On my first day of school, I knew that the class they had assigned me to was too basic and I talked to the director about moving up, but she said they didn’t have any groups at my level. They offered me a private class, but in general, I prefer a group, so I chose to stay and have an easy review week. That turned out to be a good decision. On Tuesday, a woman came into the class who had had Covid the week before and did zoom classes, but was now back in person. Daria turned out to be from San Francisco and had just left her position of thirteen years as Assistant Director of Development at … drumroll … Berkeley Rep. Since I have been attending plays there for years, we had lots to talk about (in English). Besides Spanish, this week I learned a lot about what goes on behind the scenes at a theater.
Ricardo, the guide from my bicycle tour, also leads tango tours. I told him to let me know when he had a group and I would go. On Monday he texted me that he was taking a British couple on Tuesday night. Would I like to join them? Duh! There are lots of tourist tango shows with professional dancers, but locals go to tango clubs called milongas. Ricardo is a tango dancer himself, and he explained to us the traditions and subtleties involved.
We met at 10 pm at a milonga aptly named El Beso (The Kiss) where the dance floor is far more crowded than it appears in this picture. There is not a live band, so there are chairs along all four walls. The women sit in two long rows on two opposite walls and the men sit on the other two opposite walls. Even if you come as a couple, dancers do not sit together nor dance only with each other. There are sets of four dances, with a few minutes break between each set. During the break, everyone returns to their (separate sex) chairs. When the music starts for the new set, each man issues a silent invitation to a woman with just his eyes. The woman nods imperceptibly or looks away. No public rejections. Only after he has been accepted, does the man walk to the woman and extend his hand. They dance the set, with a few minutes to talk (and find out each other’s names) during the short interlude between each of the four dances. Then they all sit down and partner with someone else for the next set.
The tango dance that they do is very stylized, and unlike in the tourist shows, the dancers improvise as they go along. Ricardo explained the hierachy: a good woman dancer will not dance with a beginner or an unknown, so although he is a good dancer, if he goes to a new club, he has to be introduced or somehow work his way up. Also, each milonga has its own personality. Some are for seniors; some are for younger dancers and the smell of pot permeates. El Beso was middle of the road and starts at an early hour: 9:30. Others do not open until midnight or later. The British couple were tired and left around 11:30. I had seen a good show and did not want to crimp Ricardo’s action, so I left around midnight too. Fascinating evening.
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| Talking between tangos in a set |
Each week, a teacher at the school gives a tour (in Spanish) of a different neighborhood of Buenos Aires. On Wednesday, we went to La Boca - the old, poor neighborhood that is home to the Boca Juniors and their crazy fans.
It also has a colorful, touristy section and it is the next neighborhood to mine so I had wanted to walk there, but I had heard that La Boca dangerous, and had not been back since my bike tour went there. The guide said it is safe and well policed until 6 at night, just don’t stay after dark. Not milonga hours but I am looking forward to wandering around there.
On Saturday Daria and I took a train ride to Tigre, the area that is the gateway to the vast Parana Delta. Only an hour from downtown Buenos Aires, it also has summer homes and resorts. From Tigre we took a boat ride to see both the beauty of the delta and the interesting houses. Then we sat for a while in a cafe and I learned even more about the working of a theater.
My neighborhood, San Telmo, is one of the few to still have old colonial style buildings. Needless to say, the buildings are not in good shape and the neighborhood was getting a bad reputation. So someone came up with the idea of holding an antiques market every Sunday, and it worked. On Sunday I went to the biggest antiques/art market I have ever seen. The stalls literally went on for a mile on the main street with dozens more on the side streets. The park where I hang out most nights was stripped of its usual restaurant tables and chairs, and full of antiques. The only sad thing is that the antiques are relics of MY childhood. Pushbutton phones. Are they really antiques?
There were street musicians and a rousing drum band. It was a huge party all day long. I had been told that everything is closed on Sundays in Buenos Aires, and that may be true in other neighborhoods, but mine was hopping.
On Monday I went to the local (sorta) public swimming pool - a huge pool complex with soccer fields and basketball courts as well. It does take two bus rides to get there - if you have a sense of direction and can follow the transportation app on your phone. Next time I hope to make it in only two rides each way. Sitting at poolside and reading, I am so happy not to be in the massive storms in Sacramento this week. Another new Spanish word: a swimming pool is a piscina in most places, an alberca in Mexico, and a pileta in Argentina. It is a conspiracy to confuse me.
One last thing about Argentine which makes absolutely no sense. The official rate of exchange is 175 pesos to the dollar but there is another rate, not exactly black market, which is between 300 and 360 pesos to the dollar. The second rate is called the blue rate. All of my guides (including Rabbi Ernesto) said to use the blue rate, and that taking money out of the ATM is the stupidest thing you can do. (Of course that is exactly what I did when I landed at the airport.) I had not researched this before I came and did not bring a lot of dollars with me to exchange. It turns out that there are long lines at Western Union because you can somehow transfer money to yourself there and get the blue rate. I do have a few hundred dollars cash on me, so one day I changed $100 at a local exchange kiosk. They gave me over $33,000 pesos, but since the largest bill is $1,000 pesos, I received a wad that was far too large to fit into my wallet. I did happen to get lucky, however. Totally unbeknownst to me, two weeks before I got here, the credit card companies started offering close to the blue rate. So as long as I charge everything, it costs half as much as taking money out of the bank and paying cash. Go figure. Does this make any sense at all?
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