I’m sitting in a cozy café in Seattle, drinking my caffè latte, working and enjoying the whir of the espresso machine in the background.  On my left is a big window looking out to the sidewalk.  I see people walking to work, the bus, the market.  I’m contemplating moving over to that big comfy couch over there and snuggling up with my laptop to finish this translation.  It took the barista 7 minutes to make my caffè latte, which is normal since it’s not “rush hour”.  It’s 10:30 am, and there aren’t many people in the café.  Yesterday it took 10 minutes.  People order their drinks and then settle down with their computers.  It’s a relaxed atmosphere. The barista takes her time and we have time.  Sometimes people go up to the counter and chat with the barista.  It’s always fun to eavesdrop.

In Italy, I am walking through the historic center on my way to work or a class, or perhaps to meet someone.  I realize that the coffee I made at home just didn’t do the trick, and it would be nice to have just a teeny bit more caffeine.  I have 5 minutes before I have to be where I’m going.  I duck into a bar (where you get coffee), go to the cash register, tell the cashier I want “un caffè” (which is what you say when you want a shot of espresso), and pay.  I bring my receipt to the barista, who presents me with a little cup with my dear espresso in less time than it takes me to say “caffè”.  I down my caffè standing up (to sit down, I’d have to pay extra) and continue to my destination.  I haven’t even spent 5 minutes in the bar.

In Argentina, I enter the cafe on the corner and pick a table near the window.  Eventually the mozo, waiter, approaches me and I ask for “un cortado” – a cortado is kind of like a caffè macchiato.  He soon returns with a full tray, and one at a time, he sets my cortado, a small glass of sparkling water, a little plate of cookies and the sugar on the table.  I say “Gracias” like I always do, the waiter says “No, a vos” and I take my first sip, slouch onto the table like everyone else in the café, and look out the window.  I could spend 3 or 4 hours in here and never feel pressured to leave or spend more money than I have.  I eventually decide it’s time to go, and catch the waiter’s eye.  Once we lock eyes, we nod at each other and he comes to the table (just like in a milonga).  I ask for la cuenta, the check, and pay him, batting my eyelashes in the hope that he’ll give me some coins with my change so I can take the bus.

What’s the café culture like where you live?

*This post was written for AffordableCallingCards.net, the expat community site. You can click here to read more posts about expat life written by myself and other bloggers.

While my days are filled with excitement and anticipation for many things, they are also touched by grief.  Someone I have looked up to and respected for at least the past 15 years has passed away.  He was Sean Goff, the brother-in-law of my long time best friend and the husband of an amazing woman who I long ago adopted as a sister.

Together, Sean and Sofia opened a beautiful restaurant in West Seattle, Cafe Revò.  Inspired by my friends’ ancestral town in northern Italy, the food bears the mark of a talented chef (that would be Sean) who loves the beautiful ingredients that the Pacific NW has to offer.

One of the cute things about Cafe Revò is that at the end of your meal, you get a lovely little card.  On one side is the trademark babe on a Vespa that you can see painted on the side of the restaurant, while on the other side is a proverb in both Italian and English.

Last night as I was getting ready for bed and worrying about everything in life, I moved my purse and picked up some clothes to put away.   Out of the corner of my eye I noticed something that had fallen out of my purse.  I ignored it at first but had a nagging feeling I should see what it was.

There, on the floor, was a little card from Cafe Revò with the Vespa babe smiling up at me.  I thought of Sean and picked up the card to see what the proverb was.  It said, “God gives us chestnuts, but he doesn’t crack them for us.”

I smiled and decided that perhaps it was Sean’s way of giving me a little message of his own.  That I have all of these gifts but it’s my job to use them.  And if I use them, great things will happen.   I closed my eyes and remembered the last time I saw him, in the beautiful restaurant that he and Sofia created, and smiled.

Rest in peace, Sean.  I know you will live on through your beautiful children and Cafe Revò.

Seattle Tango Magic starts today with a milonga at China Harbor!

Paul Akmajian from Albuquerque, NM is DJing tonight.  I had the pleasure of meeting him in Buenos Aires, and it will be fun to see a face that I will surely attach to the memories I have of my beloved city en el sur.

There will be plenty of dancing to be done the whole weekend.  Go here for details.

If you’re in Seattle this weekend, you’ll have a chance to learn from one of the most graceful milongueras I’ve ever seen, Alicia Pons.

Click here for information.

Also, tomorrow night, one of my favorite dancers/DJs, Mourad, is hosting his new monthly milonga, “Despues“.

I’m looking forward to supporting him!  I hope we see Alicia there, and also at the Sunday milonga, La Garua.  If you can’t wait until then to dance, there’s also a milonga tonight at the Century Ballroom.

Goodness me, Seattle is certainly active this weekend! You can find all of this and more at allseattletango.com.

I landed in Seattle a week ago today and hit the ground running.

I’ve most enjoyed the mix of flavors as I eat my way around the city.  Spicy Thai food, extra virgin olive oil from Italy with that peppery spice that hits the back of your throat at the last moment, awesome French food, wine from Washington, California, Italy, France… the variety of cheeses.  Real mozzarella di bufala.  I feel like I’d forgotten what food tasted like!  Well, that’s not totally true.  In Buenos Aires I got creative, and spending so much time with Joli (very good cook) was definitely inspiring.  It’s just that there were some key things I’d forgotten all about!  Tomorrow night I will eat sushi and am looking forward to it.

I was really unsure about coming up here, but I find that I’m really glad I came.  I can’t really explain to people here the things I’ve seen my past year or so in BA.  But I’m glad to be up in the northwest for a while, with clean air, lots of greenery, and amazing salmon.  I really appreciate where I’m from.

I miss Buenos Aires a little bit each day, and find that I can’t watch any youtube videos of tango performances by people I know that take place in salons I know in Buenos Aires or I cry my eyes out.  But I’m happy the rest of the time.

I’ve danced tango a few times here and quite enjoyed it.  It’s nice to embrace old friends.

I taught my first Seattle group tango class yesterday, sort of a workshop.  It went well!  It’s hard to pin the milonguero style down into a workshop and I was nervous, but I had a good time and met some very nice, enthusiastic people.

Next week I’ll be in San Francisco so I can get my Italian passport.  Definitely looking forward to that moment.

I feel relaxed and more happy.  I think things are looking up.

(UPDATE: The two examples below are based on true stories that I witnessed with my own eyes.)

Dear innocent, unsuspecting newbie to the traditional milongas of Buenos Aires, a few suggestions to make your transition into milonguera life a bit smoother.

1. It’s winter in Buenos Aires and very cold at night, so you subject yourself to throwing on a pair of trousers under that dress for the cold commute between home and the milonga.  I totally understand that and have done it myself.  We all do it.  When it’s cold it’s cold.

But what makes you think it’s logical and classy to change OUT of your trousers in front of everyone at the milonga?  What makes you think we want to be distracted from cabeceo-ing to watch you hike up your dress and pull down your pants?  And I know you think you are being discreet, but the traditional milongas are very well-lit, and do you think for a minute that the men don’t notice it?  Because they do.  If only you knew what they were thinking.  Then again, maybe you don’t want to know.

Maybe this was okay to do at your practica in your hometown.  But you’re not there anymore.  You’re in Buenos Aires.  And you’re not at a practica you are at a milonga.  Here, it’s about how you present yourself.  People here make a special occasion of their favorite Saturday night milonga.  Look around you at how people behave.  They dress in nice, clean clothes, they smell good, they present themselves nicely. Ever hear of the Italian expression, La Bella Figura? (Making a good impression, basically…) Well it applies here too, in terms of how you behave and present yourself in the milongas.  That’s just the way it is.

Tip: the bathroom is right there.  Just a few steps away.  This means that when you arrive you can saunter over to the ladies’ room and pull down your trousers to your heart’s content.  Your friends at the milonga thank you for politely observing this.  If you have a problem with this or wish to leave said trousers on under your dress (something I must admit I have never understood), maybe traditional milongas are not for you.  Try Villa Malcolm. It’s much more casual, and also very dark.

~~~

2. Some folks have an issue about dancers changing their shoes at the table.  I honestly don’t care where you change yours shoes as long you are discreet and there is enough space for you to do so without knocking your head into the table next to you and causing water to spill.  But what I DO have an issue with is this:  do you really think it’s attractive to hoist your foot on your knee and rub foot powder into your foot, between your toes, all around, put your tango shoes on and then get up to dance without even washing your hands?  Ick!

Tip:  Well, I think it goes without saying.  But I’ll say it anyway:  If you must rub any sort of substance into your feet, do so in the ladies room and WASH YOUR HANDS.

I know there are a lot of codigos to remember in the traditional milongas, but it doesn’t take a set of rules to know what’s simply logical.  The above behaviors I have mentioned don’t even need codigos, they are just basic common sense.

And now you are just about ready to milonguear…

For about a month after my lesson with Javier, I was feeling slightly rebellious against what he had taught me about my embrace.  Later I realized that I have been enjoying Tango more than ever, and it’s because I’ve been unconsciously doing everything that he told me.  Ha!  That guy’s good.

I have attended two milongas in Seattle so far.  At both, I consciously applied his philosophy to the way I embraced the tangueros of Seattle, which was to embrace the person – embrace who the person is.  Really HUG them.  With love.  Real love.  Just completely surrender and give myself, my heart to them, no questions asked.  I haven’t always done that… I’ve chased the ghost but sometimes have forgotten to simply love the person in my arms.  Truly love them.

I wasn’t sure what the reaction would be – I didn’t know if the guys here would be able to handle this chica coming up from South America and throwing her arms around them with complete surrender.  But you know what?  It worked out beautifully!  Each time, I felt the embrace and the warmth returned to me, equally.  I really, truly felt, with each dance, that I was sharing something special with the man in my arms.

Last year when I returned to Seattle from Buenos Aires I was kind of bummed out about the tango up north.  The warmth of the embrace just wasn’t there.  I’ve read numerous accounts of women going back to their hometowns from Buenos Aires and not quite feeling the same about tango.  I totally understand them – it’s not the same anywhere as it is in Buenos Aires.  That’s just not possible.  But one thing I hear – and something  I myself have said in the past -is that the embrace is colder outside of Buenos Aires.  But if that’s the case, then why has the embrace been so warm for me these past couple of days?

Do you suppose that we, upon returning from BsAs, are partly responsible and could stand to give more warmth to the guys up north, thus enabling them to open themselves up to us?  Because that’s what I think has happened with me.   For the first time on Seattle soil, I have just abandoned all expectations, all hesitation, all of my “oh I’m not in Buenos Aires so it’s going to suck” feelings, and really focused on the human being I was dancing with.

I said to myself, “Right now I’m dancing with XYZ.  I’m going to embrace him and all that I love about him.  I’m going to embrace our friendship as we dance, and think about all of the things we have shared these past few years.  I’m going to dance the love that I feel for him as a friend.  I’m going to hug him good.”

I hugged the heck out of him and he gave right back.  100%.  In a way that I have never experienced with him before.

And it happened this way with each man.  And each time I really focused on who the person was, what we had shared, how much I loved him in that moment right there.  And of course, because this is me, each time I made sure to give a little bit of my Buenos Aires to the embrace as well – there has been so much beauty (and ugliness) and magic in my life in Argentina and I hope I was able to share that with each man I danced with.  And they were all open to it.

I wonder what that’s about?  Did I just get lucky? Or do you think perhaps that we could stand to give ourselves just a little bit more?  Not always easy to do in this culture is it?

When I was first beginning tango, my friend Lachlan said, “Tina, tango is basically a big hug.”  So, upon hearing that, I gave him a big bear hug right there on the dance floor, and from that moment, our dance worked like magic.

Embrace = Hug

So far, I have noticed:

• The air is really clean, and sort of sweet
• There are a lot of tall people
• The tango community in Seattle has some really nice embraces! What a joy it was to dance yesterday!
• Coffee is really good, and there are so many varieties you can buy and none of them have sugar added
• It is really expensive here. Really. Expensive.
• The magazines don’t feature overly enhanced culos, instead they feature photoshopped toothpicks
• While Argentines have their meat, Seattle has it’s fish, and lots of it.
• The supermarkets are huge!

I’m glad to be here… and will also be glad to be back in Buenos Aires entre poco…

I know it must be hard to say goodbye to a friend as they leave for what’s supposed to be a month long vacation, only to have them write one day, saying, “I’m staying! I live here now!”. As enthusiastic I am about my change in life (which, it’s really not a change, but what I was supposed to be doing all along), I’m sure my friends in Seattle who I regularly see, while happy for me are probably wondering, “well what’s wrong with Seattle? What about us?”

That’s just the vibe I’m getting.

Well, you guys know who you are, and you need to know that I haven’t stopped loving any of you. I’d never forget you. Just because I’m in another land and feel less passionate about living in Seattle, does not negate how highly I regard our friendship. And just because I’m flourishing and fulfilling my destiny in another land, does not mean that I have stopped needing your friendship and support. I don’t only hope for friends to be there for me when I’m down, I need them when I’m happy too. So stop the pouting you guys and get ready for my upcoming visit – we’re going to have a blast!

I dug this up while going through my pictures… it’s a little collage I made of pictures I took in Pike Place Market. One of the things I love about Seattle.

This Friday night, December 7th, Christopher will be hosting our holiday milonga at the Russian Center on Capitol Hill, starting at 9pm, and going until 1am. Please attend if you’re in town!

I’ll personally be making Mediterranean Rice Salad as well as cantuccini (Tuscan biscotti) and there will be other appetizers and sweets too.

The Russian Center is good venue for dancing – in fact, it’s in that building that I learned to dance Tango (from Eva and Patricio).

Beforehand, there will be a beginning tango lesson taught by Michelle Badion at 8:30, so if you know anyone who is curious to learn tango, bring them!

Details can be found here.