It will be a bit of time before I can describe this trip in detail.  One thing I can say is that it’s needed.  The winter in Perugia has been gray, gray, gray.  It gets you down.  On top of that, I’ve been dealing with the disappointing sting of learning that a certain personal relationship was… not what I thought it was.  I’ve been processing  that for about a month.  On top of that, I’ve been worrying about my grandmother’s health, which fortunately seems to be doing well now.  On top of that, I’ve been just so incredibly busy (which is good, but exhausting!).

I stopped in Rome for a night before I came down here, and it was such a dream.  I went to a milonga organized by some people I met in Buenos Aires, and was pleasantly surprised to find all of those people, plus an Argentine I knew from my regular milonga in Buenos Aires.  Needless to say, I had some heavenly dances and made some wonderful connections.  I took the metro to get to the milonga and walked around the neighborhood where it is located.  It brought me to life.  I realized how much of a city girl I am.  You just can’t take Buenos Aires out of the girl!

Lecce has lifted my spirits.  I have met so many angels here who have gone out of their way to welcome me and make me feel good.  I have made a wonderful tango connection and gave a two-hour lesson to an amazing, sweet couple who lavished me with pastries, coffee, sweet wine and tangos sung by the beautiful voice of Tito Schipa, a tenor from Lecce.  Thanks to them, I have had requests from other dancers here asking for lessons.  It’s turning out to be an eventful week!

Everything seems to be made of the local Leccese stone.  The streets and architecture glow at night with the help of streetlights, and during the day when Lecce is bathed in sunlight it’s like standing in a city of gold.  It’s a really beautiful city.

A new friend brought me to Gallipoli today and it made my heart sing.  That beautiful ancient town on the Ionian Sea tickled my soul just right and made me feel light and refreshed.  It was so cloudy on the way there, but exactly over Gallipoli there was only clear blue sky.  It was a treat to walk along the water without a jacket, smelling the salty air.  We delightfully scooped out the “eggs” from the insides of ricci (sea urchins) with bread while looking at the horizon.  This burst of sun made me feel pretty good.

I’m positively in love with Gallipoli, but another new contact has offered to take me to Otranto.  I can hardly wait.

This has been a great experience for me because I’ve been able to get away and do something I’m good at: traveling.  It’s been a nice reminder that I’m independent.  I have gotten to know new people, I have tasted all kinds of interesting new foods, and I did it myself.

My heart is bursting with love for this area that is new to me, and I hope to keep it in my life.

Mina is one of the most amazing Italian singers, in my opinion.   She’s unique.  Her voice tears you apart inside, in a good way.

This evening I was whisked away to a presentation on the lovely Mina, and we were shown various recordings of her throughout the important eras in her career.

The pleasant surprise of the evening (for me) was when they showed us a performance in which she sang a tango, Balada Para Mi Muerte, accompanied by Astor Piazzolla.  It moved me.  And I found it on youtube:

And here’s a song by Mina che mi da brividi (that gives me shivers).

It’s called Ancora, Ancora, Ancora:

This has been the grandest summer.  I came back in April a mess, a total mess.  It is now the end of August and I’m definitely not a mess.  :-)  I’m fine!  Great, in fact!  But very, very busy.

My relationship with Tango has been funny this summer.  I really wanted to take a break from it, only because I tend to identify music with periods in my life.  When I listen to Tango I am emotionally and mentally brought back to the biggest year-and-a-quarter of my life: the time I lived in Buenos Aires.  I am not talking about the milongas.  Sure I miss them (I really miss Cachirulo), but Seattle has a really nice milonga scene so I’m fine there.

I married Buenos Aires.  I pledged my heart to Buenos Aires and told it I wanted to spend the rest of my life with it.  I threw myself into that city and experienced it as a resident (albeit clandestine).  I even stayed long enough to have gasista problems!  That’s like a rite of initiation, isn’t it?

So when I listen to Tango music, that’s where I’m transported.  To the daily life of Buenos Aires, the good and the bad of it.  That can be tough, especially considering the giant emotional experiences I had there.

But, I showed up at the milongas of Seattle anyway.  I embraced, I walked, I socialized with my friends.  I formed new bonds and strengthened existing ones.  I taught my tango secrets to new dancers and already strong tangueros.  I organized and taught two workshops all by myself, with success!  And I’m about to host Maximiliano Gluzman for a series of workshops that I’m totally excited about.

So while Tango music initially made it hard to heal from the heartbreak I experienced early in the year, the dance has kept me around people who give me strength and joy.

It has also helped me survive after my own economic crisis, because it has brought me a small income.  I’ve heard people from here complain that Tango is just a “business” for a lot of folks in the milonga circuit of Buenos Aires, but after experiencing what I have, I can understand why one would make it a business.  When you’re down to nearly nothing, you use what you have (in this case, Tango), and that gets you by.  It’s how you survive.  Tango dancers have to eat and pay bills too.  And sometimes Tango is what provides that.  The Italian word “arrangiarsi” comes to mind.  This article in The Florentine defines it for you.

Times were really hard for me.  Tango saved me.  I’m grateful for Tango.

Something else great that happened: I worked every day this August, translating.  Small stuff, but at least I worked.  I was surprised.  August is usually a time when Italy basically shuts down and goes on vacation,  so I was prepared for a month of nothing, since my business comes from Italy.  I think a few of my clients stuck around (less people can afford those vacations this year), so I got work.  Thank you Universe.  Thank you, thank you, thank you.

I’m now running around and publicizing like heck for Maxi’s workshops.  I want this to work.  It will.  :-)

I’m also planning for the next phase of my life.  Not so surprising hint: It involves a place shaped like a boot.

Osvaldo Fresedo grew up from the age of 10 in the lovely, sleepy barrio of La Paternal, the barrio I called my home for a while in Buenos Aires.  I thought of him often when I walked through that neighborhood, wondering what sort of inspiration he took from his surroundings.  According to todotango, it was there that he started to play the bandoneon.

His nickname was El Pibe de La Paternal, the kid from La Paternal.  A couple of my friends would affectionately tease me and call me La Piba de La Paternal.  Because of my experience in this beautiful, sweet, special neighborhood, the thought of which conjures images of jacaranda trees and one-story houses with ornate detailing on their facades, I feel a connection to Fresedo.

I love to listen to tango music at home.  Just sit, and really focus on every detail, the words, the rhythm, each instrument.  I love to let the music carry me to Buenos Aires and beyond while I sit with a glass of wine or a cup of coffee.  But I cannot listen to Fresedo when I’m sitting at home.

If I listen to Fresedo with that much focus, I get the most massive waves of nostalgia for Buenos Aires and I start crying.  Anything from quiet weeping to desperate sobbing.  No other orchestra can transport me back “home” to Buenos Aires like that.  The music, so melodic and sweet and sentimental, tickles my heart and then breaks it open, reminding me that I’m not there.  And I cry.  If I’m paying attention to the lyrics, I’m a basketcase.

*Dancing* to Fresedo, however, is wonderful.  If I’m dancing, I can handle the music.  I have an outlet for expression.  I can channel all my emotions into the embrace.  I can walk away from the tanda a very happy tanguera.

Last night I was dancing with a very close porteño friend during a tanda of Fresedo.  He’s someone who has been very much a part of my Buenos Aires life, and is an ideal partner for a tanda of Fresedo.  All that sentimentality and nostalgia, shared with someone who was there.  Not to mention he’s a really good dancer.  During the fourth tango, Sueño Azul, I allowed my eyes to close and all of a sudden, in his embrace, surrounded by the music, I was transported.  Literally.  I was no longer in Seattle at China Harbor…

…It was the month of March and I was walking on Scalabrini Ortiz at 4:00 in the morning, to a bus stop, after saying goodbye to a friend in La Viruta (a milonga I NEVER went to but once in a while).  The air smelled sweet because it had rained most of the night.  I had Buenos Aires almost all to myself.  As the bus (the 110) made its way through the various streets, I admired the trees so typical of Buenos Aires neighborhoods, lining the streets with their twisted roots and branches.  At the time, my life as I knew it was in the process of falling apart (so I could later put it back together again), but I was in my city, peaceful, tired, okay…albeit a little sad.  Buenos Aires was always so sweet to me at night.

I opened my eyes towards the end of the tango, back to the reality of the opening milonga of the Seattle Tango Magic festival, and sighed with contentment.  I really did have some Tango Magic.

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.

I’ve traveled quite a bit and I’ve lived in a few countries.  Music always ties me to these countries.  It ties me to all life experiences.  A song can bring back a taste or a smell or something I’ve seen.

I can listen to Italian music and think of green hills with cypresses, train rides, people, food and sometimes streets with Renaissance or medieval architecture.  I can listen to music that was important during my time in Switzerland and remember sitting on a train, looking at Lake Zurich.

When it comes to Buenos Aires, when I hear its music (in this case, Tango), I feel like I’m walking down the street in one of its barrios.  Always the streets.  Always walking.

When I listen to D’Agostino with Vargas singing, I’m in Once in the fall or winter, walking down my street, Adolfo Alsina, or maybe standing on the balcony looking down at the street and wanting to walk on it (I did this when it was too cold to go outside).

When I listen to Rodriguez (w/Moreno), I’m turning from Juan B. Justo on to Sanchez, the street I lived on in La Paternal, in the heat of the summer.

There is a particular Di Sarli interpretation of the tango Nobleza de Arrabal, and for some reason whenever I hear that, I’m walking with Joli in the wintertime, from her old place in Villa Urquiza to Villa Pueyrredon to pick up her stepson from jardin.  In some parts of the tango I can actually visualize and feel specific streets.  I can even tell you what shoes I’m wearing.

It remains constant.  I always think of streets, particular characteristics of them, what they feel like, what sorts of trees there might be, the curvy entryways of some of the buildings.  My feet touching the ground.  My weight changing and my hips shifting as I move on my left leg, then my right, then my left, then my right…

For me, Tango really is a walk.  It’s a walk in Buenos Aires.  The walk of a porteño.

(a street in La Paternal)

Yesterday I was feeling a bit too snarky to write a blog post about what I was thankful for.  It was Thanksgiving Day for me as an American, but in 37C heat I wasn’t in the mood to even think about turkey!

S came to me after work last night and we went to a restaurant in my barrio that we’d passed by before and were curious about.  I won’t tell you what it is because 1) I really don’t know the name and 2) It’s my little secret.

I got dressed up in my cute strapless blue dress with a hand-painted design and some silver flip-flops.  I’ve lost a bit of weight because I think I’ve sweated it all out just by being in this heat, so it was nice to have the dress hug me the right way.  (Yes mom, I’m drinking lots of water.)  And off we went.

The restaurant itself reminds me of a place in Seattle I used to frequent, sort of industrial chic meets cozy place in the suburbs.  Very open and airy, very nice decor, artsy, quaint.   The menu was so easy on the eyes – only one beef item that I noticed.  Variety, vegetables, flavor.  And good prices for people who live in pesos.  We had this lovely calamari appetizer (no, not battered and fried, but served with a rucola pesto), and to my surprise they gave us another appetizer for free, of stuffed zucchini.  Maybe since we’re new?  Who knows. But we gobbled both appetizers up fast.  And now I am inspired to elaborate on my own stuffed zucchini recipe.

My main was a yummy crepe with ricotta and spinach, with a fresh tomato sauce and a rucola pesto.  The presentation was lovely and the ingredients I could tell were carefully chosen.  It was nice to eat a crepe, haven’t done that in a whle.  My lovely had fish with a roquefort sauce and potatoes.

Next thing we knew there were two live guitarists playing Tango – not singing, just playing.  The waitress brought us sheets with the words in case we wanted to sing along.  These men knew how to play.  It was wonderful to listen to, and so, we didn’t sing.

Between dinner and dessert (flan with dulce de leche, por supuesto!), I decided it was a good time to talk about the things I was grateful for.  Since S is not familiar with this tradition, I’m sure he must have been either intrigued or bored.  We’ll just have to ask him.

The main thing I’m grateful for this year (and all my life) is Tango.  And not for superficial reasons.  I’m thankful for Tango because if it weren’t for Tango, I wouldn’t have done half the things I’ve done with my life.  I wouldn’t be sitting here writing this blog entry.  I wouldn’t have passed these nine great months in Buenos Aires.  I wouldn’t have gotten to know Miss Tango (or Mr. Tango or little Isa) or any of the other wonderful people I’ve known thanks to this great dance.  I wouldn’t have gotten through my father’s death in 2004.  I wouldn’t have met this great guy – who doesn’t dance Tango, but knows the music.  I am so lucky, too, that Buenos Aires reached out and spoke to me in a deeper way than I had expected.  Most people who come here get to know Palermo, downtown and San Telmo and that’s about it.  I feel so fortunate that I stayed a while longer to get to know other neighborhoods.  Noisy, smelly, crazy, quilombo-filled Once.  Tranquil, family-friendly, homey Villa Urquiza.  My gorgeous neighborhood of Paternal, with its quiet, lazy, tree-lined streets and unpretentious people.  Villa Bosch, the town my boyfriend lives in, in the Province.  All of that is now part of my life experience thanks to Tango.  I don’t even go dancing more than once a week now, but something great is happening to my dancing.  Maybe it’s because I’m relaxed and learning about a different side of it.  All I know is that with Tango, I’ve seen a lot of great things.  And sad things.  But mostly great things.

I’m grateful for a lot of other things such as my Italian citizenship, but this year is the year of Tango.

Like Johanna in her blog entry from Friday, my “adornos” that I do are finally the result of a very organic process that followed me on my path of self-discovery with Tango. I may have admired other dancers and tried to put some of their moves into practice (discarding what didn’t feel right), but I have never taken any of those “adorno workshops” that are rampant in the U.S.

When I was still a beginner, someone was in town teaching an adorno workshop for ladies. Immediately I knew I did not want to take it. I was still trying to get comfortable with myself in the dance, and I wanted my embellishments to come from *me*, not someone else.  Since then, various teachers have put on a lot of different workshops for embellishments and people would say, “Oh you should take that because you can learn new embellishments!” and it has never felt right, so I have never done it.  The whole point of embellishing is to express your own personality, not dance like another person.

In my organic process, I went through various stages.

For a while I was overdoing the adornos because I’d suddenly discovered this feeling of freedom to do whatever I wanted.  Poor leaders that had to deal with me … The longer I dance though, and especially the longer I’m in Buenos Aires, the more it comes from the heart – and the less adorning I do.  I still do it, it’s just… different now.  Embracing men who have a keen understanding of the music they have listened to since they were teenagers and letting their interpretation soak into my own being might have something to do with it (esp. since I am so very picky about rhythm), but I really think I’ve basically had a natural evolution.  And when you see my adornos now, in the crowded milongas, they are close to the floor (at least I hope), very specific to the space that I am given and to the music and my feelings.

I like what Johanna had to say in this paragraph:

Adornos are the cherry on the ice-cream sundae, the icing on the cake, the star on top of the Christmas tree. They are used as punctuation, as an element to draw attention to a specific place or moment. But there is a definite visual distinction between a technically correct adorno and an emotionally-evoked one: we either embellish because we just learned it in a class and apply it any- and everywhere, or because the music and our partner moves us to do it in that specific moment in time.

I realize that I haven’t really written much about my life lately.  The most I’ve written has been about food or voting, and that’s about it.

I suppose it’s because the longer I’m here, the more ordinary my life feels and I don’t have so many interesting things to say.

I don’t write much about Tango really, as I am not a tango tourist anymore and I am only dancing once or twice a week (and no more than that, because, as the title of this entry says, life is happening – I have other things to do and not a whole lot of money to throw away on milonga entries or taxi rides home).

I don’t have anything to say about how amazed I am about cultural differences here because I guess I’m just not that kind of expat, and I don’t find the culture that shocking at all (I’ve lived in Italy and find a lot of similarities).

But I realize that those of you at home who are wondering about me might want to be updated.  Also, I’m sure my life must seem interesting to someone out there – I’m getting enough blog hits to let me know that.  So I’ll write.

Apartment. I am finally fed up with living in Once (a district in the barrio of Balvanera), the transvestite prostitutes on my street, the drunks on the corner keeping the neighborhood awake at night, the ugliness, the sad feeling in the air, etc., and I am moving to another neighborhood in November, at the beginning of the month.  It’s in the barrio of Paternal.  A nice apartment on a quiet street, with only one roommate.  A little farther from the centro, but still convenient in terms of public transportation and it’s a tourist-free neighborhood, as far as I know.  I look forward to it.  I have to say that the more I am in Once the more things I find to like about it, but in the end, I’d like to feel a little more comfortable in general.  And so, I am moving.  I will keep some very valuable memories of this house and the people in it, and I’m sure we’ll still get together.

Dancing. I’ve had some revelations about my dancing lately, and I am happy about it.  My dancing has really evolved since I’ve been here.  I stopped stressing myself out with lessons back in March or April as you know, but that doesn’t mean I haven’t been learning and growing.  And working closely with Pedro, my milonguero friend, assisting him and interpreting for lessons, has done wonders for me as a dancer.  That, plus dancing with who I feel are the best dancers when I do go out.  Along with Pedro, there are one or two other very wise dancers who shall remain unnamed, who I allow to give me input once in a great while.  I am so grateful for it.  I feel like my embrace has improved, along with my sense of balance, my walking and most of all my enjoyment of the dance.  The best compliment I received from a friend who I regularly dance with was the other day: he commented that he really likes the way I soak up pauses these days.  He noticed that when he pauses, I don’t just lazily, sleepily wait for him to lead the next step, instead I pause with him – like really pause, soak it up, participate, enjoy it.  That’s a big thing for me to hear from someone I respect in tango.

Love. I’ve got a boyfriend now.  In fact a month ago today we went to our first dinner together, at Plaza Asturias on Av. de Mayo.  We met through Miss Tango, as she and the Pelado used to work with him.  I was hard on him at first but now I’m relaxed and enjoying it.  He has left comments here as Ariel, which is his middle name.  He lives just outside of Capital, so I’m riding the train a bit more these days, and discovering places I would never have thought of before.  He does not dance Tango.  He gave me the necklace you see in this picture.   I’m happy.

Work. Spring is here, and I believe we are turning our clocks forward this weekend, which means I won’t be so behind my Italian clients.  Work was great last month and is a little slow this month.  I really hope it picks up, as I need the money.  My roommate’s boyfriend finally returned from his vacation and I gave him his English students back.  I am teaching English to one person I know from tango, once a week.

And that’s about it.  The change in weather has been hard on me, we had sun and beautiful blue skies (and me sneezing a lot) last week, while this week it’s just gloomy and grey and rainy.  I’ve always hated the transition into spring, as it’s always so bumpy.  Soon, however, it will be steadily warm.  And then summer will come and I will wonder what I was ever complaining about.

**In case you’re wondering what happened to What’s Cooking Wednesday, I had written a whole entry on Pappa al Pomodoro, a delicious Tuscan tomato/bread soup, and then the blog entry disappeared.  I do not want to write it again, so go HERE for the recipe.

Here’s a Biagi interpretation of the song.  I do love its rhythm.  Sigh… with the right leader, it can feel like flying.

This one is danced by Federico Naveira & Inés Muzzopappa.

And the words (thanks to todotango) by José María Contursi.  Music by Mario Canaro.