New York, New York again ... #1

I'm on my way to New York, riding the Greyhound bus. I should be there at around 2:30, we'll be heading to the Chelsea Mkt, have lunch, go to the milonga and at 8pm when that ends we'll be heading to Newark to attend Adam's GettoTango party/milonga. That should go all night but I'm guessing at some point we'll pass out in some corner as we didn't get much sleep last night. We went to Ben & Thuy "unofficial" farewell party/milonga and we were there until 1am ... Yes, we are insane!

Last night I followed R again, and then I followed P. I still suck, and I will be sucking for a long time ;), but I love it (dancing, not sucking)! When I expressed my enthusiasm for following, R was like "you will still be leading ... right?" Leading ... Improvise an interesting dance while watching for traffic, as in predict other dancers trajectory (based on what you know 'about them and on what are they doing at that time), predict the next few seconds of the song so the movements are on the music, avoid doing moves that your follower can't do, look good, make your follower look good, adjust your embrace and dynamic to hers and ... oh, yeah ... have fun! Or, embrace your leader, close your eyes, listen to the lead and music and dance. Hmmm ... tough choice ;-) ( P.S. I don't to imply that following is easy, to be really good it takes the same amount of effort as it does to become a good leader, but it's a lot less one needs to do on the dance floor)

To shorten the amount of time I'll be sucking at following, I booked a private class with Carlos Moreno next weekend. I'm hoping I can jump start my following career but learning the right way from the beginning (see my other posts about group classes and the joys of learning tango with other beginners). Forming bad habits that need to be "unlearned" later seems awfully inefficient.

Speaking of dancing with P, last night was lovely (even though I was not in the "zone"). I've danced with her a few weeks ago at the Odd Tuesday milonga she is hosting and I had a very hard time dancing with her that time. It's amazing how one day you can totally "click" with someone and the next day nothing works. Or the other way around. The crowded floor at that milonga really messes with my dancing, so no doubt that was a big factor too.

OK, I need to leave some "juice" in the cell (which is used as a wireless modem right now) so I'll sign off. But I'll post again soon, and I'll try to post some pictures as well.