door, we check our personal lives, our worries, and our aches and pains with our coats, and enter the milonga where all that matters is the dancing.

It's traditional that between tangos during the time for chatting, we only speak impersonally (if we follow the codigos.) We never talk about what we or others do for a living, marital status, housing and living arrangements. We speak about the weather, the music, whether the milonga is crowded tonight, and perhaps give our first name. But often as not, we don't remember everyone's actual names and instead greet each other with, Hola, linda! or Que pasa, flaca? or Todo bien, jefe?

So perhaps everyone doesn't know my name, but still I am home in the milonga.

Thursdays at Nuevo Chique

What a Difference a Decade Makes!

2011-04-28T11:57:00.000-03:00

I left Los Angeles to live in Mexico in 2001 with lots of luggage, a cat, and several boxes shipped UPS at great expense.

Ten years later, it would have been so much easier with much less stuff if I made the international move now. In the big boxes I shipped to Mexico (and 2 1/2 years later to Argentina) were VHS cassettes, music CDs, and photo albums, not to mention lots and lots of real books and a score of piano music. All heavy and bulky.

In just a few short years, technology has changed things so that if I were to do it over again, I would have my iPod, DVDs, and a Kindle (which I don't have yet), and listo! I'd be ready to go. There's still a bulky cat and now a bird, and now also a milonguero viejo, but anyway I think beings are better than boxes, don't you?

The Universe Speaks!

2011-04-24T13:38:00.000-03:00

Anyone who knows me is aware that I am so not a New-Ager, or Self-Helper, or Pie-in-the-Sky Pollyanna. Well, I'm not. I don't read my horoscope, or seldom anyway, or check my chakras, or anything similar. Well ok, I wish on my birthday candles and the chicken wishbone (we don't have whole turkeys here.)

Otherwise I am a conservative and spiritual practicing Anglican/Lutheran, just as I am a conservative and traditional tango dancer.

But I do listen to the Universe every day when it sends me notes.
And the other day it sent me a tango note, yes it did. Maybe you got one too?

Not only are you now dreaming, Cherie, but you're adored.

And not only are you adored, but you're guided.

A lot,
The Universe

"LEFT, Cherie! LEFT, NOW!!"

(You can sign up for your own Notes here: © www.tut.com ®)

And all along I'd been thinking I was only following my partner's leads!

In tango, I think we need to "dream" more and release control
to our Guide, who adores us for the three minutes we are in the embrace.

We women are guided by our partners, and you
men are guided by the music and your dreams.
And all of us by the Universe!
Ain't it grand?

Margareta's Tango Passion

2011-04-20T11:12:00.002-03:00

Margareta (right) with the Swedish Ambassador Charlotte Wrangberg

Margareta Westergard and I met in 2000 when she made her first tango pilgrimage to Buenos Aires from her home country of Sweden. She, like me from 1997-2003 when I moved permanently to Buenos Aires, comes here to dance whenever she can. And she, like so many other women I know (myself included), wrote a book about her experiences: Tango Passion and The Rules of the Game. Margareta's book is more than a memoir, as her diary is interwoven with sections from other tango books by Sonia Abadi and Gustavo Benzecry Saba to create three different perspectives on the milongas and tango codigos of Buenos Aires.

Originally in Swedish, it has been translated and published in English this year by Abrazos Books. The Swedish Ambassador organized a reception for Margareta in the elegant official residence in Palermo last week, where Margareta did a presentation in Spanish, and there was tango entertainment, as well as a bit of social dancing.

Margareta speaking all in Spanish


Tango Passion: The Rules of the Game


Guest bandoneonista

What tango party doesn't have dancing?

You can catch the highlights of the event on YouTube:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-jMKcbxRAI8

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2_LK4cn-JNI&feature=related

The book can be ordered from www.abrazosbooks.com.
Contact Margareta at margaretawestergard@msn.com

Congratulations, Margareta!

La Virgin de los Dolores

2011-04-15T08:22:00.000-03:00

A repost from 2007

Today is Our Lady of Sorrows' special day.

La Virgin de los Dolores is very dear to me. I really feel the pain of mothers who watch their children suffer.

On the Friday before Holy Week, in Mexico where I used to live in San Miguel de Allende, her day is celebrated with special, elaborate, and creative altars in homes and businesses. During the evening people solemnly visit as many as possible, always being offered a "fruit water" to drink that symbolizes the Virgin's tears. And the next day the altars are all taken down and preparations begin for Palm Sunday.

Four years ago I offered to build an altar in my friend Nelly's mail service office. I researched the symbols and spent the night before putting little flags into bitter oranges. Early in the morning I bought a bucket of fragrant fresh mint and chamomile to spread over the altar and on the floor. I used my purple satin Victoria Secret nightgown as a backdrop, because purple is her color of sadness.

Here are Nelly and me with the altar:

It was a fabulous experience for me, a time of much contemplation, meditation, and tranquility. How I miss the over-the-top spiritual life of Mexico! But you know, one Sunday three years ago after I first moved to Buenos Aires from Mexico, I was longing for the processions that used to move pass my window in San Miguel, and I looked out of my window in Congreso and saw a procession on its way to the nearby church. It was sort of raggedy and small, very simple: a priest and two altar boys, a small image of the virgin being carried by four men, and parishioners following with a few bouquets of flowers. But it was faith in the streets all the same, and an answer to my prayer. God usually provides.

To read more about processions under my balcony, as well as two years of other Mexican experiences, both spiritual and carnal, click the link to MEXICO DIARIES.

More On the Codigos

2011-04-13T10:43:00.001-03:00

Due to much interest in this topic and a debate on Facebook, I'm reposting the links to my previous blog posts on The Codigos.

Those Mysterious Milonga Codes

More Milonga Etiquette

The Milonguero Way

Please remember that this is my perspective from Buenos Aires, and that I only attend traditional milongas. I believe the codigos are fantastic for many reasons, among them that the woman alone feels safe and in charge of her evening. The codigos were developed over a very long time for very good reasons. If some people don't like them or don't want to respect them, no problem; they can stay in their own countries or just attend the "alternative" milongas here that cater to young foreigners. There is not just one way to dance tango, nor is there just one kind of milonga, thank goodness. To each his own.

Codigo Fallout

2011-04-11T14:48:00.000-03:00

Don't get me wrong, I love the codigos of the milonga.

But sometimes they can backfire.

For example, when I first saw Ruben dancing years ago in the milongas of Lo de Celia, Club Español, Los Consagrados, I looked and looked at him to no avail--for two months!

Much, much later I asked him why it took him so long to cabeceo me. He replied, once in Lo de Celia, his friend and table-mate danced with me and then told Ruben that I would be his girlfriend! This in effect put "dibs" on me, in the codigos of the caballeros. Well this guy never did dance with me again, but Ruben had to wait a decent time before doing so himself out of respect for his friend. Yes, I know, it's ridiculous, but many men here are like that.

Ruben is extremely conservative, and the traditional code among men is important to him. In the same way, he doesn't care to dance with married women if their spouse is there in the salon or if he is a personal friend. Nor does he like to dance with my friends; he looks on them as family and it feels incestuous (sorry, ladies).

By the same token, our milonguero friends don't know how to treat me if I appear in a milonga alone. Last week I didn't go to Chique as we have been teaching a lot and since we had no students to accompany that particular time, I decided to take a night off and Ruben went alone. The following week, I entered the milonga with two students while Ruben was parking the car. Our men friends were taken uncomfortably aback not to see us together two weeks in a row and didn't know how to greet me: kisses and hugs as usual or restraint? So they all held back, uneasy, until Ruben arrived, and then everyone was kissing and joking and jolly. All was right with the world and as usual in the milonga.

It's the same machismo that dictates only men get menus in a formal restaurant, and that the waiter never addresses, or even looks at, the lady who is accompanied by a man. Yesterday I heard a story of a woman and a man sharing a taxi and he got out first, instructing the driver to take the woman to such and such an address, her home. But on route, she changed her mind and decided to go to a milonga. The taxista refused to take her, saying he was following the orders of the man!

But there is a reason tango came out of this culture, and that the woman follows the man without question, trusting him to "dance her well." The man has certain responsibilities which by Jove he will honor. And ok, sometimes they are more responsible to other men than to women, but on the pista, they will do their best to see that we have a good dance--because that makes them feel more like men.

All of this can serve as a reminder to the ladies that whether we dance or not often has little to do with us. It's not that we aren't pretty enough, or young enough, or skinny enough, or dressed sexily enough, or enough of a good dancer; the men have their own issues, like honoring a friend by not dancing with his woman, not liking the particular music at the time, already having promised the "vals" tanda to someone else, wanting to cool down and dry off before dancing again, wanting to enjoy their drink or finish their conversation. One of the first things a tanguera needs to learn is that it's not all about her.

Unlike many situations in life, the milonga is a place where women can be women and men can be men. Let's enjoy it while it lasts.

Simplifying

2011-04-06T22:47:00.001-03:00

I just came to a realization today that I've been spending a whole lot of time on emails and phone calls from people I don't know. As a professional librarian, it's my nature to want to give people information, and it's a pleasure when I can, especially about something that I love so much: the tango.

But now that Ruben y Cherie Tango Buenos Aires has 15 5-star reviews on Trip Advisor, and as of this moment we are rated the No. 3 Attraction in Buenos Aires, the emails and phone calls come fast and furious, and include all kinds of questions such as what to wear to a milonga, where can they buy tango shoes, which is the best hotel, which milongas are closest to San Telmo, etc. And I've spent hours and hours answering such questions, many times for people who never took a class.

For some reason I've become the "go to" person in Buenos Aires regarding milongas. Yes, I get phone calls about addresses and times of milongas from locals and foreigners. And even, because Ruben does taxi dancing, I get phone calls at 3 and 4 a.m. for taxis!!!

All of this rather saps my energy from what I prefer to do--teach tango with Ruben. So from now on I'm simply going to recommend that folks purchase Sally Blake's very complete guidebook, Happy Tangos, and read therein all they need to know about tango in Buenos Aires.

Reading Happy Tango--click to buy on Amazon

And I'm going to stick to writing emails about dates, times, prices and class confirmations. And save my energy for our students. Maybe even for writing my own book!

Hoppy and Ruben: Affairs of the Heart

2011-04-06T19:16:00.001-03:00

As anyone who knows Ruben knows, he has a happy heart--not the sad, nostalgic, "she done me wrong" mood of the tango, or your typical Argentine. He finds joy in dancing, perhaps where others find release from sadness. Whatever. It's not important why someone is drawn to the tango.

But I had the strangest thought last week. Somehow in conversation I remembered my crush on cowboy star Hopalong Cassidy when I was a teeny weeny child, like 6 or so. I remember well being smitten by his all black attire sitting on his white horse, Topper, his white hair under the black hat, and his laugh, his fabulous, joyous, hearty laugh.

I mean, I really remember being "in love" with his image on our little black and white TV. He was my first love; my more serious affair of the heart was when I was 7 and really and truly in love with Gene Kelly. No kidding, folks, you can laugh, but I remember. Never put down the emotions of children. Puppy love is a whim of the adults.

So last week when chatting with a student, it occurred to me that Ruben has a resemblance to Hoppy. Can you see it? Or am I plain nuts? Or am I crazy even to think it makes any difference what someone looks like after a gadzillion years. It's sort of like the psychologists who say you either fall in love with someone who reminds you of your father or is exactly the opposite.

Ruben looks nothing like my father. But somehow, he reminds me of Hoppy.

I never knew that Hoppy (Bill Boyd) made a successful visit to Buenos Aires in the early 50s, where he also was idolized as the cowboy hero of radio, film, TV, and the comics. His words to Clarin on arrival: "Estoy moi contentou de haberr arivado a esta yenerosa y hospitaleira Aryentina".

Viva Hoppy!!!

Gaucho Fair at Mataderos Opens Again!

2011-04-02T23:23:00.000-03:00

The Mataderos Fair is open again! Hooray! My favorite way to spend a Sunday in Buenos Aires! Check out the website for information on all of the activities, performances, shopping, and eating.

(A repost from 2010)

Tango tourists often engage us to take them to various points of interest, such as La Boca and Caminito, San Telmo, and the Feria de Mataderos being the most popular destinations for our Tango Tours. Ruben is a fountain of information on the history, background, culture of the tango and old Buenos Aires.

A friend just asked me if it wasn't boring to return over and over again to places where I've been so many times.

The answer is absolutely not because each time it is a different experience. But even more so at the Feria de Mataderos.

Newly reopened today for the season (until the middle of December), it's the best way to spend a fine Sunday in Buenos Aires. (closed when it rains)

Tomorrow the weather looks like it will be perfect. Why not take advantage and Hie thee to the faire?! You won't be sorry. Try to get there early (noon) and have an asado lunch in time to see the Gaucho Games which begin around 3:00 p.m. Please don't overlook the Museo, which aside from the interesting displays, gives you a peak at a historical building unchanged for more than a century. (They also have a nice bathroom, FYI.)

If you'd like us to take you some Sunday, just make a reservation in advance.

My Birthday Wishes

2011-03-31T22:03:00.001-03:00

Here in Argentina you get three wishes when you blow out your birthday candle, not just one like in the States. So a heck of a lot more rides on your once-a-year puff 'n huff over your birthday cake when you can get three!

My birthday was last week, and even though this year I felt, as we are so busy working and teaching, that I wanted to stay low profile on "my" day, the milonga organizers wouldn't go for that and so I had celebrations in Nuevo Chique and in Los Consagrados, complete with delicious cakes and, yes, birthday candles.

My three wishes were simple;

Hollywood in December, looking east

Rainbows in my hometown for my friends and family to have joy and health;

Double rainbow seen from my terrace in Boedo

Where lies the "Pot O'Gold"

Rainbows in my adopted city of Buenos Aires, and in fact double rainbows sometimes are necessary, to live under and to remind me that God's promises are everywhere;

And someday soon, before we are both too old and broke, Ruben can get a visa to visit my country for a couple of weeks to see where I grew up, what I talk about so often, so he can know my loved ones.

Tango Gods Part 2

2011-03-22T11:51:00.001-03:00

I too had my idol growing up as a tango dancer during the last 15 years. Living in L.A. and traveling a lot in those days in order to dance, I took classes with many of the "greats" in Los Angeles and at festivals around the world. I even hosted an "idol" in my home for 4 days before I had to ask him to leave because of his behavior -- no respect for me, the tango, or his students.

The only one I really learned from, the one I respected the most, was Carlos Gavito. He danced the way I felt about the music (like Ruben does.) For me, as a dancer he was without equal. Completely dedicated to the tango, he was a marvelous stage performer as well as social dancer. But he didn't put on airs; what you saw was what you got.

Everyone knew that he had a woman, or two, in every city Forever Tango played. He was open about that as well. He used to say he was married to the tango, which is a cliché perhaps, but so true for so many people.

Whenever he was in Los Angeles, I took his group classes and privates. After a point, he told me that I didn't need any more lessons, nor should I bother with attending local milongas; I should just save my money and go as often as possible to Buenos Aires. I really appreciated his honesty, and respected him not only as an elegant dancer, but as a person. He didn't act superior or all-knowing, as well he could have, and his conversation (always in French with me, for some reason) was sophisticated, funny, and interesting.

Even when he was sick near the end of his life, he still went to the milongas although he didn't dance much socially any more. But it was obvious that the milonga was where he felt at home. I saw him in Gricel, El Beso, La Catédral, La Viruta, Nino Bien--always friendly, warm, respectful, nice, a real caballero. I can't imagine him doing any of the gross, stupid things that I've seen other "famosos" do in public.

To me, Carlos Gavito was a "tango god," who I will always respect in my memory as someone who loved the tango above all else (including money), and who taught me and shared that love of tango with me and all the world.

I didn't know him that well, and I'm sure there are all kinds of tales about him. But compared to the "idols" I wrote about in my last post, those famous dancers who have let fame and fortune go to their heads and are not humble in the presence of the tango or the students who pay them, Gavito was The Man, and always will be for me.

Hero Worship/False Idols

2011-03-12T12:23:00.000-03:00

In every field there are famous folks who have become cult figures, from rock 'n roll, to fashion, to sports, to science, to TV, etc.

Tango is among the worst, because everyone has his own style/preference/ideas of how to dance. "You dance who you are," means that there is not just one way to dance, thank goodness. But searching for the right way for YOU to dance can be like following the Holy Grail with one wrong turn after another; like trailing after glamour stars of tango, hoping some of the glitter will fall on you by propinquity.

Students and wannabees look often for quick fixes and "Argentine Tango in 10 Easy Lessons." One of our students told us about a "tango boot camp" in their country where you can learn to dance tango "well" in a weekend or even one day!

Well, sorry to disappoint, but this can't happen. Tango takes its time. I don't care who your teachers are or what they promise before you plunk down your money or how many hours you practice in a weekend; you've got to put in your time. Tango has to "cook" within you.

Often because of media fame or cults of personalities, some dancers are worshiped, not so much for what they do (which can be good or bad or several degrees in between) but who they are. Generally these are dancers who tour outside of Argentina, either performing and/or giving workshops.

The great social dancers of Buenos Aires just dance night after night in the milongas; they don't speak English, they have never left Argentina, no one has starred them in a movie, they haven't won or even entered tango contests, and they haven't danced in a stage show.

When hero worship makes cult personalities of tango dancers, it's usually because of marketing; the media and especially YouTube can make a star of anyone. But if all you know of a person is what you are told by advertising, and what you read/see on the internet or at long distance in a huge tango workshop, perhaps that person doesn't deserve the gifts lavished on them when foreigners bribe them to rub elbows during their trips to Buenos Aires from lands far away. And even more to the point, do not deserve adoration.

I guess I'm getting somewhat cynical after so many years of working with tango, and above all, observing what goes on. Foreign dancers wine and dine the objects of their hero affection, and spend a boatload of plata on private lessons and buying drinks in the milongas, and always paying the taxi. That's fine, really; the foreign dancer gets what he wants--a little prestige to hobnob with the famous and an ability to name drop, and the Tango Star gets free meals, gifts, and more hours of private lessons. There's nothing wrong with that; it can be a friendly recognition that the visiting students probably can afford to do those things more than the locals. The problem begins when it turns to hero worship, when the star can do no wrong on or off the pista.

It's always been hard to separate the dancer from the dance. But worshiping false idols by throwing money at them, especially when the person involved is an extremely bad example of how to behave--meaning not following common rules of etiquette and not being a caballero (yes, I'm referring here especially to men), makes everything bad for everyone except the "hero" who is getting rich off of a false reputation of being a fabulous dancer, teacher, and a perfect person.

I have had occasion to know well a couple of famous touring tango dancers/teachers and they both made fun in private conversations of the foreigners they profited from.

We've all heard the story of Pablo Veron's fisticuffs with a woman at a New York milonga.

And the extremely famous contest winner who socked a woman in the eye when she inadvertently nudged him on the dance floor as he was walking to his table. She had to ice her face and leave the milonga. Ruben and I were dancing right next to this incident in Los Consagrados about a year ago. This is the same famous dancer who announced to his table of friends that no foreigner could ever dance like an Argentine--and he makes his living off of teaching foreigners.

I've heard about the really bad attitude of a famous dancing couple while giving workshops in Australia--leaving the room, paying attention only to each other, etc.

And tales of many male tango teachers seducing their hostesses while being housed for workshops.

Is this professional behavior? Is this worthy of adoration? Or is it all part of the Tango Game?

Some dancers haven't a clue how to teach. Some can't handle the fame and fortune that came to them late in life. Some are just "bad" people who can dance well. And some are ego maniacs with no respect for those who respect them.

But there's something a bit "immoral" about worshiping so-called heroes who behave badly. We can admire their talent--the way they play football or golf, or the way they dance. And that is what should be appreciated, not the whole package of a low-down rude, haughty, superior s.o.b.

Famous tango dancers are famous mainly due to good luck and marketing. If you like the way someone dances, by all means study how they dance. But don't waste your adoration on folks who probably would not take you to the E.R. at 2:00 a.m., especially if you were no longer paying them for privates or inviting them to restaurants.

You can have good professional relationships with your tango teachers and you can have good friends. Only rarely are they one and the same (yet it can and does happen.)

In the States, everyone is our "friend." "I'd like to introduce my friend, Bill," you say to Norm, but you've only known Bill a day. We all have many "friends." In Spanish they differentiate between "amigo" and "conocido," which I think is a great thing to do. In English we rarely use "acquaintance," because everyone is our "friend."

Maybe it's time to think who really is our friend and who is our tango teacher and who is such a perfect person he/she is worthy of worship.

Weekend of El Carnaval Porteño in Buenos Aires

2011-03-03T14:17:00.000-03:00

For the first time in well over ten years, the two days before Ash Wednesday and Lent are official government holidays this year for Carnaval. Plan accordingly, as this is going to be a BIG four-day weekend!

Bit by bit people's festivals and celebrations are climbing back into Porteño life, after being squashed during the dictatorship. (And that includes, thank goodness, the tango.)

The murgas in local barrios are getting bigger and longer, and now the corsos are also coming back. The above photo is from the corso on Avenida de Mayo in 1931. Last weekend El Carnaval Porteño came back to Avenida de Mayo and will again be there this coming weekend.

Get out your sequin top hats and gloves and prepare to PARTEE!!!

Thanks to SoundsandColours.com for a great explanatory article by Juan Data (in English) and for highlighting Grupo Dale Murga's video of the famous murga song, El Murguero.

Charlas Con Coquito

2011-02-28T21:13:00.000-03:00

I talk a lot with my bird; in fact, we often have great conversations in which I'm able to express my negative opinions, my feelings, to confess all in English or in bad Castellano, and he always listens carefully. He stops chattering his chirpy chirpy sounds, cocks his head, and fixes me with one beady eye and gives me his full attention (unlike most males when I talk). I can go on about anything with Coquito, no subject is taboo, no theory is too outrageous.

And then he always cheers me up when he says, Dame un beso!
Beso, Coquito!! Beso, papa!

I love Mirasol, my Argentine cat. While she's no Phoebe the Expat Cat, then again she hasn't traveled with me to three countries. She's loving...what more does one want from a cat?

When I talk to Mirasol, she answers, Meow. Sometimes she initiates the conversation, with Meow?

Now Coquito not only asks questions--How are you? Okey dokey?

But he answers them too--Te quiero, mama! Birdie Boy! Cookie!

I feel a little more sane to charlar con mi pajarito. Do you think? It beats conversations with myself.

Dinner With Podestå

2011-02-25T13:38:00.001-03:00

So lucky to have good friends like Marcela and Ruben, organizers of the milonga Nuevo Chiqué on Tuesdays and Thursdays. We were delighted to be invited to an asado one hot Saturday night at Marcela's house in Belgrano.

And so much like the Night of the Milongueros I wrote about four years ago, I opened my ears and listened to what this small group of folks who were there so long ago had to say about the tango.

Yes, they talked about the orchestras, and favorite moments long past, and lyrics of tangos, and then the great and famous singer Alberto Podestå, sitting across the table from me, sang Percal. Can you believe it?

The Maestro himself

Illuminated by a bright circle of light

Yes, la juventud se fue, but what memories!

Carnaval en Gualeguaychu

2011-02-23T18:50:00.003-03:00

Note: for MUCH better photos, please check out NW Nomad.

Gualeguaychu, in Entre Rios, is sort of a back-water, one-horse pretty little town on the shore of the Gualeguaychu River, about three hours by car from Buenos Aires and close to Uruguay. No high rises, no gourmet restaurants, very few buses, lots of bicycles, people sit out on their curbs at night during the summer to cool off. But what it does have, since 1997, is a Carnaval to rival that of anywhere in the world!

During the military dictatorship, Carnaval and Murgas, as well as tango, were suppressed. But all three have come back with a vengeance! Well ok, Gualeguaychu doesn't have tango, but Guau! What a carnaval--every Saturday night in February and through the middle of March.

Five years ago, we made a turn-around trip in one day with a tour company, Eternautas. It was hot and cramped in the small van, we were all exhausted from the Corsodromo parade which didn't end until after 3:00 a.m., but worst of all, that was the night of Ruben's first gall bladder attack--and it was bad.


Typical Gauchito Gil altar along the road

So we wanted to revisit the Comparsas under more pleasant circumstances. We drove up in Ruben's old batata, passing many Gauchito Gil altars on the three hours through the pampas.

We stayed in a lovely posada for four nights. Ruben went fishing and to the Casino, I read and relaxed, and we swam in the dark pool at night to cool off. Saturday night we walked over to the Corsodromo (which used to be the train station) and had cocktails on the grass while we watched the people buying feather headdresses and posing for photos.

Every weekend there are three comparsas competing in the Corsodromo, each one with their floats, amazing costumes which are mostly feathers and glitter, dancing boys and girls, snazzy orchestra and singers, and batucada band. We saw Kamarr, Mari-Mari, and Ara Yevi.

She was the leader of the Nazis.

My favorite was Mari-Mari, just as five years ago. Their 2011 theme is Pesadillas, or Nightmares. Think Cirque du Soleil. Beginning with a boy reading scary stories in bed, with every kind of feather-bedecked nightmare dancing after him in the parade: spiders, bats, dragons, vampires, monsters, werewolves, German Secret Police, royals followed by a guillotine, and all bouncing along the way to the infectious Mari-Mari music like colorful chickens. A gigantic float was a writhing haunted house with claws moving beds in and out--with a person screaming on each bed! Most of the floats are hand pushed or pulled but a very few are pushed by tractors.

I'm so sorry my photos can't do the Pesadillas de Plumas justice. And oh yes, there were gorgeous barely dressed young beauties as well.

I can't praise the concepts high enough, with the clever, intelligent, inventive, witty flow of fun. Just when you think you can't be awed or surprised anymore, here comes a comic character, a rollicking grim reaper, or a dancing Dracula.

The final Comparsa ended their parade of "Education," (at least that's what I think the theme was) with the best batucada group of the night--and they were all wearing motarboard caps and gowns! But you have to see the video. Ruben took video, but it's very hard if you're not in the first row. We were in the fourth row and even so had to stand up on chairs and it still seems like we got nothing but the big heads of the folks in front of us.

DETAILS:

We stayed at La Posada del Puerto with a view of the river and a giant swimming pool, a treat at any season. They also have a gym and spa.

We ate at Campo Alto twice, and enjoyed great meals and live folk music.

However the other 2 restaurants we tried (La Cascada and El Argentino) were awful.

More info on Carnaval en Gualeguaychu. And here in WelcomeArgentina.

A Day in the Delta

2011-02-16T16:08:00.000-03:00

It wasn't until I moved here in 2003 that I visited the Delta de Tigre, although I had heard of it often, especially from my vacation landlady Maria Teresa. But I was always too busy dancing tango and recovering from late nights to take a day off to visit nature.

A few months after my permanent arrival (and long before I met Ruben), I was invited to spend a day there on a "date." The man in question was a non-English speaking porteño who happened to be blind, but who managed very well on his own. He explained to me over the phone what train to take, where to meet, and I was glad to finally visit a place out of town I had heard so much about.

It was a day in May, and especially cold. I wore my winter parka. I went to Retiro and caught the train to Maipu, where he and I met as planned, and then we took the lovely Tren de la Costa to the end of the line, Tigre.

Once there, he asked me a lot of questions as to where to go to buy tickets for an island excursion. My Castellano wasn't very good and I was a bit overwhelmed, but eventually we made it to a lancha (motorboat bus) and disembarqued at one of the islands to find a restaurant for lunch.


Tren de la Costa

The truth is that I was totally freaked out with fear that he might fall as we walked near the shore, or getting on and off the boat, and I couldn't really remember when he asked me if we had come "right" or "left," or where the passerby had said to find a good restaurant. And it was all in Castellano.

But somehow we found a restaurant and had a lovely lunch outside near the water and made it back to the train for the return trip to Buenos Aires, leaving me just a little worse for wear.

After that, I visited Tigre with Ruben a few times also on day trips to take friends and visitors. One time we took a catamaran and had lunch on board as we toured the canals and rivers. Another time we went with friends to Bora Bora on a prepaid excursion which included lunch on a secluded island about 30 minutes from the Estacion Fluvial. Although the voyage was short, we seemed a million miles away from the concrete jungle of Buenos Aires.

This month we had planned to camp overnight with Ruben's nine-year-old grandson Franco, but he had a broken arm and a cast, and we were in full swing of the tango tourist season with teaching, and so it was for only a day that we took Franco to Tigre, his first time. Our very favorite place, La Puerto la Pista, was too far (90 minutes by motor launch) to go for only a day, so we were like all of the other tourists at the Estacion Fluvial choosing a day trip to an island that appealed to us for a package price.

We wanted a place with a beach, about 30 minutes away by motor launch, a restaurant, kayaks, and a play area for kids. Visiting the booths at the station, we were promised everything, but we chose not to buy a package that included a prix fixe lunch. Lucky for us.

There was no one else at El Ciervo Rojo when we arrived, no beach, and no one had cleaned up the facility since the weekend. Of course we arrived hungry, and to give credit where it's due, the picada we ordered was delicious, if small and expensive. There were no kayaks, and the one canoe was grounded because the water level was very low. So Ruben and Franco fished and swam; I read my book. When it was lunch time, Ruben went to check on the menu and the parrilla, neither passing muster. So we went next door and had a great asado, despite the frowns of the guy at Ciervo Rojo.


Ruben y Franco--happy fishermen!

All of this is by way of saying that there are many options for a nice day or weekend in Tigre; and it behooves one to check them all out. The booths at the station are there to sell, so buyer beware.

I completely understand the appeal of this natural green Garden of Eden with its canals, rivers, islands and lagoons. And why the wealthy porteños built mansions there last century for an escape from the hot city, even if they were only occupied for a couple of months during the summer.

Now there is renewed interest in Tigre as a weekend/summer vacation destination. It is truly a place away--no roads, no internet, no cable TV (or at least very little). It's best to stay overnight and take your own provisions to make your own asado, to truly appreciate the beauty and far-from-it-all escape that is Tigre.

Or ask us and we'll take you. Ruben the Survivor Man makes it happen for you! :)

Celebrating Eight Years in Argentina--And Five Years of tangocherie!

2011-02-02T18:19:00.003-03:00

The following is a chapter from my unpublished memoir, The Church of Tango, written in 2003 when I moved from Mexico to Buenos Aires. I am posting it now in celebration of my 8 years anniversary living in Argentina, and my 5 years of blogging here on tangocherie; this is my 661 blog post. With more than 6,000 page views per month, I thank you, gentle reader.

If you don't know where you're going, you'll end up somewhere else.

--Yogi Berra

2003

In the evening flocks of grackles wrote V’s against the mango sky. The setting sun shone through the dusty dome windows of Las Monjas one block west, and I could see the towers of five more colonial churches from my rooftop. Almost every day beneath my windows passed processions of pilgrims, celebrants, or mourners. The Virgin sat on the back of a pickup truck. Thirty schoolchildren carried an enormous Mexican flag. Peppy tuba bands and old men, hats in hand, walked behind a hearse.

View from my balcony on Mesones

Even so, after two years in Mexico I had overdosed on the traditional fiestas that used to enchant me. As someone who enjoys the Latin passion in the cultures of France and Cuba, I couldn’t find the same joie de vivre in Mexico.

Mexican allegre was not a moving, pulsing force, but comfort and relaxation—abundant good food, bright and happy music, flowing beer and tequila, family togetherness and church. The sole ecstasy I witnessed was in the many fervent religious activities. I missed the zest and energy on the street and in the music that I found so compelling elsewhere.

I enjoyed greeting folks whenever I stepped out my door, yet the population was transitory, and new friends were hard to keep, often leaving after a short stay to return home to Canada or the United States. Real relationships had little time to develop. Sometimes it was painful to live alone in one of the most romantically beautiful places on earth, looking out my windows at the indigo sky and the lights of the Churrigueresque skyline twinkling below.

After more than two years, my social circle had changed. My favorite bar had closed, and even before that I stopped going out in the evening. Long ago I had given up on dating anyone. Pablo—my personal trainer—was the only man I saw for the past year, and that of course was a secret. Sure I knew it’s a cliché. I really thought at the time that God had sent him to me, I was just so lonely.


The front door to the art gallery and my apartment upstairs

Over the past couple of years, I found that without realizing it, I was drinking too much, too often, as a way to be with people. Lately I might go to Harry Bissett’s on Martini Night, and after two Cosmos, the smoke and the cackling Texas laughter would drive me around the corner and home. I read, worked on the computer, wrote articles and emails to the world “out there,” and watched Mexican TV.

The folks I counted on were the women in my cancer support group, the people at church, the group of writers who met at my house weekly, my fellow flamenco students, as well as the two or three friends I made at the bars when I first arrived. I had some Mexican acquaintances by now, too, yet somehow there was always a gap between us which wasn’t a problem of language. I guess it was cultural differences, although I hated to think that was possible between people who cared about one another.

There were several different social groups in San Miguel, and I didn’t fit into any of them: the cocktail party circuit; the landed house builders, remodelers and decorators who had inexhaustible discussions on whether to paint the sala saffron or aubergine; the old hippies in beads; the Texas Junior League women with perfectly streaked blond hair and chunky silver jewelry active in charity fundraisers; the gringa owners of boutiques and businesses; the newly reinvented artists; and of course the Mexicans who had little time to spare away from their work and families.

Where I felt empowered, at my best, and at home was with dancers. In San Miguel I had searched out dance in studios, schools, clubs, theaters, parties, and discos. I tried Sweat Your Prayers on Sunday mornings, folk dance at the Bellas Artes, contact improvisation, Mexican folklorico, salsa in classes and clubs, and took the bus to Mexico City in search of tango, the immigrant’s dance. More than a hundred years ago in Buenos Aires, the lonely porteño, far from his loved ones in Europe, was drawn to the connection and nostalgia of tango. In Mexico one’s family is large and ubiquitous, and people live for the moment. Unlike me, the Mexican has no need to search for a family in a milonga, and Mexican tango is almost an oxymoron.

Finally it was flamenco that saved my body and spirit. And after a student flamenco recital in which I did a solo belly dance, opportunities presented themselves to teach La Danse Orientale, to perform, to collaborate creatively with the flamenco teacher and musicians. But then what? I couldn’t afford to keep going in a financial hole every month and manufacturing my own artistic outlets. I knew I couldn’t live forever in the expensive Brigadoon Gringolandia that was San Miguel de Allende. If I did, I'd soon be one of the crones sitting in doorways with gnarled hands outstretched to passing tourists.

Much of the Happy Hour conversations now centered on how the town had changed and how expensive it had become. I had done my best to live within my budget, moving three times to cheaper and smaller San Miguel apartments. Nevertheless from the beginning it had been an impossible dream in the most costly place to live in Mexico. I had increasingly gone into my savings, and soon they would be gone if I didn’t do something drastic.

San Miguel de Allende had been my home throughout three icy winters when I wore dance tights 24/7 and my electric throw over my shoulders on a long extension cord, heating my apartment with pots of water boiling on the stove. And during two hot and breathless springs, when dusty winds covered the town filling my lungs with desert sand, bus exhaust, and dried dog and burro dung.

The weather-perfect months in between I reveled in the afternoon rains, the ideal temperature, and the dazzling colors of the bougainvillea-bejeweled colonial architecture. Now the pleasure I found in San Miguel was no longer enough, and I knew, not for the rest of my life.

I learned a lot in Mexico; I had met people I cared about, I loved my apartment and the beauty of the town, where, like at Chateau Rodney in Los Angeles, I heard church bells and train whistles calling me to places far away. But it was time to move on—to someplace where the cost of living was less, where there was symphony and ballet and art museums, to someplace where I could dance more than solos. I yearned for the embrace of tango.

After more than a decade of searching, it looked like my future would be in other places, other hemispheres. I missed Los Angeles and the United States, and if wishes could make it so, I would still be living with my family in our house in Los Feliz under the Hollywood Sign. I had twice paddled in the River Styx, and now I’ve been blessed with the chance of forging another life. I would have designed a different path for myself, but my life unfolded without consulting me.

Once again I had to bid a painful farewell to a mixed group of people who had welcomed this stranger into their lives. I was going to miss the man selling cigarettes and sodas on the corner, the flower seller who made the rounds of all the bars and restaurants every night, the girl who practiced her cello while working in the art gallery below my apartment. I was worn-out from the partings and leave-takings of the last twelve years.

But in Mexico, where nothing was as it seemed, “manana” didn’t mean tomorrow, and “Adios!” was not goodbye.

If you'd like to read the "end" of the saga, please check out Home is Where The Cat Is

Murga Time: Drums Don't Lie!

2011-01-28T21:31:00.000-03:00

Yes, it's Carnaval season all over Latin America, but at the same time various barrios in Buenos Aires have murgas every weekend through the beginning of March. No feathers and naked girls (and boys) here--for that you have to go to Gualeguaychu (where we're going next month) or Rio de Janeiro! The murga is not about pure fun; it has more of a political and protest agenda. Whatever it all really "means," it's fascinating and fun, and definitely a special cultural experience.

Sandra always has the latest information on upcoming cultural events in Buenos Aires. Read about where to catch a murga de barrio on her blog, My Buenos Aires Travel Guide.

(You can review previous posts on tangocherie about this fabulous phenomenon two years ago and last year.)

Here's the little video I made of the Boedo murga last year, just a block from my apartment. All year long I hear them practicing, and those drums don't lie!

It you decide to catch a murga somewhere in the city, wear old clothes and perhaps dark glasses to protect your eyes because the kids have fun spraying everyone with soap foam!

B.A. Tango Guide #206 Download Here!

2011-01-28T00:24:00.000-03:00

B.A.TANGO 206 - digital

Is Buenos Aires Still Cheap? Was It Ever? Tango Tourist Tips

2011-01-22T14:52:00.001-03:00

My first trip to Buenos Aires in 1997 was very expensive--the dollar was pegged to the peso and the city was as expensive as Paris. However I remember well that a bottle of Lopez vino tinto was 2 pesos, or $2 usd.

When Argentina defaulted on its foreign loans in 2001, the ensuing economic crisis caused the peso to fall to 3 to 1, and folks to lose their jobs and homes. Mortgages were payable in dollars which caused the payments to quadruple. Banks closed to prevent people from withdrawing all their money before its value fell even more. Going though several presidents in only a few weeks, Argentina dropped from being the most expensive city in Latin America to the cheapest in just one year.

So at the beginning of the new century, peso prices were low if you had dollars to spend, and many tourists flocked here to do just that, including buying real estate.

The reputation of living cheap below the Equator in a "third world latin country" has lasted way longer than its validity. Nowadays those who can afford to and who have U.S. visas fly to Miami to shop.

Nowadays Buenos Aires is a very expensive place to live. The only thing that is more reasonable here than my home town of Los Angeles is housing, but due to California's recent economic problems, even that is changing. But oh yes, tango shoes are still a steal!

It's worse for the locals, of course, but they are used to the unbelievable 30% inflation and doing without. It can come as a shock, though, to tourists traveling on the cheap to find that basic expenses can be the same as "back home." And luxury items and anything electronic are incredibly expensive.

One can manage by lowering one's life style and expectations, but the older we are the harder it is to do that.

Remember that there is no Target, Trader Joe's, or .99 Stores here--everything is full price and usually then some--if you can find it.

My advice to the Tango Tourist, especially the First Timer:

1) Don't bring lots of clothes. No ones knows or cares if your outfit is designer from Barneys of New York. And in fact, it helps for you to look the same at the milongas so that folks recognize and remember you. That said, ladies, plan on not wearing wigs or changing your hair style too drastically. If you have a dress or blouse with back interest, that shows off better than the front while dancing.

2) Bring just one pair of comfortable tango shoes if you have them. You will want to pick up more while here, but in any event, it is not necessary to have zillions of different shoes color coordinated to go with every outfit; this marks you as "tourist." Two or three basic black in leather and/or suede will do for the men--goat skin, or cabra, is the most flexible and comfortable. And please don't fall for the two-toned. Ladies only need a pair or two in black, one in red, and another in a color. Beware of glittery or white shoes unless you have perfect footwork.

3) Bring a very comfortable pair of walking shoes, preferably not white.

4) If you're not that fond of bland food, bring a small bottle of Tabasco Sauce and as well as some Lemon Pepper, garlic salt, or whatever else that gives flavor and makes you happy.

5) If you love cocktails more than wine, pick up a bottle of your favorite spirits in the Duty Free.

6) Leave your good and/or flashy jewelry at home. Cheap costume stuff is the way to go here.

7) Bring your iPod and your laptop. Most tourist residences have wifi, and many cafes do too. Then you can download your photos and add tango and folklore music to your iPod on the spot. CDs of local music are much cheaper than at home, and furthermore most tango DJs sell great music for dancing to those who inquire at the milongas (don't worry; they pay their union/copyright fees)

8) Bring your favorite perfume, cosmetics, and OTC drugs; while many are available here (and many not), the prices are extreme. If you think you may get an infection, know which antibiotic works for you and your condition, as you can buy them OTC here. The controlled drugs are the addictive ones, like Ativan, and you do need a prescription for those.

9) Forget about ethnic food; get used to the delicious cuts of beef and pork that abound. And if your habit is to go out for breakfast, get used to coffee and sweet rolls with fake orange juice. Better and healthier to eat breakfast at your hotel or apartment and have cereals and fruit.

10) Don't walk the streets and wait for buses in fancy dancing attire; even if it's hot, cover the décolletage with a scarf until you get to the milonga.

11) Never take drinks into a milonga and put them on your table. You must order a consumacion from the waiter as well as leave him or her a tip.

12) Your best bet is to bring clean, new dollars to exchange for pesos. Forget travelers cheques; nobody takes 'em and nobody wants 'em. Don't rely on paying for everything with a credit card. But bring 2-3 ATM cards, the easiest way to get local cash.

13) Don't worry about going to fancy and expensive restaurants. Chances are the food is better at home. Just stick to Argentine beef, wine and salads.

14) One tango show is like another; if you must go, choose the cheapest.

15) Have a good guidebook, like SallyCat's Happy Tangos.

The old glory days in Argentina are long gone. How I would have loved to be here in the 40s when you could choose which fabulous orchestra to dance to every night; when folks dressed to the nines and men had to have polished shoes and a coat and tie to enter a milonga, when life--and the language--was more polite and formal.

The old adage still is true: bring less stuff and more money. Other than leather goods, there's not really a lot of appealing things to buy and take home. Your money is better spent on good private tango lessons, lots of milongas, and taxis for late at night when you are tired, and even a taxi dancer if you want to quick-start your milonga experience. Splurge on the memories, which can be priceless.

Summer Sunday

2011-01-18T10:14:00.000-03:00

To all who know him, Ruben Aybar can be bigger than life--personality, energy, jokes--he can take up a lot of space in a room. Basically, believe it or not, he is a shy man who's motivation is making others around him happy.


View of Boedo from the Terrace by Sergio Stellato

This is never as true as when he is the host of a gathering, whether it's at a milonga or at home.

And it's also true that he likes to show off his cooking. So these qualities work really well together, and especially for me, because when we have people over, there is really very little for me to do until I do the washing up afterward.

Last Sunday began very hot and humid. We arose early to prepare for the "Bloggueras Barbecue" we had planned for that day. Lunch was for 1:00, and so the fire must be started by 9:30.


Photo by Sergio

While I dithered around looking for tablecloths and enough glasses and making chimichurri, Ruben was swabbing the terrace with detergent and cleaning the parrilla. Steam rose from the tiles and the hot metal grill even before he put any charcoal in it. Then he brought out the patio table and chairs, which I wiped down, and lowered the awning.

An Argentine's parrilla is sacred and quite scientific; the charcoal is lit in one location and added to the barbecue as needed; the grill is raised and lowered appropriately, and attention is constantly paid.

Just as the coals were beginning to blaze, a huge wind came up, blowing sparks all over the terrace and onto Ruben, who was working in his shorts. He got a few burns but paid them no mind.

He can scrub the vegetables while I'm just thinking about it, and he hurried to get them on the grill first, as the potatoes take the longest to cook.


Photo by Sergio

Everything was ready as scheduled and we sat down to enjoy an asado of beef, pork, chicken, chorizos, provolete (barbecued spiced cheese), red and green peppers, onions, potatoes, and a new item since our trip to Brazil last year, grilled fresh pineapple.


Photo by Sergio

The gale wind died down, but in its place were dark clouds. All of a sudden, like at picnics around the world, the sun was gone and the sky turned black. Then the hot steaming skies released buckets of water. The three men moved the table indoors and lunch continued while Ruben tore through the salon pushing the barbecue on wheels over the polished hardwood floor out to the quincho. He returned with more platters of food.

Photo by Sergio

The awning filled with water and tore, releasing another waterfall. Ruben remarked that he was glad he had watered the plants a couple of hours ago.

Conversation in three languages flowed like the wine without a break as we cozily watched the downpour outside.


Photo by Sergio


Photo by Sergio

Photo by Katie Metz


Photo by Katie

Ruben and I had a great time, although he never ate anything. He says that when he cooks, he gets filled up with the aromas.

By the time we had danced, eaten ice cream, drank coffee, and the last guest departed, it was a gorgeous clear evening, beginning to get hot again.

The blogs represented are SallyCat's Adventures, Seashells and Sunflowers, and Tina Tangos.

Vera Berv's Pastels

2011-01-12T22:17:00.000-03:00

What an honor to know that Ruben and I are the subjects of one of Vera's artworks! You can see more of her work on Facebook. She lives, works and dances tango in Boulder, Colorado, with regular forays to Buenos Aires.

I See You! by Vera Berv

Dancing in the City of Angels

2010-12-31T17:55:00.001-03:00

I'm in red and black at right, dancing with Avi.

I usually never take my tango shoes to L.A. when I visit. But this time I planned to meet my old tango friends at the milonga of my first teacher, Linda Valentino, Tango Mio.

That's me in black on the right

I loved seeing so many familiar faces, faces of my Los Angeles tango family: Flo, Dee, Howard, Manley, Johanna, Marcelo, Linda, Malina, so many.

An extra-added bonus was son Jason and his friend Connie attending with me. What a surprise to see Barbara Trelles who had been a student some years past in Buenos Aires!

It's a wonderful venue, the old Leonardo's Ballroom on LaBrea, with a great wooden floor packed with dancers as soon as the QTango quintet from Tucson took the stage.

We also saw Black Swan, but I was disappointed. Yes, Natalie Portman is gorgeous, but enough already of the closeups of her face with the same expression: closeup--longshot--closeup--longshot. And we're supposed to believe the PR that she did her own dancing? I don't expect an actress to be able to dance the lead in Swan Lake, but the faking just seemed so, well, fake.

The makeup was outstanding though, and so was the performance of Barbara Hershey as the ultimate controlling ballet mother. (Sure I was a ballet mother myself, but I never was able to control Jason, not then, not now!) I do hope, though, that the film will make people want to see the ballet. Along with MacMillan's Romeo and Juliet, Swan Lake is my favorite. I've seen it danced all over the world and like The Nutcracker, I'm never tired of it.

My last dance event of 2010 was The Nutcracker danced by the Pasadena Dance Theater at the historical Pasadena Playhouse. For me, it was never Christmas without The Nutcracker. I have many memories of watching Jason perform every Nutcracker role over the years, from Snow King to Russian dancer to Mouse King to Cavalier.

Jason as The Nutcracker, with Elkin as Clara, in the Los Angeles Ballet circa a long time ago

It was a cold and crispy winter night. We climbed into the hills of Pasadena while the stars shone overhead and the city lights twinkled below.

The performance was wonderful, great staging, well-rehearsed, delightful; a fitting finale to my holidays in Los Angeles.

Holiday Greetings from Ruben y Cherie

2010-12-21T18:06:00.000-03:00

National Day of the Tango

2010-12-10T18:26:00.001-03:00

Sandra of My Buenos Aires Travel Guide is always up to date with announcements of interesting events in Buenos Aires. I wrote about this special tango day last year, but this year I'll quote Sandra. (For Ruben and me, every day is a special Tango Day!) Go to Sandra's blog for more information on the free live orchestra concert with tango superstars and dancing in the streets:

Buenos Aires celebrates National Tango Day on Saturday, December 11th, 2010, with an open air free concert at the Obelisco, at 7:00 PM.

The Tango, declared by UNESCO as World's Cultural Heritage, celebrates its days in commemoration of the birth of Carlos Gardel and Julio De Caro. The stage will be mounted on Avenida 9 de Julio looking towards the south, there will be 8000 seats available to the public, and two large screens will be installed for easy viewing of the show.

El Dia de La Inmaculada Concepcîon

2010-12-07T20:11:00.000-03:00

by Murillo, Bartolomé Esteban

Today is a holiday: el Dia de la Inmaculada Concepcîon, a Holy Day of Obligation for Roman Catholics, or Dia de la Virgen, or the Day to Put Up Your Christmas Tree.

Check out my last year's post here. I had my Virgens wrong, but still it's the national day of decorating for Christmas. Everyone brings out there tinseled plastic trees from the closet and plugs them in. Dress shops drape ornaments around the bikinied mannequins in display windows.

Just to let you know, my beautiful little pine tree lives on and today we will bring it in from the terrace and decorate it for another year.

Ruben--my Papa Noel and my Christmas present

The Old Post Office

2010-11-30T16:14:00.001-03:00

Oh the fun I've had here in Viejo Correo in Parque Centenario over the many years of dancing in Buenos Aires! I used to go every Tuesday night when Yvonne y Eduardo organized a milonga, and also on Friday afternoons I was usually there, along with many milongueros, porteños, and tourists like I was then.

But things changed, as they always do, and the old tango club fell out of favor a bit and the trend went elsewhere. I think the change began when most tango venues were closed for several months after the Cro Magnon tragedy and during the Year That Tango Died. Many salons couldn't recover from the closures when dancers had to find other places to go.

Viejo Correo continued as usual after remodeling and reopening, but more as a club de barrio. And then a few months ago, Tuesday nights became home to the Practica X nuevo crowd, causing a very nice installation of new colored lights to make the ambiance more "cool."

Ruben y Carlos, posting a letter

With our old buddy Alberto

So love the black and white floor!

When Alfredo y Graciela asked us to perform at their special event, Encuentro Milonguero at Viejo Correo last Sunday afternoon, we were glad to revisit my old haunting ground. We knew almost everyone there and dancing on that familiar black and white floor brought back lots of wonderful memories.

Organizers Alfredo y Graciela

Twenty-four Long and Exciting Hours

2010-11-29T12:50:00.001-03:00

A couple of weeks ago we left the Milonga de los Consagrados to go out to a club in Banfield to perform a vals, tango, and milonga at a private fiesta. Ruben was wearing his beige suit for the occasion. Then we drove back in the opposite direction to milonga Los Bohemios in La Boca where Ruben was to act as a judge in a tango contest.

The tango club has indoor parking because La Boca is not the best place to be late at night wandering the streets. However when we left at 4:00 a.m., we had a flat tire. Ruben wanted to change it at a service station where there was more light and security, so we drove on the rim to one a few blocks away. He changed it, not doing the beige suit any good, and we made it home, just a couple of hours before we were to take a tourist group to the Feria de Mataderos, where we all had a great day. And we got back in time to teach a class at 8:00 p.m.

Whew.

P.S. Last week Ruben's car was stolen at twelve noon while we were at the supermarket buying fixins for Thanksgiving. I hope the thief got a flat; Ruben thinks he probably ran out of gas!

A Harvest Festival Remembered

2010-11-22T11:47:00.000-03:00

Just like Art Buchwald used to do with his Thanksgiving column explaining the custom to the French, here is a republishing of my annual Thanksgiving post. Happy Thanksgiving to everyone, even if this coming Thursday isn't your traditional day. We all have much to be grateful for.

Each autumn when the harvest is brought in, the people of the world throw a party. Here in Argentina the grape harvest is celebrated in March in Mendoza. But at any time during the year, somewhere in the world people are giving thanks for their blessings.

The biggest holiday in the U.S. is celebrated on the fourth Thursday of November, and is also a harvest festival. Bigger than Christmas or the 4th of July, it is Thanksgiving Day. No matter the culture, race, or religion, on this day the salad bowl of American people are united by one tradition: a family feast of traditional foods (with ethnic specialities often added), and then football on TV.

Did you know that eight nations of the world have official Thanksgiving Days? -- Argentina, Brazil, Canada, Japan, Korea, Liberia, Switzerland and the United States. (But try as I might, I could find no information on Thanksgiving in Argentina.)

The ancient tradition of declaring a special day or period for giving thanks goes back to the time when our ancestors hoped that an ostentatious display of gratitude would placate their capricious gods - thus ensuring continued bounty. But these days of thanksgiving were also occasions for celebrating the year's plenty with feasts and joyful gatherings.

Proclaiming days of Thanksgiving for various reasons - success in war, a bounteous harvest, the recovery of a king from illness - was part of European tradition for centuries.

Modern North American Thanksgiving lore is associated with the Pilgrims. In 1621, a year after arriving in the new world on the Mayflower, and following a severe winter in which many of their numbers had succumbed to disease, the colonists celebrated their first successful harvest by organizing a thanksgiving feast to which they invited the neighboring Native Indians. On the menu for that first American Thanksgiving were almost certainly some foods that are staples of the holiday today - turkey and pumpkin - along with other wild fowl, venison, oysters, clams, fish, corn cakes, and wild fruit and nuts.

But enough about history! What's for dinner?

On most North American tables, a turkey still holds pride of place for the annual Thanksgiving feast. In the US alone, over 40 million turkeys are consumed on this holiday weekend each year!

In November 1997 the United Nations General Assembly unanimously declared the year 2000 as the official International Year of Thanksgiving.

That same year, an English writer and director, Gurinder Chadha, came out with the quintessential American Thanksgiving movie, called, WHAT’S COOKIN? In it, four families in Los Angeles, my hometown, celebrate Thanksgiving Day. The families are Mexican, Vietnamese, Jewish, and black, and show the dysfunctions and problems that all families have in common. On Thanksgiving Day, their commonality is also thankfulness.

We all have something to be grateful for, especially we expats, even though it's hard to be far from home and family on this most American of holidays.

I am very thankful that this is my #644 post on tangocherie. Time does fly!
Springtime in Buenos Aires is not turkey time, and we're going to have a delicious Argentine barbecue, but still, on Thanksgiving Day and every day, I am thankful for you, dear readers!

Call Me Crazy; Age Appropriate Dancing

2010-11-10T15:46:00.002-03:00

Last night on Dancing With the Stars two pairs of children danced a jive in appropriate costumes, the little girls not tarted up in high heels or sexy outfits. They were great and no doubt will be professional ballroom dancers very soon. But I've seen other child ballroom couples performing and dressing as little adults while dancing in high-stakes, high pressure competitions. And it always makes me uncomfortable.

Does anyone else have a problem with children pretending to be adults? Kids dancing adult moves in skimpy outfits, and little tykes competing in beauty contests? Adults think miniature versions of themselves are cute, and they are, but I feel sorry that often these kids are on the growing up fast-track. (The recent controversy about "skinny" jeans for toddlers had more to do with price and designer labels than passing for 18!)

When I was a child taking dancing lessons, my teacher did not allow any girl under 18 to wear fishnet stockings or slit skirts in the recitals. I thought it was silly at the time, and probably seems ridiculous in this day and age, but now I understand.

Ok, I'm conservative, but neither do I think tango is a dance for children. The tango is sensual with the implied motive of "conquering" the partner with the dance. Why should a child dance it, especially with an adult partner?

And there's more, dear reader, sorry. I also am very uncomfortable watching a father dance a steamy tango with his daughter (Los Copes), a mother with her son (Los Pugliese), or a brother and sister (Ayelen y Federico). I know Fred Astaire danced professionally with his sister Adele, but there was never anything sensuous about their dancing.

Fred & Adele Astaire

Maybe in Argentina anything goes when it comes to steamy dancing.

I was very surprised when I first arrived in Argentina to see how popular belly dancing, or Odalisca, is--but mostly with little girls. In the Middle East it is a dance for mature women, and star performers can be up into their '70s. Call me a prude, but I would never let my young daughter put on a seductive revealing outfit and shake her hips at men. I've seen ten year olds acting as sexy as some of the starlets on Bailando Pour un Sueño. And then people are shocked at teen pregnancy, sexual promiscuity, and early marriage.

Let's let children be kids. Teach them folk dance, contemporary, acrobatics, gymnastics, tap, or, after eight years of age, classical ballet. Social ballroom classes, such as Junior Cotillion, give confidence and teach etiquette to preteens. Learning to dance is healthy and an investment in future happiness. Let's just save the sensuous adult stuff for later, along with dance competitions and contests. Childhood is short enough.

Bueno, entonces...

2010-11-04T09:31:00.001-03:00

I've heard of Bueno, entonces... Learn Spanish I and II video Argentine Spanish learning program for years. I've heard that it's easy and fun and the best way out there to specifically learn Castellano, the Spanish of Argentina.

So when General Linguistics offered me a review copy, I grabbed it so I could finally see for myself.

And it is delightful! It is conversational and full of words that people actually use on the street--including some naughty ones you wouldn't learn in high school. There is a soap-opera story of a nerdy British guy hitting on his hottie Argentine teacher that even keeps you interested in the next lesson.

I don't have any personal electronics, but you can even put it on your iPhone, iPod, Blackberry, or Android to carry it around with you. You do need iTunes which is readily available for free downloading. Perhaps that would be the best way to use the program.

You can click on the link below (or the icon on the top right) and buy Bueno entonces... and download it immediately for $147 USD. Or for $199 USD you can buy it on 6 DVDs. The 18 hours of AV instruction comes with PDF extras like a workbook and a slang dictionary. Plus the publishers keep you up to date with new material on Twitter, Facebook, YouTube, and their own blog.

Because Argentine Spanish is so difficult to come by in learning materials, let alone actual live classes with Argentine teachers in other countries, if you plan on coming to Argentina, I recommend this program.

To be fair, there are a few little things I wish were different: it's definitely aimed at young people, there is too much English for my taste, and I grow tried of the cartoon illustrations. How great it would be to have it live action. But still, for the price ($147 USD), the quality, and the technical online support, it's a great value and a must-have for all anglo-phones intent on visiting Argentina. Heck, I've lived here 7 years, and still I learned plenty from Bueno, entonces...! (which means, Well, then...)

If you want to learn Argentine Spanish, this is the way to go. And if you click on the link here on my blog to purchase, tangocherie gets a little commission, which would be nice. But I wouldn't recommend it--or anything to you--if I didn't like it. You know how frank and critical I am when necessary.

Years ago I became addicted to the 52 episode French learning series on TV, French In Action. It also had young people acting out a year-long story, lots of conversation, and real-life situations (but no dirty words!!) If Bueno entonces is half as good (I haven't watched the full 18 hours yet), it is very good indeed.

Click here to visit General Linguistics.

B.A. Tango Guide #205 Download Here!

2010-10-30T08:36:00.000-03:00

BAT 205 - Digital

Besitos Locos!

2010-10-25T14:20:00.002-03:00

Ruben and Coquito have a thing going. But I'm not jealous--I love them both!

La Vida Gauchesca

2010-10-23T14:02:00.001-03:00

At the top of my list of things I love about Argentina is the gaucho life and history, and especially as it relates to tango. I love the mystique and above all, the outfits. Gauchos today correspond to the American cowboy, in that they still live the life with their horses, which in the provinces of Buenos Aires, they keep at home.

You can see genuine gauchos in Buenos Aires every winter with their animals at the Fair and Exposition in La Rural, and every Sunday from April to December at the Feria de Mataderos.

At Mataderos you can see them ride in a competition of the sortija, the winner earning a purse. And you can learn more about gaucho history in the Museo Criollo. (Read more Mataderos posts on tangocherie.)

Gauchos also have their own confederation, which you can check out in Spanish on the web.

The gaucho figures strongly in the history and life of Argentina. Centuries ago when there was wild cattle roaming the country, the gaucho made his living by herding and selling them, banding together with his comrades to get a job done, and then going off after his solitary life again. Each man was allowed to round up 12,000 heads. When a cow was killed, the gaucho threw the tongue on the fire and ate that, so as to not ruin the carcass he needed to sell. He lived on beef and mate, and had the company of a "china" (country girl) and his guitar.

When the pampas began to be fenced in and owned by grand estancias in the 19th century, the gauchos had to look for another type of work. Some took jobs at the estancias, and many came to Buenos Aires and had to wear closed toed shoes for the first time in their lives, as the gaucho boots left their toes free. See illustrations of their clothing here.

Aside from his horse, the gaucho prides himself on his skill with the asado, or barbecue, which truly is an art. He doesn't use charcoal, but wood, and keeps moderating the temperature of the fire by adding and subtracting the coals. He adds coarse salt during the slow cooking to keep the meat from drying out right before he turns it over, bones down. All parts of the animal are eaten, including the fat.

In Argentina, it's only the men who are asadores.

Here is a famous verso gauchesco:

El Gaucho
Mi gloria es vivir tan libre como el pajaro del cielo, no hago nido en este suelo ande hay tanto que sufrir; y naides me ha de seguir cuando yo remonte el vuelo.

Those Mysterious Milonga Codes

2010-10-19T14:57:00.002-03:00

Most tango dancers around the world have heard of the "codigos" (unwritten rules of the milongas in Buenos Aires) and know a little bit about the cabeceo, or the head-nod invitation to dance. Also, at many international tango festivals there is discussion about the line of dance, la ronda, and how leaders need to manage it, which is also covered by the codigos. These two aspects are the most well known of the milonga codes.

But do you know that there are more than forty codigos of how to behave, from when you enter the milonga until you leave? There is etiquette to cover every situation (before it becomes a "situation").

Many foreign tangueros don't know or care about "old-fashioned" rules from a time and culture gone by. But the Argentines have been dancing tango in Buenos Aires for 150 years and have figured out a few things about how to conduct themselves at a milonga. The tried and true codigos are for everyone's benefit.

Tourist dancers in Buenos Aires sometimes rebel and want to act as they are used to at milongas in their countries. But out of respect for tradition, the local tangueros, and the tango itself, it behooves one to learn and follow at least the most important of the codigos while dancing in the traditional milongas of Buenos Aires.

I'm not going to list them here, because you can find the "rules" elsewhere on the web. Suffice it to say they are all about common courtesy. Here are some sites that discuss the codigos: La Milonga (español), Tango Chose Me,
Tips for Cabeceo Success, Crossroads, and once more a great article from Tango and Chaos--All the Meat on the Fire.

Medical Concerns of The Expat Life

2010-10-15T07:30:00.001-03:00

Do you dream of being an expat somewhere? Do you imagine retiring to some exotic locale way, way south of the border? Do you fantasize living the rest of your life in the Mecca of Tango where you can dance 24/7?

It's a fabulous idea and an incredible experience if you can pull it off. Who doesn't want to "follow their bliss?"

As someone who's been there, my advice is to just please use common sense and a dose of reality when you are making your plans. And remember, everything is easier when you are young. If you are a retiree or over 55, I'm sorry to say it's tougher--everything is more difficult as the years add up, especially physical concerns--but it's not impossible.

One very important thing to consider before pulling up stakes for parts unknown, is your health history. If you have chronic health problems or have suffered a catastrophic illness, you might want to reconsider starting over in a strange land, especially in the Third World. My attitude at the time was that I had survived cancer, it was all behind me, what the hell, I'm going for a new life.

But when I had a complication from radiation treatments received in Los Angeles after I returned to Mexico in 2003, the doctors there had very little experience with radiation as most Mexican BC patients have radical mastectomies and no radiation. I found a good oncologist in a small town in the middle of nowhere who figured it out, but that's what he told me.

Medical care in a foreign country is not the same as you are used to. And if you are not a native speaker of your new country's language, when you are weak, nervous and sick you may misunderstand the medical instructions in any language. Even if the doctor also speaks English, there can be miscommunication due to inexact language usage.

If there is free public health care available to you, are you sure you would want that instead of a top-of-the-line medical team? Can you afford to pay a top team and private hospital? A friend of mine on a tango vacation once needed emergency surgery and the hospital required a payment of $10,000 usd before proceeding; she had to wait for two days until the money arrived from Sweden. Thankfully, she is just fine now, several years later.

Some people say in an emergency or in the face of a serious illness, they would fly home for treatment. Money must be available for that option, as well as a health plan in the home country.

And when you are sick and used to running to the drugstore for your favorite OTC treatment, it can be a shock to realize that many are not available world-wide. Sure, there are local medicines, but you need to find out what you need and how it suits you before you desperately need it! I really miss Pepto Bismol, Nyquil, and many others (and thankfully have friends from abroad who keep me supplied).

My purpose is not to scare anyone from taking a chance on a new life in a new country, but just to bring awareness that it, like most things, can be more complicated than you think, and probably will be.

Che Araña

2010-10-14T09:37:00.000-03:00

This is too cute!! Just what I needed this morning!

As my friend commented when she posted it to Facebook, Eat your heart out, Pulpo!

Pink October

2010-10-01T00:04:00.000-03:00

It's that time of year again when the media wants us to be aware of breast cancer, get checkups, and above all, find a cure. Should we have to be reminded every October to take care of ourselves and others?

So once again I'm contributing my story, Cancer Dancer, which you can read here.

During my first cancer treatment, I visited a multi-media art exhibit in the big beautiful central library where I worked in downtown Los Angeles
Art.Rage.Us.: Art and Writing of Women With Breast Cancer. The very moving pieces of art and poetry comprising the exhibit were all by women at various stages of their breast cancer treatment, depicting their emotions about their own personal battles with disfigurement, disease and possible death. And in so doing created a call-to-arms for progress in diagnosis, treatment, and attitude.

Out of this traveling exhibition came a beautiful book published by The American Cancer Society, The Breast Cancer Fund, and the Susan B. Komen Breast Cancer Foundation. featuring illustrations from the exhibit along with the artists' biographies and writings.

available at Amazon

Here are two examples of the art, but many of the sculptures, paintings, collages, photos are very graphic images of the physical trauma of the treatments, showing especially the artists' feelings about mastectomy. And so the exhibit and the book are considered controversial.


"Venus Revisted" painting on silk by Carole Bonicelli


"Diagnosis 1" mixed media by Mary Ellen Edwards-McTamaney

A few years earlier, in 1993, the New York Times Magazine published a daring self-portrait cover photo of artist/photographer and former model, Matuschka, with a story on her stunning series, Beauty Out of Damage.

Many people were appalled and offended at the in-their-face photograph, which the NYT titled, You Can't Look Away Anymore.

But have things changed so much in the almost 20 years since? Last year Facebook banned photos of cancer survivor Sharon Adams who wanted to share her mastectomy scar pictures to make an impact on women in a stronger way than a delicate and subtle pink ribbon. Supposedly the photos were reinstated after a hue and cry went up on FB, but now there is only a very tiny one of her surgery scars.

It's hard for me to understand how such photos or depictions could be considered lewd, obscene, pornographic, disgusting, macabre, etc. I find them brave and heroic in celebrating the beautiful women within; femininity is more than a body. Not suitable for children? Not suitable for the sensitive? Anyone can get cancer and they have to deal with it. The more aware people (men get breast cancer too) are of the consequences, the more active they will be in prevention. Because of the efforts of women like these, cancer is no longer a dirty word--at least to most people. Being afraid to look at images of the damage cancer brings is simply outrageous.

Oscar Wilde said one can either make
a masterpiece or be one. Artist
Matuschka has managed to do both.
Linda Vaccariello
Cincinnati Magazine

How to Choose a Teacher for Private Tango Lessons

2010-09-27T18:58:00.002-03:00

This question goes around the net from blog to travel site to personal emails to internet mailing lists. As a teacher myself of social milonguero-style tango, here's what I think:

1) Do a little research and know what syle of tango you want to learn, and then if the teacher in question teaches that style. For example, if you want to learn tango nuevo, find a teacher who is known for that. Ot social tango as it is danced in the milongas of Buenos Aires. Or stage tango. Or whatever. Be sure to know before you start if the fit is right for your goals. If your aim is to be a capable social dancer, then a stage tango star is not the best teacher for you.

2) If you want to learn social Argentine tango, it's usually not a good idea to select a teacher at a ballroom studio who teaches other ballroom styles as well.

3) Watch the person dance and decide if you like what you see or not. Is he/she musical? Elegant? Do they have a good embrace and connection?

4) Prospective students often think they need a man teacher if they are a woman, or a woman if they are a man, because they are thinking they must dance together during the lesson. The ideal situation is a teaching couple, so one can dance with the student, while the other watches, and they both correct and contribute to the student's learning. (Remember though that only a man can teach a man how to dance like a man.)

5) Does the teacher play music in class that is actually danced to (not as background)? Does he teach by counting or to dance by feeling the music?

6) Pricing: how long is the private lesson? Is there one teacher or two? Are there extra charges for studio rental, a practice partner, translation?

7) Weekend workshops from traveling teachers are fine, but you need to learn technique and the basics from consistent classes. Especially at the beginning of your tango journey, it can be very confusing to take a couple of classes from many different people who dance different styles. Heel first, toe first, weight on the balls of the feet, pivot or not to pivot, disassociation? One lesson can cancel out another lesson, leaving you all the worse for wear.

After the first lesson or two:
Evaluate--does the teacher act like an arrogant tango god who knows everything? Does he also include some culture and codigos of how tango is danced in Buenos Aires? Does he expect you to dance just like he does (or she does)? Does he teach complicated patterns or the 8 count basic instead of how to improvise? Did he tell you that the basic step of tango is the walk? Does he encourage you to go to milongas?

Here's what British Peter Campbell had to say about his first lesson in Argentine tango:

The 29-year-olds Valeria Sol Alvarez and Sebastian Acosta emerge from their dressing room in full attire, complete with sequins and dark suit, I wonder quite what is in store.

Their opening number is a traditional tango from before the 1930s, but as their legs flick seemingly effortlessly through each others, I ponder how I am going to avoid crippling my partner if I attempt a similar move...Sebastian continually, and graciously, reminds me on which foot I have to start for each sequence...

In the final moves he lifts her right above his head, spinning her round before dropping to the dramatic final pose as the music crashes to a halt. They remain in the final position, bent over each other in passion, for a final few seconds.

Seeing the way that the pair interact, their bodies moving so gracefully and effortlessly across the floor, puts my humble steps greatly to shame.

This kind of experience is liable to put off a prospective student forever!
Above all, after a few lessons you decide that you are not enjoying learning Argentine tango, don't give up! Just find another teacher. There are as many different ways to dance tango as there are people; you dance who you are. So please don't give up on the dance just because you didn't learn or enjoy your first teacher. There are many more out there waiting for you. Just find one that you like and who makes the classes fun. Tango should be a pleasure, and that includes time spent learning it.

Diostango October 2010 Download Here

2010-09-25T14:07:00.002-03:00

Diostango Nº 48 - Octubre 2010

Feliz Primavera!

2010-09-21T08:23:00.002-03:00

Here in the Southern Hemisphere, today is the first day of Spring! Called the Spring Equinox, the September Equinox, or the Vernal Point (you can read more about the celestial explanations here and here.)

Spring Tulips by Elizabeth Brinton

Spring is celebrated big time in Argentina, especially Buenos Aires, where there are special Primavera parties and milongas, and everyone salutes their friends with Feliz Primavera! Maybe because Porteños tend to love hot weather and the vacation and leisure that summer promises. It's a bit weird for me because my March birthday was always celebrated in springtime, along with Easter, and now suddenly it falls in autumn. But any occasion to celebrate is a good one, I say.

A tango print by Elizabeth Brinton illustrated my last post on the Embrace, and I'm using another one of her stunning prints from her beautiful new website now for spring.

Don't Fear It, Embrace It!

2010-09-18T14:37:00.000-03:00

This popular debate on the internet Tango-L is a bit like clerics in the Middle Ages arguing over how many angels can dance on the head of a pin. How close is a "close embrace?" And what the heck is an "open embrace?" And if you dance close, does that mean you have to go for coffee afterwards?

I believe the term "close embrace" as it relates to tango was coined by a native English speaker to distinguish it from the "hold" of ballroom. But an embrace is an embrace. Do you "embrace" someone at arm's length in normal life?

The tango embrace, even though you may not know or care about the person, is the same position as embracing someone you love. It's not the person you love, but the music. And it is the dance position of tango. You want to dance tango? You assume the position. It doesn't mean more than that and there's nothing to be afraid of.

The milongueros of Buenos Aires know this. It is true, however, that some may try to take advantage of a foreign woman's rush of emotion at being in such intimacy with a man who seems to find her so desirable. Perhaps where she comes from the men are "afraid" to embrace her fully, afraid that she will think he is "interested" in her for other reasons, or back home the man himself is afraid of his own emotions when he has a woman in his arms.

So many people get all riled up about what does it mean to dance so close, how much do they have to like the person to be so close, they have to really know well the person they clasp to their chest, etc.

It's a dance, folks, not matrimony! Just a five minute commitment to forget yourself in the arms of someone while you move in harmony to the music.

In my experience as a tango dancer and teacher, many "foreign" dancers, especially those from Anglo-Saxon traditions, are indeed afraid of the embrace. It has to do with our personal space, which unlike latino and arab cultures, is much wider. People from "English" cultures are not used to being that close to someone who is not their sweetheart or beloved relative; sometimes their emotions get all confused after a tanda of moving together as one, hugged so dearly by a stranger.

Print by Elizabeth Brinton

The embrace is the position for dancing tango--it's the base for all of the emotions and feelings that arise from the music and being connected, not only to your partner and the music, but to the Universe.

There is no such thing as an "open embrace." If you can stampede a herd of elephants between the couple, there is no embrace.

Tango is danced heart to heart. The beating of two hearts united together is the rhythm of tango. Two hearts, four legs = 2 x 4 = Tango.

As studies have proven over and over again, the embrace is good for your health. Hugs are healthy for your heart and good for your soul. You don't need a Free Hug in the street. You can dance tango until dawn and go home full of endorphins, feeling cured of all that previously ailed you.

Painting by Jan Rae

I'm not going to say as others have, just go and dance salsa, swing, or something else if you don't want to embrace your partner! People of course can dance how they like, but dancing tango without the embrace is missing out. Why fear it? Use it, luxuriate in it, enjoy it!

Alberto Castillo and Me

2010-09-16T09:51:00.001-03:00

For me, the thrill of a lifetime! I don't know about you, but my favorite songs from the beginning of my tango listening have always been those recorded by Tanturi con Castillo. Alberto Castillo's voice melts my heart. I even especially loved the wonderful Argentine film La Luna de Avellaneda because of the portrayal of Alberto Castillo (by El Chino Laborde) singing Siga el Baile...Carnavelito Carnavelito!! and then delivering a baby at the milonga (Castillo was also a doctor.)

From left, Dr De Luca, Marcela, Maestro Jorge Dragone, Ruben

So was I excited when Ruben and I were asked to dance in an homenaje to Castillo in Nuevo Chique? Are you kidding me? And in the presence of Castillo's son, Dr. Alberto Jorge De Luca--who looks exactly like his dad--and his grandson Pablo, as well as the famous orchestra leader Jorge Dragone. DJ Dany Borelli put together a video presentation of film clips on a giant screen. And Ruben and I danced to Las Violetas, such a rapid vals that it is almost never played in milongas, Singing the very fast tongue-twisting lyrics was a tour de force for Castillo. We were the only exhibition. Halfway through the piece, when Castillo began to sing, I felt that my heart would burst.

It was a great honor for me, even more because I am a foreigner, to have taken such a part in this lovely salute to one of the finest, if not the very best, singers in tango history. A true icon who I have revered from the beginning of my tango career in 1997.

Such a successful event organized by Ruben y Marcela, who do a great job every Tuesday and Thursday with their wonderful milonga, Nuevo Chiqué.

(Photo by Guillermo Thorp for Diostango)

For me, Castillo is the Voice of Tango! (And just look at these tango faces in the film clip below.)

Tito Palumbo Speaks Out About the Championships

2010-09-11T15:39:00.001-03:00

SOME REFLECTIONS ON THE TANGO BUENOS AIRES 2010 FESTIVAL AND CHAMPIONSHIP. By Tito Palumbo

The following are some thoughts that come to mind about these events produced by the Ministry of Culture of Buenos Aires.

Something was previously mentioned in the News Updates No. 204 / 1 where I wrote about a venue named Meeting Point.

I assume that tango lives in our city's 365 days a year and the month of August has always had a stream of tourists from the northern hemisphere, where it's summer and holiday time.

The city government has organized the offer of these events over this stream of visitors (1).

A great deal of shows, classes, milongas, conferences, was featured in several venues, private and belonging to the city government, which culminated in the finals of Salon Tango and Stage Tango at Luna Park. And all is well that ends well.

I attended the night where tribute was paid to Maestro Horacio Salgán and the Quinteto Real performed. It was a night full of joy for all those who attended; with excellent music played by the ensemble’s new members and listening to the maestro (94 years) who told the history of the group continuing with a semblance of his teammate Ubaldo De Lio whom he personally handed a memory plate.

The following Sunday singer Ariel Ardit, a prominent artist, performed at the Theatre 25 de Mayo. A tango orchestra conducted by pianist Andrés Linetzky accompanied him. Due to a vocal problem derived from a performance he had earlier that day in the province of San Juan, he had to shorten his show that lasted just an hour.

I responded to a question about the World Tango Championships in an interview with the magazine Tango in Rome (Italy) last June: “I agree that there are many ways of answering your question on the championships: a) they award a diploma to winners who may begin working as professionals, b) it is a business for some officials involved in the organization, c) they provide audio-visual materials to business owners without paying the dancers, and d) they generate tourism to the city. In the meantime I've change my opinion on the last point as indicated in preceding paragraphs.

The winning couples in both categories, Salon Tango and Stage Tango were:

Salon Tango

1º) Sebastián Ariel Jiménez y María Inés Bogado (Buenos Aires)

2º) Diego Ezequiel Pérez y María Soledad Cantarini (Rosario, Prov. of Santa Fe)

3º) Cristian Andrés López y Naoko Tsutsumizaki ( Tokyo, Japan)

4º) Ariel Manzanares y Daniela Sol Cerquides (Buenos Aires)

5º) Frank Obregón y Jenny Gil (Caracas, Venezuela)

Stage Tango

1º) Diego Ortega y Chizuko Kuwamoto (Colón, Prov. of Buenos Aires)

2º) Cristian Correa y Manuela Rossi (Buenos Aires)

3º) Cristian Andrés López y Naoko Tsutsumizaki ( Tokyo, Japan)

4º) Leonardo Luizaga y Paola Giselle Luizaga ( Zárate, Prov. of Buenos Aires)

5º) Eber Alejandro Burger y Yésica Lorena Lozano (Lanús, Prov. of Buenos Aires)

My idea on Stage Tango as it was seen -especially in the semifinals- is that there was a lot of choreography reminiscent of the classical dance, with a male dancer holding a female dancer that was doing pirouettes and jumps. Tango, nothing at all! In an interview with Claudio Segovia, creator of the show Tango Argentino, which in the 80s revived the desire to dance, he said, "The knowledge of Tango dance was born with Tango Argentino; it created the tango-dancing that did not existed before. As spectacle aroused the interest and desire to learn to dance. Those with passion for dance began to learn to dance tango." (2)

Surely seeing young couples today doing Stage Tango, agile, with plenty of tricks, no spectators over 25 years will run out of the theater to find a tango teacher and take dance lessons.

The Dance Championship Finals involved this year a notary to certify the vote of the judges. This should now be completed with the installation of an electronic board that will allow the public to see the ratings made by each one of the judges on each one of the participating couples.

About the participation of singer and composer Ruben Blades I found in it another measure to promote Tango abroad. An Argentine singer can be known within the limits of our country and, at most, Uruguay and Chile. However, this Panamanian has a presence in many more countries. He had enough tact not to choose to sing tangos because then the comparison would not favor him, that's why he sang his own songs with music composed and arranged by outstanding maestro Carlos Franzetti, based on tangos and milongas rhythmic. But the combination proved to be self-defeating, the metric of the verses that goes very well with salsa does not match at all with the music of the River Plate.

Her female dance companions paid an emotive well-deserved tribute to Maria Nieves (Rego). As one of them told me: "She is the last milonguera, we just are dancers." She danced with "Pancho" Martínez Pey showing that she is a remarkable artist with great mastery of the stage.

Susana Rinaldi, admirable actress and singer, closed the Stage Tango finals. Now, she doesn’t belong to the milonga, her songs are not played in the dance halls. It turned out that her performance took place after having released the winners of the competition, so being on the stage she found that half the attendants was gone, including the city authorities.

There were mistakes in bulk. By instance, it was announced that Omar Viola would be the master of ceremonies in the Grand Closing Milonga to be held on Sunday 29. Well, he never knew it before, the organizers did not inform him; he just knew about it after the date when an acquaintance asked him why he had not been there.

The accreditation of journalists was in the hands of incompetent staff. Personally, I had to complain to the Press Chief because I didn’t receive the confirmation being the application sent in time and order. Milton Saldanha. a colleague in San Pablo (Brazil), has written a highly critical editorial for his magazine Jornal Dance. I had difficulties taking pictures on the Salgán’s Night; I was making some shots from a box, without using flash, without bothering anyone, when a security employee came to warn me that I could not take pictures. Staff of the Press Festival had to intervene to tell this employee that I was authorized. All privileges were to the television and mass media in Luna Park; BA Tango - Buenos Aires Tango was relegated at the last moment, when almost all participants, very tired, had withdrawn.

(1) It is recalled that the Iº Tango World Championship took place in March 2003 and moved to August from the following year on. The first two Buenos Aires Tango Festivals took place in December, the following from 2001 to 2007, inclusive, in February and March, and from 2008 on, in August. One can see a clear political opportunism tourist oriented business for which the Tango is a cultural phenomenon used to take advantage.

(2) B.A. TANGO – Buenos Aires Tango Nº 23, second fortnight of February 1996, p. 1.

TITO PALUMBO está en / is on FACEBOOK

* * *

5º CAMPEONATO DE BAILE – TANGO SALÓN - “LA MARSHÀLL”

5th “La Marshàll” Tango Salón Dance Championship

Durante los miércoles de septiembre tendrá lugar la 5ª edición del Campeonato de Baile de Tango, categoría Tango Salón, sin distinción de sexos en los roles, organizado por La Marshàll. En Plaza Bohemia, Maipú 444. Informes a los tels. 43 00-34 87/15-54 58-34 23. Más info en www.lamarshall.com.ar

Las próximas fechas son:

Día 15 – Ronda eliminatoria;

Día 22 – Semifinal;

Día 29 – Final.

Premio a la pareja ganadora: $ 1.000.

- - -

The 5th edition of the Tango Dance Championship, Salon Tango category, regardless of gender roles will take place during the Wednesdays of September. It is organized by La Marshall. At Plaza Bohemia, 444 Maipú St. For information phone 43 00-34 87/15-54 58-34 23. More info on www.lamarshall.com.ar
The next dates are:
09/15 - Qualifying Round;
09/22 - Semifinal;
09/29 - Final.
Prize to the winning couple: $a 1,000.

* * *

More Happy Tango

2010-09-09T10:30:00.002-03:00

Finally got my hands on Sallycat's delightful guide to all things tango in Buenos Aires!

(You can read my earlier report on it here.)

If you are planning a Tango Trip to Buenos Aires or if you just enjoy reading Sally's blog, you will love Happy Tango. She has organized all of the information you will need and more for a dance-packed vacation, to make the most of your time and to hit the ground dancing. There is information on the milongas, codigos, language, transportation, places to stay, tourist tips to Buenos Aires, she covers it all. I wish I had had this book on my first trip here in 1997.

She writes all about what you need to know in her refreshing personal style. (The information is organized alphabetically so you can easily find what you're looking for, but as a librarian I miss having a table of contents and/or an index.)

AND, a real plus over other guidebooks, she has a webpage of updated information, because things are always changing.

Here's where you can order it.

And may all of your tangos be happy ones!

Diostango September 2010 Available for Download Here

2010-09-03T22:04:00.000-03:00

What a beautiful photo of Osvaldo Zotto!

Diostango47(2)

El Campeonato Mundial

2010-09-03T16:28:00.002-03:00

Okay, it's all over except for the PR, photos, and marketing.
If you were interested, you've already seen all the blog reports, the videos, news of the Finals and who won them. I'm not going to be redundant here.

I have only this question: do you really think that an 18 year old couple who've been dancing tango for two years can be the very best tango salon dancers in the world? IN THE WORLD?

I would love to know your opinion. Please leave me a comment. If only to orient tangocherie in the real world.

Week of Campeonatos!

2010-08-27T15:49:00.001-03:00

Marcelo Castelo y Ruben

The beginning of Championship Week in Buenos Aires (especially the Campeonato Mundial de Tango) included a Milonga Contest on Sunday in Mi Club, a milonga organized by Marcelo Castelo in Banfield (Province of Buenos Aires).

The Trophies

The Winners

Fifteen couples competed in two rounds of two milongas each--first a slow then a fast one. The club was packed with good dancers and it was so fun to be there and be a part of an event outside of El Centro! (Ruben and I also did a little milonga demo.)

A great evening! Congratulations to all who participated!

Ruben with old friends

Your Judges