is no Nirvana. BsAs has average dancers, even bad dancers too. BsAs' milongas can be very crowded and hard to dance for some. BsAs has hot and humid summer days. BsAs has problems like every other city in the world...
But in BsAs, you can dance tango 16x7 (save 8 hours a day for sleep, eat, drink and go to the batroom). In BsAs you can dance with just about the world. In BsAs, you can dance with the best, if you are strived to be the best. In BsAs, you can experience something magical...
So if you are serious about knowing tango, make a trip to BsAs. Maybe you come back with disappointment, maybe you come back with depression, maybe you come back with different perspective of tango, or maybe you come back and quit...
Then one day you would say this: I('ve) dance(d) tango, I've been to BsAs...
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Do you think people really quit?
ReplyDeleteEB,
ReplyDeleteHaven't met one yet in my short tango journey? Just I think some do.
XX
TP
PS My new blog: Tangoperfect.
tangoperfect.wordpress.com
That is well said, Tango Junkie, and I'm glad you clarified it... because it really drives me nuts when Tangueros who've just come back from BAs speak of it as if it is perfection. And it is not. There are problems: bad dancers, not so good dancers, crowds, people who try to abuse you, too many tourists (including us, even if we don't want to admit we increase this statistic), drugs (just read Cherie's "The Dark Side of Tango", which she posted a while ago..); it is a place where sometimes it is very hard to break in...
ReplyDeleteBut, at the same time, it has a great beauty: that of opportunity. It is a place where, as you notice, the fruit is ripe for those who know well enough to grab it. It is intense, it is emotional, it is there for us to take it inside and shrink as much juice as possible from it... (and sometimes get frustrated because we don't suceed). And finally, and most important: it is real.
I agree with you. Every real Tanguero (a) should go there, I find out.
So well said, TP! As to Elizabeth's question do people really quit - I think so, I have heard stories. I suppose it ends up to be temporarily, because I can't imagine you won't come back to tango at some point or other, but I have to say I have thought about it since we came back. It could be post BsAs blues, but today was the first time I danced since the trip and after the first half hour I wanted to scream! I was just about to text Eva and tell her 'All right, I am finished with this' and was pondering over the irony of having brought back 8 pairs of shoes, when luckily, or perhaps serendipitously, the only dancer who could change my mind at that moment of utter disappointment walked into the milonga (which was close to impossible to happen for a number of reasons). I have to think that there is something out here watching over us, the dedicated tangueros and tangueras :) I am a happy woman tonight. But again, for how long...
ReplyDeleteI liked that.
ReplyDeleteMy month in Buenos Aires was divine - but divinity cannot be appreciated without having some bad experiences too. While the tango was 99.99% a very, very good experience for me (lucky me!) I had some of the most emotionally wrenching days of my life in that city. It was mostly personal stuff but I do think that it was also an unconscious reaction to all that was around me.
Buenos Aires is a beautiful but tough city, with a lot of things that are wonderful to remember, but other things that are hard to see. Some people cannot handle its intensity. One of my friends who dances Tango did not like BsAs at all. But you know? I don't think he'd be the person he is today if he hadn't gone.
Good or bad, it's important to go and learn from it.
:-)
The thing is,
ReplyDeletetango opens up your heart.
And sometimes it hurts.
But you know you are alive!
Tangocherie said it perfectly. Tango does make you feel alive...and for that, I am thankful.
ReplyDelete