Dancing for Dante

I was asked to do a presentation on Tango (in Italian) and a dance demonstration for the Dante Alighieri Society, at their Seattle chapter meeting, which was last night. The topic was Argentina and its connections to Italy. They wanted Tango as well so they asked me if I’d do it. Sure!

I put together a nice print out of more or less this article that I wrote for my Italian friends while I was in Buenos Aires, and included a picture of the obelisco on 9 de Julio. Picked out some nice Tanturi, decided on my staple black dress that has been in my life faithfully for the past 6 years, purchased up in Canada at Le Chateau - the only place I buy my dresses because it’s the only place on this side of the pond that has dresses that fit me the way I like. Princess shoes for confidence and added effect (the shiny silver heel makes embellishments look pretty).

It went well! I was a little nervous about my Italian - I’m not good at speaking in front of a crowd (even though I studied theatre). I was also nervous about talking about Tango - it’s so hard to explain what Tango is. I did my best and in the end just told them to go to Buenos Aires.
My Italian was just fine, it came pouring out, perhaps a little fast, but that’s okay. I hope I made sense. I was nervous. We danced beautifully, I felt - it was very easy to relax. Dancing in front of a group is so much easier than talking. I can focus on the music and my partner and it soothes me.

We meant to dance to 2 songs, but wound up being asked to do 2 more after that, which was a huge compliment. And what nice people to dance for They were open, curious, and had very good questions for us - it was a lot of fun to be around a group like that. I’m pretty proud of myself. And I was happy that I could share my heart with people who were open to seeing it. I wouldn’t call this a performance so much as I’d call it sharing something I love with people who hopefully walked away from it feeling good.

I did get someone to take a video of us with my digital camera, and got it on to my computer right away so I could watch it and see how we did. I was pleasantly surprised - I look like I dance tango. Whew! We’re not Julio & Corina (I wish) but I’d say we’re at least nice to look at.  I won’t be posting it here, but if you’re curious and I know who you are, you can ask me for the link.