La Nuit Blanche

[Due to the sensitive nature of this topic, a disclaimer is in order (my first on this blog): the main character involved has been disguised by the imaginary name of X, no pronouns will be used to refer to this person's gender, and I will not answer any questions asked me, here in the blogosphere, or in my real life (hello, Friends!), as to this person's identity.]

It is a touchy subject… But I feel I must address it.

Yes, it’s true. There is malice in our dear Tangoland.

There are many instances of back-stabbing, name-calling, betrayal, ignorance, trickery, knife-thrusting, grumpy grump, stubborness, lying, and overall general drama in our beloved realm. And all this has been foreseeable, though regrettable, and in perfect accordance with the natural Order of the Universe. Afterall, our Tangoland is a part of the Real World, too.

But it hurts very much when a friend has gone over to the Dark Side, and this friend doesn’t even realize it.

I have such a friend, or, someone who used to be a friend, named X, who in the beginning of our story, seemed to be a vastly different person from the one revealed to me over time.

X has become a tiresome person. There are two things that make X tiresome… First, a persistent prejudice against certain members of our community, and second, the ignorance of racism. In the first offense, X is only harming X. And in the second offense, X is harming others.

This person X is quick to put certain members of the community into little categories all made up in X’s mind, and labelling one particular category with snide, unflattering appellations such as “The Group”, and “The Stuck-Ups”.

It is hurtful, since these kind, sweet people are fast becoming my friends.

These are the people who danced with me when no one else would. These are the people who watched me spin myself into a cocoon, and are continually delighting in my budding (albeit wrinkly) wings. These are the people who encourage me to continue, and take care of me when I am sitting alone at milongas or festivals. And who protect me from unwelcome advances. These are people who will dance with beginners and encourage them to keep coming back. And X refers to these people as “The Stuck-Ups”. Which is simply not the case, in my experience. The injustice of it makes me angry, especially when said to my face.

Don’t get me wrong — I, myself, have been terrorized by tan-egos and tan-egoistas, and horrible tangorillas, and individuals who are just so incredibly, consistently stuck up, that it is a torture to even have their glance turn in my direction. I still avoid these people. I run across one or two new ones, occasionally. Sadly, little does X know that X has become one of the people X claims to despise, and doubly sadly, I now find X just as horrible a tangorilla as this one, or this one, in male, or female form.

Another personality quirk that X has, is to dismiss the non-Argentine teachers, dancers, and milonga hosts in our community as unworthy of attention or praise. “I will stick to my Argentine teachers, if you please,” X says. Upon watching performances by revered non-Argentines, X exclaims, “What a crock of mierda. These Americans/Europeans have no idea what tango is about.” (Actually, the Argentines say “carajo”, not “mierda”, to refer to crap). And undoubedly, X, who also happens to be non-Argentine, feels that X is an expert in “what tango is all about.”

I don’t mean to sound so politically correct. I’m not trying to, honestly. But it is just common sense that just because a teacher/dancer is Argentine, doesn’t mean he is a great teacher/dancer. Conversely, just because a teacher/dancer is not Argentine, doesn’t mean he is not a great teacher/dancer. Just because the Chinese didn’t invent Western classical music, doesn’t mean Yo Yo Ma isn’t a great cellist. Just because DJ Krush is Japanese and hardly speaks English, doesn’t mean that he isn’t one of the greatest composers of hip hop the world has ever seen. Just because photography was invented by the French, doesn’t mean that Garry Winogrand isn’t a great photographer.

X works in the (insert any craft here) industry. I just want to scream at X: “Well, (insert any country here) didn’t invent the (insert any craft here) — what makes you think a (insert person of X’s nationality here) such as yourself can excel at it?”

Where is this blind racism coming from?

Let me be frank: I am fully aware of tangueros and tangueras who dance only for a couple of years, and then (to our chagrin) decide they are ready to teach and perform. But a clueless tango grasshopper is clueless no matter what nationality. And these non-Argentine teachers and dancers that X scoffs at, and passionately tells people to avoid, spend half their lives travelling away from home, to be immersed in Argentine culture. They learn the language. They study the dance, and the music. They may dance a different sort of tango that may not be agreeable to some, but it is not difficult to recognize excellence, genius, and emotion, when one is face-to-face with it, in a class, or a milonga. To dismiss artists such as Jennifer Bratt and Ney Melo, or Korey and Mila, just because they are non-Argentines — now, that is a crock of carajo.

This racism of X extends to the milongas and practicas hosted by non-Argentines in our community. I am sure the Argentine hosts and hostesses around the city appreciate X’s patronage, and undying loyalty to the people of Argentina. But it is unnerving to find that X loudly, and verbally discredits and disrepects the events held by others. And yet I see X often frequenting the milongas and practicas maintained and DJed, with painstaking effort, by these same non-Argentines who X despises.

Let me tell you about New York City: Unlike Buenos Aires, Dancing is not a natural state of being over here. I am living in continual fear that there will be no place to tango in my homwtown… That the gestapo city government will shut down these spaces… The city has already restricted the cabaret license into a choke-hold. For example, street photography is dying because the city regulates the use of tripods on the street, and photographers need a permit to photograph in many places where there is open sky — basically almost everywhere. What makes us think that the milongas are safe?

And does X even realise the difficulty of securing places for social dancing in a paranoid city such as this one, where the only way to even step on the beat in the street is to hold a massive peaceful demonstration so huge, that the police will give up and stand by watching?

These non-Argentines are the people who bring us some of the most beloved milongas this city has to offer. Sure, they may not be Argentine… Some may not even be incredible dancers - although some are. Some don’t even teach, some do, and are some of the most revered in the country. And they are responsible for the great effort it takes to keep tango alive in this city — not the revered Argentines who live in Buenos Aires, as much as we love them for their magic, and definitely not people like X who continually complain about the deplorable situation of the “Americans destroying Argentina’s tango.” Perhaps some are, but I know many are not. I’m just thankful there are places to dance, and that is more than one should expect from people who are doing all the work for us, so that people like X can go out and criticize what they’re doing. Sure, they are making some money by doing this, but I don’t know of a single milonga host who makes a living out of hosting milongas.

It’s as if a friend had died, or had moved to another country. No, worse — as if the person I had enoyed talking to and sharing some precious moments with, has never even existed — that the whole friendship was a figment of my imagination.

There is a saying in Argentina, I have learned recently — it is also in a tango called “Niño Bien”:

“Estás mostrando la hilacha.”

Which bascially means: “You are showing your true colors.”

It is heartbreaking when I discover that most everything I knew about a person was a lie, that someone I had once considered a dear friend, I had never known at all. I guess none of this is very new… Friends drift apart all the time, and the people who we think we know show their true characters with time.

But it’s still sickening, nontheless.

Taken from Cherie’s blog, the above is an interesting multimedia presentation from Clarín about tango, with blips from musicians and dancers who tell us what tango means to them.

I am a bit piqued that there wasn’t a single piece of footage on how tango is being danced inside a real milonga… Oh well.

(Also, I didn’t know that someone named Valeria Lynch became the most important artist in the country in 1986. Note to self: Must search for Valeria in the tango music stores, and possibly catch her live while I am in Buenos Aires.)

Anyway, the inspiring thoughts and sentiments of the interviewed dancers and musicians made me think why tango is so alluring to me. Why the music is so moving, even though I don’t know the words… Why I persistently listen to scratched up recordings of ancient songs sung by men and women who are long since dead and gone… Why it still sounds so modern and relevant and fresh to someone living in another century, another city, another culture, another time.

And it reminded me of an alleged exchange that occurred between two artists almost a hundred years ago:

“The music salon at Chanel’s hotêl particulier was smothered in the odor of tuberose. Diaghilev led Igor to the massive polished Steinway and directed him to play a composition. On those first youthful and derivative pieces Markevitch played, Dighilev commented: ‘I have told you to prepare Tomorrow for me, and you are thinking only of Yesterday.’

Shy as he was at sixteen, Igor was nevertheless capable of a ready return: ‘I’m not interested in yesterday or today but what is forever.’”

-From “The Crazy Years: Paris in the Twenties”, by William Wiser

The tango is alive, because it is eternal.

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.

I talked with my umma today.

If there is one person on this earth I would describe as my soulmate, it is she. And she is the one who got me into dancing tango, did you know?

I got her a pair of 2.75 inch pewter-colored Comme Il Fauts for Mother’s Day. No woman can have too many beautiful shoes, no matter what her age.

The above photograph of her was taken three years before my birth. At the time, she was 23, younger than I am now. She is still the most youthful person I know, and she has carried her beauty gracefully and naturally (and, I may add, almost supernaturally) into her age.

Let me have inherited a single thimbleful of her courage and strength, her passion and capacity to love so deeply, her delicacy in thought and subtle layers of understanding, the natural grace with which she acts and speaks in everything, and the savagery of her wit, quick as lightening and sharpened to the thinnest blade — and I would consider myself a beautiful woman.

Happy Mother’s Day.

Artist: Mathieu Saura, a.k.a. Vincent Moon

I will be in Buenos Aires in 92 days.

My Lover will be there with me, and he will be showing me the Buenos Aires that he knows and loves. However, I will also be spending lots of time exploring and discovering on my own, with flickle camera in hand.

I am completely overwhelmed by the thought of this place, this country, this continent, this small point on the map of the world globe. I am not only excited about all the tango I’ll be dancing and listening to, but… It’s been so long since I’ve had the chance to explore a new city, that my arms and legs are turning into spaghetti, my mind to jell-o, jiggling around in delight…

I am making my baby-steps in learning about this city before my first trip, starting with reading about it by typing in “Argentina” and “Buenos Aires” into Wikipedia. (I know, sad… but I have to start somewhere, right?), and the TimeOut, Moon, and Wallpaper Guides to Buenos Aires.

I’ve been snuggled into my loveseat, to read the fantastic stories written by my beloved Tango Hours, lovely Psyche, and my favorite New Yorker duo Eva and Malena, and ofcourse, the writings of dear Sallycat, sassy Tina, and chère Cherie — porteñas who write and feel with such fiery spirit.

Also been trying to read TangoScopio’s blog with my (thus far) extremely limited castellano, but I gave up after about five posts, hehe.

The Buenos Aires Herald has been a daily morning read for the past couple of weeks… And today, I will search for a map of Buenos Aires, (and hopefully a subway and bus map), so I can pore over those thin wrinkly streets and triangular barrios and visit them in the imaginary hemispheres of my sleep.

I want to take regular Spanish lessons. And take tango group classes. And eat all the cups of dulce de leche icecream I want. And eat asado and alfahores every day. And take tango private lessons. And be in the milongas. And go shoe shopping. And go to the flea market for the mate. And go to the opera. And the bookstores. And have breakfast in the cafes. And go to the cinema, even though I won’t understand a thing. And wander around and get lost inside the real Tlön, Uqbar, Orbis Terius…

36 days of chaotic bliss, enveloped, enfolded by my Lover’s warm, wet mouth, arms scented with cologne, wooden floors, sliding, echoing feet, the brash honking of unfamiliar automobiles, mornings heralded by unfamiliar birds, the fragrance of rain and moisture of an unfamiliar land, the inflections of gestures and tongues curled, interlocked in a more beautiful speech, streets that have witnessed different tragicomedies from the ones I am used to walk upon.

5 weeks.
2 full moons.
1 month, plus
1 week.

Not enough! :-D

By tomorrow, I will be in Buenos Aires in 91 days.

And the day after, in 90 days.

And the day after that, in 89 days……

dear daddy zeno,

i am in a pissy mood.

because,

(inhale-

one thing that sucks being the one with the big camera on a personal non-work-related night out is that you never get to have photos of yourself, but don’t get me wrong, occasionally, i actually love taking pictures, especially of my friends, when the setting is right, and the mood is right, and the lighting is right, and the angle is right, and they’re not smiling into the camera, and they don’t blink when i take the shot, but then everyone seems to magically forget to take out even their digital point-and-shoots when i happen to be there, that i know they all have in their bags, and all of a sudden, i am no longer a human being, or a beautiful woman, or even a friend they are supposedly sharing memories with, but just reduced to being a big black bulging

that is there to document their lives of which i am mysteriously no longer a part, and i hate it when people give me the bullshit, “oh, but you are so very special, you were the one taking the picture, you were there, too, don’t worry,” but, screw that, because i want a pretty picture of myself, too, dammit, and something else that makes me mad is when people point out things they think i should photograph, for instance, when they poke me in the ribs and sigh, “oooooh, look at so-and-so, what a cute dress, what cute hair, she’s so cute…. you should take a picture of that, oh i wish you had brought your camera today, why didn’t you?”, and i want to scream, hello??, what about my cute dress, and my cute hair, what about me, i want a picture of my own cute self, but ofcourse, no one could care less about the photographer-friend, so i end up taking a picture of myself in the bathroom mirror, to include in the album of memories, you know, because i want to be remembered as having been part of things too, and i, too, want to remember what i looked like when i was young and sexy and having fun with loved ones, but ofcourse, a big black camera is covering half my face, and by the time i get that camera away from my eye and someone finally does take pity on me, or perhaps, is actually inspired to take my snapshot, i’ll be old and wrinkled and depressing to look at myself, anyway.

-exhale)

next time, i am leaving the frigging camera at home.

(but ofcourse i won’t).

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.

The above is a Korean hair salon on 32nd Street, here in New York City. In Korean, it means: “Shall we cut?” As in, “Shall we dance?”

However, I have recently realized that, in Spanish, it means something else, entirely.

The revelations that descend upon you while walking the streets of Manhattan eating icecream, are simply amazing.

Children, you will have to forgive the enigmatic post prior.

What I like about blogging, is that I can write for many different kinds of readers. Friends and family… and penpals I have never actually met… and strangers… But most importantly, myself. Sometimes, I feel as if a great weight has been lifted off of me, just by putting something out there so intimate to my personal life, without explanation, without elaboration, understood only by myself and a very few people out there, for instance, my brother, who has known me most of my natural life, or perhaps, my mother, if she knew how to use a computer. And the fact that something was put out there makes me feel as if “it” has been exorcised. The nightmare. The nostalgia. The grump…

It is Spring, and I am cleaning out the swampy cobwebs.

I saw a major movie star make an impromptu appearance at my favorite milonga this past month. But true to New Yorker politesse, I will refrain from going ga-ga on my blog, and keep the name secret. And no, it wasn’t lame-o-Bullock…

I may have imagined it, but I thought I saw his face transformed as he watched the dancefloor, intently, his heart floating to Never Never Land, Chagall-style… Or it may have been the fairylights reflected in his eyes? I hear that he’s been taking private tango lessons. I wonder what sort of tanguero he would make?

We left him alone wth the music, and let him soak it all in. If he ever did become available on the dancefloor, there will be no fear of him getting ripped apart by ardent fans… It’ll take more than being a mere movie star for us saucy tangueras to be impressed by a man in the milongas. :-D

That’s what I love about being inside a milonga. I enter a completely different realm, away from MTV, away from Extreme Makeover Home Edition, away from bad electronically spliced R&B, away from Paris Hilton, Fashion Week, Michael Jackson’s nose, Takeshi Murakami LV bags. The grotesque glamour and plastic glitz of this city is silenced, painted over, made invisible, blotted out as non-entities.

The world is changed, and I can breathe again.

Music.
Floor.
Man.
Woman.
Tango.

It’s almost ridiculously child-like, don’t you think?

If the real world is like Tom Clancy’s Ghost Recon Advanced Warfighter 2, then the world of the milonga is like Lego…

…But memories are in color.

I know it comes maybe once in a lifetime.

And it has passed, for both of us, into nostalgia, mingled (always, don’t deny it) with regret.

(I saw it, the thing that encompasses the whole essence of you, that one thing that marks us unto death, the memories relived with the copies of copies of copies of people and places that we wish could replace the void it left inside of us when we realize it has gone away, irretrievably, into the past.)

Now I know I have never been your’s.

And someone else is here.

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 god 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.)