El Tango!

So it would be wrong to leave Buenos Aires without perfecting the art of tango.  Having seen people of all shapes, genders and ages strutting their tango-stuff in the streets of La Boca, and along Calle Florida, I was fully prepared to excel in Argentina's national dance.


As Emma, Sabrina, Melissa and I arrived at the heaving Milonga venue for our class, I was a little apprehensive about giving the Argentinos a legitimate excuse to touch me.  I had covered up accordingly.  However, once inside, the opposite was true.  As our (incredibly sexy) teacher took his (also incredibly sexy) partner by the hand, and walked us through the steps, I discovered (for the first time ever!) I could actually manage the footwork.  After several run-throughs, we were instructed to find a partner and try it for real.  As the men sprinted through our midst to grab a partner, I found myself abandoned on the edge.  When the instruction to change partner was given a second time, I again found myself alone.  Eventually a gropey, sweaty Argentino clasped me to him, but the combination of slippery hands and bad breath was too much for me.  An older man with a thick grey moustache offered me his arm, and I found myself dancing the tango.  The dancefloor was utterly packed, and (after bumping into the 100th person), I commented 'hay muchas personas acqui!' to my partner, who smiled politely.  As we swept past a table full of people, they errupted into laughter, whooping and cheering.  '¿Ellos son tus amigos?' I enquired, but he looked blank.  "No eeenglish," he responded, pointing at himself, "d'Italie".  So much for two weeks of language classes!

As the lesson drew to a close, the floor opened up to couples tango-ing the night away.  However, it was very quickly made clear to us that this was for pros only.  Sabrina and I were on the receiving end of some very dirty looks after our poor attempt to join in, and one couple actually shouted in Emma's face that she should remove herself until she had some better moves.  And a partner.
Disheartened, I headed to the bar for some drinks, and was accosted by a plump older gringo in a football shirt.  "Inglés?" he offered by way of introduction.
"Si", I replied, waving down the barman.
We then had a conversation in Spanish (check me out!) about what I did, where I was from, and why I was at a tango class.
"Porque es Buenos Aires!" I exclaimed, "necessito bailar tango!"
"Hay tres cosas importantes en Buenos Aires," he continued, "Uno - tango.  Dos - Dulce de leche.  Tres - Maradona".
I confessed to enjoying the second, but knowing little about the third - expressing a preference for David Beckham (Maradona is a famous footballer...right??).  I then remembered that BA is famous for one more thing...
"El bife!" I added, "hay muchos bifes en Argentina!"
At this (and no word of a lie), the guy looked me up and down, said something in Spanish about beef, then said (in Spanish), "Yes, you have obviously enjoyed a lot of beef in Buenos Aires!", while leaning forward and pinching a bit of fat on my stomach.  I have literally never been more speechless in my life! He followed this up, hopefully, with, "¿tienes un novio?".  Like he had any chance after that!

Saturday night again saw me outside my dancing comfort zone, as a few of us headed to Pacha, on the outskirts of the city.  Having never been to Ibiza, I was entirely unprepared for the enormity of the place - and the vast queues that fed into it.  Unperturbed (and drunk), Sabrina and Melissa swanned up to the shortest queue, where they managed to secure queue jump and free entry for 'las chicas' only...which was then remarkably extended (no idea how we did it) to include our only 'chico' as well.

Once inside, it was impossible to move a muscle, let alone throw any shapes (other than the shape of a frozen hot-dog sausage).  The only thing to do in this situation was abuse the drinks offers (who knew champagne and red bull could be so addictive...and make you feel so bad the next day!), and get the elbows out.  We clambered into a taxi (missing Will's jacket, Melissa's shoes and Sabrina) at around 5:40am, and it was well into the afternoon before I surfaced.  Perhaps I won't be doing Ibiza this summer after all...

In actual travel news, I will soon be doing some actual travelling, and leaving BA.  Details of phase one of my 44 hour bus ride to Rio will follow when I've recovered!