back to work ...

... after a week of vacation. Saturday to Thursday in Montreal then Friday to Sunday in CT for Yale's summer tango camp.

As you can read in my prior posts, the (Montreal International Tango) festival was a disappointment (though apparently festivals can be worst...). So Wednesday we (Debbi & I) went to the Studio Tango milonga and it was fun. Thomas Howlin was DJing, and the music was fine. I didn't care for some of his selections but that's to be expected. Even when I'm DJing and dancing I find myself thinking ... "what the hell was I thinking when I selected this song"

While the milonga went for 4 hours and I danced practically non-stop, I only danced with 5 or 6 people, all of which I danced with before. This raises an interesting issue. The more good partners one dances with, the more interesting dancing is, but so far I've been reluctant to "give up" a good partner for the chance at another good one. As in, if I find someone I like to dance with I usually dance until I need a break or they need/want one. For example Wednesday I asked an older woman, she is probably in her 50s (but one would not be able to tell from the way she moves). She is a wonderful dancer, the best leaders in Montreal line up to dance with her and we danced for 5 tandas in a row. Now, I could've walked away after say two tandas and maybe I would've found somebody else just as good. Or maybe not. Well, I'll eventually figure it out, this is one "problem" I don't mind having ... ;-)

Thursday morning we packed everything and headed back to my place, which we left Friday at noon to make it to the Yale's Summer Tango Camp site around 4pm (the drive only took about 2.5 hours, we had to run some errands). Friday evening there were maybe 10-12 people there, and I didn't dance much. Robin Thomas assisted by Kyla Mares taught a class on front ochos. I know that sounds too simple, I mean front ochos are probably shown within the first hour of any beginner class. But as it usually the case in tango, one can make any (simple) move into a fantastic experience and this class brought back to life the close embrace front ocho for me. I got to dance with Kyla a couple of tandas and she is not only good, but lots of fun to dance with. She is from Reno, AZ where apparently she is "growing" a small community. The big surprise came when she told me she was only dancing for a couple of years. Wow, that only shows how irrelevant "the years of experience" is as a metric for dancing abilities.

Saturday Robin & Kyla had another class, on milonga this time. I definitely like his teaching style with one caveat. I don't believe he allows for enough practice time before he stops the music to make another comment. Sometimes I would barely have time to execute the exercise once and then we'd stop again. But then again, maybe it's a good thing, it avoids practicing things the wrong way. While more people came Saturday, the milonga started late, around 11PM (the class went for 90 minutes before that) and it ended very early, around 1AM as everyone went to sleep or to hang out around the camp fire. That was kind of disappointing, but the room was very hot and humid, and the floor was slippery and I think people just got sick of dealing with that. While the room had lots of windows, all of them left open, there was absolutely no breeze, so that didn't help. I danced a little bit, the best dances were with Kyla and M, a follower from NY who I met at the last Longa Milonga in Providence. I also got to follow Robin which went well as long as he kept it simple ... Note to self : need more following practice ;)

Sunday we got up late, made breakfast and attended the last class, on vals. Again, there were no fancy moves (which is a good thing), but rather some work on musicality and rhythm. We danced a little bit after that, but other then a couple of tandas with Kyla there was nothing out of the ordinary. We left the camp site around 5:30PM after having a bite to eat with a bunch of other people and we made it home around 10PM (no it didn't take that long to drive home, I had to stop at the grocery store).

So, did I enjoy my vacation? Sure, it was fun. I was expecting a lot more tango, but I did get a few good dances, hung out in Montreal, I got to use the tent again (after two years), met friends from Montreal and NY and made some new ones. Not bad for one week. And I got a really nice shirt from Montreal that goes perfectly with my new blue linen pants. Speaking of linen pants, I need to remember when I'm making the next pair to really re-enforce the waist band. When it's hot and humid linen seems to "grow" and one of these days I'll find my pants around my ankles at the end of a tanda. Sadly I no pictures from the first part of this trip because the card in my new compact camera crapped out on me... Grrrrrrrrr

But I have some pictures and I'll post them soon, so stay tuned.