Before I get into the event at last night’s milonga, I just want to say that Sunday, at my happy milonga, I had the best Tanturi vals set of my life. I danced with the son of the organizer, an Argentine-American who is a fabulous young milonguero. He really is a bright, wonderful person and we recently agreed that we should always try to dance together as early on as possible at milongas because we seem to bless eachother with good dances for the rest of the night. Always a good person to have around. Anyway.
That tanda was out of this world. Especially the first song - I actually forgot that I was in Seattle, and I seriously, honestly thought that I was in Buenos Aires. I’m not even exaggerating or being poetic. It was weird and very cool. We were dancing The Ghost. Tanturi can do that to me, and with Castillo’s voice to help me along, I can easily slip into another dimension. The tanda was so good and so special that at the end we hugged and gave each other a high-5. We’re silly that way.
It made up for the fall I took later on towards the end of the evening, due to a very slippery floor (because of the people who had rented the space the previous evening)… I don’t feel like blogging about my fall as it was kind of traumatizing and really embarrassing. But at least I was not dancing when I slipped. I was walking towards the dance floor. I’m trying to think it’s funny. I’m okay.
LAST NIGHT. I had a great time, dancing one tanda after another with some of my favorite guys in Seattle to dance with. The added plus? Almost all of my invitations were done via the cabeceo. !! It’s hard to do in a dimly lit place, but the guys I dance with here also know that I like the cabeceo, so they put themselves where they know I’ll see them and it works well.
At one point I was sitting down, watching people begin to dance a milonga set that had just started. I had decided to take a little breather. A man I’m not sure I recognize came up to me, stood in front of me and said, “Are you resting?” I said, “Yeah, for the moment.” He said, “So you don’t want to dance?” I said, “No, sorry…thank you.” He pouted (pouted!) and said, “Oh. Well that’s too bad, this is a really good milonga.” I said nothing. He stood there for a moment. I didn’t say anything else, just decided to enjoy watching people dance. He finally walked away and approached another girl, asking her to dance. I heard her decline, saying that she doesn’t really like to dance milonga. And I think this is true because I never see her dance milonga. He then seemed to be trying to convince her to dance, or perhaps demand to know why. I couldn’t hear him, I think he asked her why, as I heard her say, “Because I don’t want to.” Finally he said something like “Damn!” and stomped across the room to pout.
He may have just been having a bad night, but I think he could benefit from learning to take no for an answer.
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Sunday nights are your happy milongas too? Yay! I love that you two start off the night with a good luck tanda.
I wish more guys in Montreal would use the cabeceo.
I really hate the whole “why won’t you dance with me?” scenario. It’s uncomfortable for both parties.
I may have wanted to dance with him later but if he won’t leave me alone, then he’s blacklisted.
I can empathize with this guy. When a favorite set of Calo/Beron or Tanturi/Castillo comes up, my whole body just aches to dance, and it is incredibly frustrating if there is nobody to dance with. I do not support his “pouting” and “why don’t you dance with me” routine, however, since there is a greatly more powerful and sophisticated means of getting rejected - the cabeceo. I am happy to report that I have achieved a milestone of sort at a recent milonga where 100% of the rejections I received were non-verbal. I would like to disagree with the oft-stated assumption that cabeceo is easier on a man’s ego. In my old way of walking around asking verbally I could collect two or three rejections during a cortina, Now with the power of cabeceo I can sit in one place and gather seven to eight rejections in 30 sec. I am sure I can improve on this number with more practice. It is astounding how quickly I can be turned down with a glance.
At the end of the aforementioned milonga a very sweet lady came up to me and said how sorry she was that I did not dance very much. If not for the fact that she was not feeling well that night she would have liked to dance with me, she said. It turned out she was the organizer of the milonga. On the way out I chuckled over the fact that I had managed to attract the attention of an influential tanguera by doing little more than sitting around getting rejected for most of the night, but such is the sophistication of tango.
Hi Gentimiento
Glad to see you again.
I dunno, I think that if the cabeceo is done properly, there is no rejection at all. Just missed eye contact. In the correctly done cabeceo, there is only ever “yes”. “No” doesn’t even play a part because it doesn’t have to. Anyone who doesn’t want to dance with you (or me) just won’t make eye contact. It’s a hard game to play. Being turned down is never a “fun” experience though, and I can even say it from a woman’s point of view.
My body aches to dance when I hear Tanturi/Castillo as well, but I’m sure that’s obvious.
Ah, the Tangoed (tangled) web we weave.
tina! ALL your dances were accepted via the cabeceo?! in the US! this gives me hope. maybe we are on the way to making it a part of our tango culture as well.
i actually tried it for a couple hours at a milonga last week, but nothing came of it… then again, a man here who would actually be informed and experienced enough to use it is probably an advanced level dancer, and would dance with people he knows will have a great connection with him.
once, a man kept staring back, and i thought it would work… thirty minutes later (long after the “stare” was forgotten), he walked over like everyone else and asked for a dance. so i don’t think it was a cabeceo… he probably thought i found him attractive or something.
:/
I have seen at the Vancouver practica little printouts for the Tango etiquette. I can´t remember if the cabeceo was on there or not, but things like the line of dance.
Perhaps it would be helpful if organizers of the milongas and practicas outside of Buenos Aires would start educating the dancers on the finer points of the rules of engagement for Argentine Tango, by doing something similar.
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