La Nuit Blanche

Photo: NYC City Hall Subway Station, National Park Service of the United States

I changed my shoes and walked onto the wooden floor in the last thirty minutes of the milonga.  Three tandas, three men.  A Spaniard, a Japanese, and a Russian.  The tanda of D’Arienzo started off with “Mandria”, and continued with “La Bruja”.  By the third song, I had lost my wits to the joy of the dance, the music, the exhilaration.  There are certain songs I can’t listen to now, without feeling a sharp pain, akin to the stormy calm that precedes tears.  They were played often in Buenos Aires, and belong to the soundtrack of my life there…

Then a quick walk through the rain with a friend to the subway station, and brushing off the droplets from my leather jacket on the station platform, only to find another tanguero and another tanguera waiting for the same train.  A moment later, yet another tanguero and yet another tanguera make their entrance into our station.  The latter draws out a portable stereo device out of her bag, plugs in her ipod, and listo!  Six dancers pair off into an impromptu Subte Milonga.  Like magic.

Then the train comes speeding along, and it’s all over in three seconds.

Incidentally, the song that came out of the stereo was “La Melodía del Corazón“.  Oh how I wished my beloved had stayed until the Cumparsita…

(I am liking New York more and more with each passing day.)

Parakultural, Salon Canning

I didn’t go out this past weekend to a favorite NYC monthly milonga because I am going through a period of mourning.

No, it’s not the dancing that I miss. Superior or not, different or no in Argentina, the dancing, I am convinced, is beautiful here in New York. I myself am a New Yorker, and the porteños seemed to love the way I dance…? Maybe it’s because here at home, I am lucky to be partnering with the most amazing dancers, maybe it’s because so many of my friends have been spending so much time in Buenos Aires that they brought much of it back with them, perhaps it’s because some of them were porteños in a past life, I don’t know. But no, it’s not the dancing iself that I miss.

What I do miss, are the places. I miss the high arched ceilngs, the truly café-like atmosphere, the airy brightness of the milongas, the wood panels, the French windows opening onto stone balconies, smoking rooms, the professional mozos dressed in black and white. I miss that there were more tables surrounding the dancefloor than the dancefloor itself. I miss the permanence of these places, as if they were built just for dancing tango.

I miss the mood of the milongas. How they felt like they had been there forever. How the old places carried the weight of decades and decades of memories, how it seeps into your being and permeates the way you move, how the new places were feverishly vampiric with new young blood pumped into fresh new veins, adding an asbolutely modern aesthetic to this old dance.

I miss the hosts and hostesses who greeted me with open arms and warm hugs and kisses on the cheek, who remembered my name since the second time they saw me, who treated me like a darling of their milongas.

I miss the men who were dressed in impeccable suits, and beautiful hair, the really old milongueros, and the teenagers, alike. I miss how they smelled of citrus and cologne, as if they had prepared themselves earlier in the evening, just for me. I miss how they gazed at me, intently, from across the room, and respected the distance between us when I turned my eyes away. I miss how they would walk me back to my table after each tanda. I miss their ludicrously funny palabras.

And I miss, terribly miss, my new friends. I met a group of beautiful English girls during the last two weeks of my stay. Every night, we shared tables together, walked to and from the milongas through the streets of Palermo, Villa Urquiza, Constitution, Retiro, met for coffee in the afternoons, went to birthday dinners and the theatre, bought gifts for each other, took pictures of each other, took care of each other. We would nickname the milongueros with the names of movie stars, talk of love, of fear, of desire, of ambition, of art, of cities, laugh-lines deepening with the smoldering glow in our eyes. I miss Tina, her velvety eyes and silly laugh. I miss Sally, her sparkling wit and warm hugs.

I was blessed, particularly so, I think, in comparison to other turistas on their first visit to Buenos Aires. I was spoiled with everything I could wish for.

And now it’s just not the same…….

Last night, I went to a popular Sunday night milonga, only to find that my friends were sleepy and tired. They had all attended the All Night Milonga the night before (which I had skipped out on, to opt for yummy home-made Peruvian food and a farewell party across the river), so they were all changing their shoes by the time I arrived… That was 10:30pm.

My Lover was happy and relieved that I had come. He had called me, soon after he had arrived, saying my name just for the sake of saying my name… I think he had been missing me, a tiny bit. :-D

Our first tanda consisted of sweet lyrical tangos, the kind of songs that make it so easy to melt into thin air, especially if you are in the arms of a handsome porteño you happen to be madly in love in. As we were passing by a corner table seating some elderly gentlemen, one of them started to call out in castellano, with great gusto:

“¡Oooo! Something something…. rrrrrollo, estrrrrra, rrrrrilo… something something… ¡¡¡Buen provecho!!!”

My eyes were fluttering open and closed, in and out of a waking dream (Oh! That tango was so sweet! But I didn’t know what it was called), but I could feel my Lover’s initial surprise and confusion, and then a slight intake of breathe and a giggle.

At the end of that song, I asked my Lover what the man had said, and he replied that it was the equivalent of “Bon appetit.” I looked over at the table of elderly gents, and smiled. Which drew more exclamations of,

“¡¡Oooooo!!” and “¡Eeeeeee!” and the like.

Later on in the night, when I was grabbing huge chunks of vegetables and crackers by the refreshment table and stuffing them into my hungry mouth, the Oooo Man came over to me and started speaking to me in rapid Spanish.

“Ooooo…muy linda…hoho…heehee…¿cuánto cuesta…something something…todo?”

Erm…

“Yo no hablo español, perdón…” was all I could muster, in my carefully coached porteña accent, ofcourse.

“Oooo, something something… no nececita, something… Sos china? Japonesa?”

That I could understand.

“No, yo soy coreana.”

He then started speaking to me again in rapid Spanish, but I had to say again, helplessly,

“No hablo español…”

I felt like a dummy. There I was, a sweet Argentine gent trying to talk to me, saying (most likely) deliciously lewd things to me, and I couldn’t understand a word. :-(((

It was time to go home. I changed my shoes, and gently took possession of my raincoat (upon which, the Oooo Man happened to be sitting), said “Ciao, buenas noches”, and walked over to my Lover and linked arms.

In the elevator, I started wondering who the Oooo Man might be. My Lover answered,

“He’s a famous milonguero from Buenos Aires. His name is Tete.”

And then I felt like a super dummy.

Artist: Original drawing by the author of Through the Looking Glass, Lewis Carroll

Almost exactly one year ago, I walked into a dance studio, and started dancing tango.

Well, it was supposed to be tango, but it probably looked more like a cross between the WWF and a dismal medieval funeral procession marched backwards. Bobbing up and down… On stilts…

(Ugh.)

And with my very first step, to the very first note of the very first song, which I no longer remember, I fell in love.

Back then, the only things I knew about that far-away land of Argentina were:

Jorge Luis Borges
Gato Barbieri
Astor Piazzolla
Madonna singing that incredibly annoying song.

Since then…

I have been impregnated by a magic seed, and am awakening to find myself climbing an enormous beanstalk. I’ve fallen down the rabbit hole, and when I forget to chase that elusive ghostly white rabbit, I am staring at my own transformation in wonder, wide-eyed, through the looking-glass. My floppy, clumsy tail has been exchanged for a pair of real legs and strong feet. Those misadventures through frightening forests of mean old trees are behind me, and now the flowers are teaching me the art of their effervescent colors, the secret to their ephermeral scents. Along the way, I have met my share of evil sorcerers, stupid ogres, spiteful goblins, and ugly dwarves… But when I get too frightened or tired, I peek into the occasional gingerbread house, and partake of shiny, sparkly, glittery things that make me very happy, indeed. And ofcourse, I consistently ignore the midnight curfew, comme il faut, or no, and, I have kissed my frog prince…

Last night, to celebrate, the Lover and I threw core strength and dissociation, groundedness and connection, all obsessive thoughts of practice and technique, buck all to the winds, and just danced for fun. I didn’t care if my hysterical giggling made our chests vibrate against each other, my right eyeball knock against his cheekbone. He didn’t care if his head was at a weird angle while his lips were on my forehead, kissing me for the duration of half a song. Everything we learned and had absorbed into our bodies just fell into place, our imperfections naturally adjusted themselves to the other, we fit together like a puzzle, and we had a blast.

This dark, hilarious, difficult, fantastically delicious fairytale gesamtkunstwerk that is the Tango is now so much a part of my life, that I feel as if I have always, always been dancing it. And I am going to dance it until I am 365 years-old.

And my dear blogueros and blogueras, you will all be there dancing and writing right there with me, right?

Love,
Nuit.

I think my seratonin levels must be so high right now, I am still floating about, daydreaming about the past weekend. I feel truly lucky to have been there, and to have had such a great experience during my first tango festival. I was dreading the first-timer’s hardships… The unfamiliar faces, the intimidating level of dancing, standing around not getting invitations, too shy to approach anyone… But thanks to some wonderful people (who are fast becoming friends), and a little bit of luck, I had an amazing time!

The trip wasn’t without its small mishaps: my temper flared once or twice… Then again, dear readers, you know what I’m like when something ticks me off. Ahem. In any case, I did feel spoiled… And so cared for… And so warmly welcomed… I shared some lovely moments with some beautiful people, talking about tango, about dance, about art, about shoes, jewelry, double-sided “dress” tape, having breakfast, taking cat naps, taking classes, sneaking liquor, squeezed between friends on the road trip… And all this with my Lover’s arms around me.

Some highlights of the festival for me, were (this is a personal Dear Diary list, so feel free to skip down to the end):

• Walking into the first milonga of the festival, and being awestruck by the high arched ceilings and wood panelling of Branford Dining Hall. Yale certainly provided us with a magnificent space to start out the weekend.

• Swallowing four orange seeds in my eagerness to accept a dance from a favorite tanguero M from my home city, and staring into his open mouth when he realized what I had done to hurry over. All the giggling made for a very playful tanda.

• Dancing to Di Sarli’s “Cornetín” (one of my favorite tangos of all time) with a beautiful tango goddess, my muse. She suddenly appeared before me, telling me I will dance with her now, because this is her favorite song, and no one else but Nuit will do. :) Dancing with her is like magic. And she was in 4-inch heels. Beat that, tangueros!

• I had a first time with a wonderful leader J from Michigan, and at the end of the set, I did not want to let go. My arms seem to have turned into velcro, and I kept hugging him with my eyes closed at the end of the song. I am surprised he didn’t feel compelled to peel my arms off from around his neck…

• You know the big tap after the high boleo in this video? I have always wanted to be able to do that, but couldn’t, or wouldn’t, because I didn’t want to hurt anyone, and also didn’t want to look like a dummy if it came out wrong. But the embellishment just came and happened, and to the music, and it felt incredible.

• Dancing with Sorin, at the afternoon practica, and being wowed. He taught me a Secret Trick, and I will be trying it on various tangueros at practica here in New York, hehe.

• I had my first real cabeceo from a tanguera, N, and she is truly delightful, not only as a follower (I just wish you could see her dance!), but as a leader. We even danced a milonga, and I can’t tell you how incredibly fun she is. This just confirms my suspicion that some of the best tango leaders in North America are women. She and my Lover were fighting over me after that first tanda, and I had a teeny tiny pleasureable moment of diva-liciousness.

• And oh yes… I danced two tandas with a tango master at the All Night Milonga. No, it was not a mistaken cabeceo, and no, I did not run towards him when he was walking in my general direction, which also happened to be the way to the bathroom. I was absolutely sure I was the one he asked, because he appeared out of no where from behind my chair, looked right at me from 3 feet away, and asked me if I was “going to just sit there, or dance with him tonight?” And I still couldn’t believe it. And ok, I’ll say it: he made me swoon. There was a wonderful buoyancy in the dance, like floating on liquid mercury… And I even left him with something to remember me by: a big purple mark on his beautiful white shoes, placed there by my stomping plum-colored Comme Il Fauts… and an accompanying big purple bruise on his toes. My very own special brand of Dance Hickey. :-D So it was incomprehensible to me that he invited me to dance again during the Brunch Milonga the next day.

In short, I danced so much I felt like a voodoo doll with pins and needles sticking into my feet and legs.

I felt an overwhelming swell of emotions during the last milonga at the end of the festival. When my Lover gave me a tender kiss on the nose during our last song together, I almost cried. I know… this may sound like one of my baroque exaggerations, but in truth… I was so glad just to be there, that I was there with him, that there was music, and a floor, and I felt thankful for everybody, for this festival…

For Tango.

For Love.

For my next festival:

Bring:

• Arnica gel (For painful feet, grace à lovely Debbi! – it totally works, niña!)
• Eat lots of bananas (For the potassium, which gives you energy – a wise tip, also from Debbi!)
• Dance sneakers (A must, unless you want to get your feet amputated.)
• A rolling suitcase vs. dufflebag (Go easy on your shoulders.)
• Sunglasses (For those mornings when the milonga ends at 7am.)
• Shoe hole punch (For stretching straps.)
• Band-aids

Do not bring:

• Nail polish (After 14 hours of dancing a day, you won’t care how your polish is looking, just how much your toes hurt!)
• Sleep mask (After 14 hours of dancing a day, you will be able to sleep like a mummy in direct sunlight.)
• Hairdryer (You will sweat so much after the first hour, that your hair will look like puppy fur after a rainstorm, anyway.)
• Book (Unless you’re travelling alone by train or plane.)

I am packing and getting ready for my first tango festival! And am crossing my fingers, hoping it won’t be as horrible as the last time….

My situation has changed, somewhat, since then:

My dancing has improved during the past few months.

I will be taking a bunch of classes, and meeting new people.

I have made some beautiful friends in New York, and am looking forward to some planned pre-milonga dinners with my lovely tangueros and tangueras.

I will have my trusty camera with me, so I can start taking pictures if I have been danceless for more than an hour. (sob).

And I will be there with my Lover — it’ll be our first tango trip together.

I am nervously excited.

Excitedly nervous.

Ok, just nervous.

So nervous, that I almost forgot my double-sided dress tape.

Wish me lots of fun!

p.s. Friday 2:10pm

Help… This is happening to me….!

Artist: M.C. Escher, “Bond of Union”

“Gall, amant de la reine, alla, tour magnanime
galamment de l’Arène à la Tour Magne, à Nîmes.”

Ou bien:

“Galle, amant de la reine à la Tour Magne, à Nîmes
galamment de l’Arène alla, tour magnanime…”

The story of my life…

Until I found the Tango (or the Tango found me), and I discovered that:

1+1=1

It is that simple.

And when I met my Lover, it became:

1X1=1²

Or, rather, in truth, it is more like:

(1X1)+(xoxo)+(xxx)+143+(2X4)=

Words are emotion in action. (No, sex is. But that’s not the point.) Words seem flimsy and incongruent, poor artificial instant pseudo-substitutes for an evolving emotion…

And did you know, there is nothing tastier than an icecream cone in the dead of winter?

Especially when the flavor is dulce de leche and it is being eaten on the way to a milonga, my Lover’s right arm around my shoulders, the coldness of his icecreamed tongue on my lip, my fingers numb from the frost, the combination of brain freeze and heart throb creating an electrical circuit for a pleasureable sensation of anticipation of the evening to come…

The lovely La Tanguera wrote an interesting post recently “On Tango Jealousy, Freedom and Growth“. My own Lover happens to be a tanguero, and this got me thinking of our own “precarious” situation in the milongas. Precarious, yes. Contemplating the story of the married couple in La Tanguera’s post, it seems the tango can be the conduit for some disasterous scenarios, if the couple isn’t careful.

I have heard of horror stories where married couples actually divorce because of tango. But it is not “because of tango.” Granted, this dance is close, the bodies of friends and strangers pressed against you to the sound of magical music, lips a mere few inches from each other, the sweet scent of perspiration filling the senses, the sensuality of hair always within reach, hands and legs brushing over muscles and tendons at all times within the duration of the dance. Yes, the sheer physicality of this dance is a bit intimidating, not to mention the enormous amount of emotional engagement it takes to connect wordlessly with another human being. So I can understand how some couples can freak out over it — especially when the milongas and festivals are filled with such beautiful people twisting their bodies every which way in each other’s arms.

But I am a firm believer that whatever problems surfacing in tango between couples were already there to begin with. These problems would have manifested themselves in any activity the couple engages in, the tango merely being one of those activities.

Examining my own situation, I am thankful that the man I am falling for has the mature intelligence to understand that tango is tango, and love is love. That dancing with someone, and falling for someone are two different things… That sexual and emotional attraction between human beings is a fact of the Universe, and Tango is a part of that Universe. That there is a definite divide between feeling attraction and pursuing that attraction, and human attraction of whatever form is a natural part of what it means to tango. And most importantly, that tango is something to be shared with many different people, not confined and caged inside a twisted world of jealousy, suffocation and fear.

It is true that the dance changes when you fall in love. But then again, it transforms with every person you take into your embrace. That is what is beautiful about this dance. It is a constantly evolving Kaleidoscope — multifaceted, crystalline, mysterious — and the more pieces you have inside of it, the more sumptuous the experience.

And Love is like a brightening of the light that shines through the glass.

The pieces burn, and the colors glow.

…for the heat has been turned on~
and hot water has returned~
to my apartment, oh yeah
oh yeah, baby~~

la di da, la la la~~

Someone please, please compose a tango with these lyrics…

Heartbreak… Will you sing this for me if we ever meet?

Venus

The New York tango scene ROCKS!!!

I just had the most amazing night, ever. The space was just big enough for a huge festive crowd, and it was just small enough so that it felt intimate and friendly. And the music… The DJ was sublime tonight.

I reconnected with some leaders I haven’t danced with in a while. One told me he had missed me while I was away in Venice. Another said I looked “dazzling” with my hair down. An expert trim and soft wavy curls were cascading down my back, à la Botticelli… Yes, I was having one of those good hair days. A small smile and a nod on the way back to my seat had one cute man running after me to ask for a dance. The man with the lovely handkerchief was there, and he mopped my own forehead in between songs, apologizing profusely, hehe. Another said he had felt rejected, because I would never look at him from across the room, at other milongas. He was relieved to find that I wasn’t mad at him. “Mad at him”? What could possibly make me mad at someone I barely know, and with whom I had had some amazing tangos? It’s funny how, sometimes, men can be like small vulnerable children…

I met a woman today, who approached me at the dance studio, and who showed up at the milonga. Neither of us were drunk, but quick witty conversation and golden laughter flowed like sweet bubbly champagne. I liked her instantly, the minute I met her. That almost never happens to me with people. She is incredibly warm and intelligent. We exchanged our contact information, and made a date to meet during the week. Perhaps she will become my first tango girlfriend. See? It was a good idea to take group classes, afterall.

I also met a new leader who is so musical, I was left reeling on the dancefloor after each tanda. He has only been dancing tango for a year and a half, but he has been listening to tango music all his life. I danced to this for the first time, with him. There is something about the way we danced to this piece that made my heart break. Perhaps it was the way he held me. Or maybe it was the song.

When I came home, I was still humming Chopin softly to myself, like a lullaby. I went over to my vanity, took off my watch. As I unclasped the necklace from around my neck and started undressing, I gazed at myself in the mirror. I think I had never looked so beautiful as I did at that moment.

Because tonight, I am truly happy.

I found another Tango Angel tonight.

I seem to have this weird habit of getting stuck with dancing with drunkards at milongas. This one was particularly Tan-ego-esque, telling me that I am “obviously just learning tango,” and can I please just try and keep up with the walking? This coming from a dumb-ass who bumped me into 4 couples on an empty dancefloor, and couldn’t even stand straight during a 20 second pause, where I had to hold him up for all his swaying stupor. I walked off the floor after one song without a word. He wouldn’t even remember the night, let alone my face, by morning, anyway.

As I went over to the bench to sit back down, I ran into this one, who, to add to my mortification, had been watching.

“Hello!” he greeted me warmly.

“Hi.” I answered metallically, and then promptly ignored him, passing him by.

I was pissed. I couldn’t get the smell of Pine Sol out of my hair, apparently the preferred scent of the drunken jerkface I had just been struggling with. I took several deep breaths, looked up at the ceiling and sighed, hands tightly clasping my seat. I must have looked like a werewolf about to burst into howls of rage. I saw the drunkard passing by with another poor woman in his arms. Rolling my eyes, I was just about to grab my boots and leave the milonga, when the angel got up, walked towards me, and asked for a dance.

Nuit: Umm…

TA3: Oh, sorry, were you resting?

Nuit: Nooo….

TA3: Are you ok?

Nuit: Nooo…

TA3: (smiling) You don’t want to dance with me?

Nuit: I… had a bad night.

TA3: What happened?

Nuit: Lots of dances that didn’t really “work”. I’m afraid I won’t be any good for you.

TA3: Come on, let me make you feel better.

And that is exactly what he did.

And he only caressed my leg once.

And it was divine.