Tango Dancing in Buenos Aires
When I think of Argentina the first images that come to mind are of red wine, good steak and tango dancing. The city oozes sexuality, there is an entire different element of emotion and passion here, late night dances and romances happen alike and tango merely accentuates that atmosphere. The Argentine Tango itself originated in the late 1800’s in Buenos Aires and has been considered something like ‘a sad thought you can dance to’ where the couple dance very close to capture the feeling that the city seems to expel. Now of course being a ballroom and latin dancer myself I wasn’t going to pass up the opportunity to learn the trade in the city that it originated and leapt at the chance to experience an authentic class. Tucked away up a staircase in an unassuming building in downtown Buenos Aires exists a vast ballroom where such dances occur almost every night. With borrowed dance shoes in tow I arrived at the class at 2pm and was immediately transported back to my teenage latin class years. The floor was well polished, the wall decoration was beautiful yet crumbling at hints of age and a chandelier donned the decorated ceiling. The crowd, exclusively all above 50 years old, were pleasantly surprised to see such a young and partnerless entourage give their local dance a shot. And then the teacher began - in Spanish of course. Despite the language barrier it was relatively easy to follow the steps and practice walking and moving once again. Although years of professional training in dance, I had to throw the rule book out of the window and re-learn new techniques which are completely different to anything I have learned before (in some ways it might actually be harder for someone who has danced European tango before) but nonetheless we were provided with a basic and fun routine. Throughout the two hour session we were also encouraged to dance with a series of partners, many who spoke no English, and to move around the room to the music. I was already being shown up by my fellow dance students yet the lesson provided us with a good knowledge of the basic techniques. Before I knew it the session was over yet thanks to a captivating tango teacher we left confident that the later Milonga (actual dance evening) would be a piece of cake. Return to the same ballroom an hour later and the tempo of the evening has completely been switched up. The ballroom is now buzzing with tango dancers in dresses, heels, suits and all over the age of about 50 years old. In the bathroom ladies are slipping on their shoes, changing into their tango dresses and reapplying their perfect lipstick before heading over to take a seat on the ladies side of the room. Now this is where it gets interesting. As the lights dim the female dancers sit on the left side of the room whilst the men all gather on the right, eyeing up their potential suitors. When you make eye contact with a man he will then walk over to you and ask for a dance - which you can’t really decline. Perhaps it was a rookie error of mine to glance at any of the elderly tango men however in a room with a much older crowd we completely stood out anyway. My moment came. A man crossed the room, held out his hand and I could tell there was no going back. Before I knew it I was trying to dance Argentine Tango in Buenos Aires with a local tango dancer and my god did I embarrass myself. Being the youngest in the room by almost 30 years, all eyes were on me of course and in broken Spanish I tried hard to explain that this was my first dance and I was probably going to be terrible. Although being held really, really close my partner struggled to lead me and for 4 dances we spun around the centre of the room, stepping on each others feet and probably looking a little silly. Did I just offend Argentina with how poor my tango skills turned out to be? Probably. At the end of the four dances everyone then returns to their seats and the ritual begins again, and I guess the only way I could explain what this entire experience reminded me of was what happens when you meet a guy in a nightclub. With aching feet and after a number of other locals had asked for my hand we made a swift exit feeling both accomplished and surprised at this local tango lifestyle. When I later chatted with some twentysomething Argentinian (and may I add beautiful) guys they explained that though Tango is the national dance of their country, it is not something practiced by the younger generations who are more accustomed to electronic music. But for 100 pesos (£4) a milonga is an amazing way for an older generation to keep healthy, socialise and meet new people. In an age where you often hear about loneliness amongst older generations it is absolutely brilliant for this opportunity to be readily available, every night, for anyone to attend. So I might’ve offended some people with my questionable moves but this bizarre yet wonderful experience is the first of many dance immersions I expect will happen in Latin America. It’s a must on any visit to Buenos Aires.
0 Comments
Malbec, Europe and Politics in Argentina
The jet lag has finally subsided and I’m now totally immersed in the reality of Buenos Aires where (when stripped of its tourist traps) is a vast bustling city of winding streets, Spanish speakers and the perfect way to ease into a magical Latin American life. Take a turn down any cobbled laneway in the warm spring sun and for a second you will be convinced that you are actually in Paris. Another turn and you’re in Italy or maybe even Greece. I say that this is a good gateway to the Latin world but the European influences are staggering in the incredible architecture, food and general cultural habits. If you wake up early enough you can often catch residents cleaning their streets outside, for $6 you can catch the extensive bus system to anywhere in the city and croissants (medillunas) are a quite common Argentine breakfast. So really I didn’t feel too far away from home at all. Naturally my next task was to thus seek out the unusual traits that drew it away from it’s European counterparts and you only need to look at the time to spot your first difference. Jeopardizing my jet lag even further was the discovery that the pace of Argentine life is incredibly slow and everything starts late - really late. At 10pm on any night of the week, the streets are full of residents eating their dinner (my main meal was served at 11.20pm a few nights ago) and even the coffee shops remain open this late too. As a result the clubs are empty until around 3am when the crowds finally start to roll in and somehow everyone can still function on such little sleep! More unusual habits began to peer out at me such as Dog walking being a career choice here and a day doesn’t go by without seeing countless people walking with up to 20 dogs in tow. You can also walk down the street with a beer in your hand, bus drivers are a little reckless and tend to speed, there is an abundance of retro cars amongst the city, it is incredibly hard to find a resident that understands English and once again I am totally lost in translation. That being said I was still too comfortable and the reality of South America felt far from hitting me. It was this Sunday that the country faced its congressional elections and as a result of the vote there was also a ban on selling alcohol and drinking alcohol throughout the whole 24 hour period (why wouldn’t people need a drink after messing with politics?!). Anyway to a great extent the tempo of the city slowed even further as people made their way to local polling stations in an orderly fashion and I didn’t even see a single protest despite a tumultuous political underbelly. It wasn’t long before we encountered some local residents who wanted to have a drink and laughed as we questioned the temporary drink restrictions. A few foreign words in Spanish at the supermercado and the shop assistant was scanning through chocolate bars and placing bottles of Malbec into a bag for us. We then climbed several flights of stairs in a nearby house, greeting their flatmates on the way through winding corridors of an old European-syle house and finally onto a stunning rooftop. We basked in the warm evening sun and drank amazing Malbec (seriously the best quality wine I’ve had in a while and half the price of anything in Australia) whilst listening to Cumbia music and Spanish conversations. Our hosts of course offered us food at around 11pm and we carried on drinking into the early or late hours. It was in this moment that I truly felt the first breath of the real Latin America. Looking across the horizon at the backs of buildings, you are stripped away from the frontal European facade. Colourful roofs, laundry, people dancing in the sun and the echoes of Latin music immediately plunged me into a sense of utter excitement. This was real. I’m in South America and it’s extraordinary. (I was listening to Steppenwolf when I was writing this)
The first thing that sprung to mind today was all the goodbyes that I have already had to say this year. It was very early in my Melbourne residence that my first friend left the country following the expiry of her visa and I can still vividly remember how sad she looked. I was reminded that my time too would come and in the blink of an eye here it is, my final entry about Australia. Though the last few weeks have been somewhat of a partying blur, it was a sobering drive to the airport today. For the last time I went past street corners, bars, homes and warehouses that have all defined a part of my Australian experience. And as I cast my gaze on these memorable places my mind quickly conjures up images of happiness and excitement so vividly in my mind. For instance, I wish you could’ve danced around my best friend's room with me. I wish you could’ve truly felt the cool breeze on your skin whilst inside my Brunswick warehouse. I wish you could’ve felt the same exhaustion throughout my hitchhiking saga and I wish you could’ve struggled through my hangovers on my behalf. The list goes on – if only you could imagine the stiflingly hot Cairns sun, the high of Splendour and Golden Plains festivals and all the days inbetween where I just got on with daily living. Of course it hasn’t all been plain sailing and like any year in any life I have laughed and cried and raged and felt all of the emotions that you have felt too. The one thing that I can be certain of is that my year in Australia has been well-lived, well-experienced and positively life changing. All of the expectations that I arrived with last October were crushed by a reality that I could’ve never drawn in my mind - and I predict that exactly the same will happen with Buenos Aires and South America beyond. And yet the world keeps on turning. As I watch the shape of the Australian terrain become nothing more than a tiny spec in my aeroplane window, I carry forward my Australian memories of both people and places, locked away in the confines of my mind like ghosts anticipating the moment when something triggers their revival. Like any chapter in any book, today I have experienced a plot twist and a change in tempo as I embark on my flight to Argentina. However like a good book, the previous chapter will leave traces and links within the forthcoming and merely add even further depth to the winding journey that I am plotting everyday. It was whilst sitting in the centre of Melbourne yesterday, admiring the warmth the summer sun and the countdown to my final week in Australia, that I was approached by a stranger.
It was of course quite a typical scenario, but one that doesn’t tend to happen much anymore. The stranger, a girl roughly around my age had asked for directions to a local cafe and I was happy to show her (as my year long residence here was enough to make me a local). After talking a moment longer and realising that we both had foreign accents, our conversation quickly leapt onto travelling. The stranger had actually arrived two days earlier from California to find a job, a home and begin her working visa here in Melbourne and oh how that scenario sounded all too painfully familiar to me - give or take 365 days. It was as if I had been looking into a mirror at the girl in front of me, completely alone in a alien city. In that moment two strangers bonded over the fears that come with arriving in a new place and we became friends through the knowledge that we had both arrived with just a backpack. We exchanged contact details and I even invited her round to my house that evening to party with my friends. It was in that moment that I realised I had come full circle through my travelling experience and as the next wave of lost, broken travellers descend on my temporary home and I slip into the position of a local adviser, I guess it signifies that it’s my time to leave. Melbourne is accomplished. It was an interesting and wonderful moment but it also reminded me of a very important lesson that I vow to stick to. That brief encounter which quickly spun into a friendship, an invite to a house party, tips on jobs and also a personal reminder of how far I’d come was the result of my new friend asking a question, and asking for directions. This, in a year where we find so much comfort in using Google Maps and our phones to guide us through life, was a refreshing and positive moment. We all need to ask more questions. Though my Spanish might not be up to scratch I promise that when I find myself as the lost foreign traveler once again (in a mere 9 days) that I will step away from my phone and look to ask the people around me for help. Who knows what unusual friendships we could all create. |
Tamara DavisonNepal, China, Malaysia, Australia, Argentina. Archives
November 2017
Categories |