Or you could organize your own milongas
Tango Diaries
- Thread starter Bailango
- Start date
itwillhappen
Forum Master
That's very unfortunate. But if I know it correctly, it was a lot of driving for you too?
Really?! I've often seen event organizers still cleaning the venue, while I, as a DJ, close my laptop and go home after the "work." My girlfriend and I are vaguely considering whether we should support a milonga or even organize our own. No thanks, at least not as a regular commitment, maybe once she's retired.
The technical barriers to entry are decreasing and decreasing...
opendoor
Forum Master
Dear diary...
What a difference a day makes. Perhaps it was just how I was feeling that day; perhaps the solar wind was blowing stronger, or maybe it was simply psychology. Yesterday I went home frustrated; today, euphoric. Yesterday I wore my Italian tango sneakers by Schizo; today, my white Bloch Amalgams. Yesterday I admitted to myself that I would never be able to dance properly again. My knees ached unbearably and felt unstable. My lower back hurt, too. Today, everything was bearable. Yesterday, the milonga was held in a former factory hall that had been decorated with great taste. Today, I danced in a shabby club with torn curtains. Yesterday, the DJ played a 50/50 mix of traditional and neo-tango. I liked the blend. Today, the orchestra Romántica Milonguera was playing. During the break, I told the musicians that they sounded much better live than they did on their recordings. Yesterday, all the followers were a head taller than me—so much so that I mostly kept to myself and danced with only one suitable partner. Today, the crowd consisted mostly of visiting dancers, and I always was asked by skilled tango gazelles. What a difference a day makes.
What a difference a day makes. Perhaps it was just how I was feeling that day; perhaps the solar wind was blowing stronger, or maybe it was simply psychology. Yesterday I went home frustrated; today, euphoric. Yesterday I wore my Italian tango sneakers by Schizo; today, my white Bloch Amalgams. Yesterday I admitted to myself that I would never be able to dance properly again. My knees ached unbearably and felt unstable. My lower back hurt, too. Today, everything was bearable. Yesterday, the milonga was held in a former factory hall that had been decorated with great taste. Today, I danced in a shabby club with torn curtains. Yesterday, the DJ played a 50/50 mix of traditional and neo-tango. I liked the blend. Today, the orchestra Romántica Milonguera was playing. During the break, I told the musicians that they sounded much better live than they did on their recordings. Yesterday, all the followers were a head taller than me—so much so that I mostly kept to myself and danced with only one suitable partner. Today, the crowd consisted mostly of visiting dancers, and I always was asked by skilled tango gazelles. What a difference a day makes.
Miradamiranda
Well-Known Member
I’m back. Both here and on the dance floor.
Recovering from a tango drought of 6 and a half MONTHS of practically zero tango. There were 3 practicas of 2 hours each with a rather low level of dancers. That’s it. I finally get back to my ‘tango happy place’, arrange my year’s worth of travel dates to be able to be at the tango events i prioritize, just to get knocked out with a 2-week flu, losing a bundle of money on hotel and festival pass I couldn’t use in an expensive city (Basel), but worse was to miss an opportunity to dance with a number of my top top top favorite partners from far away. The following weeks were a slow start, rebuilding energy and muscles that had been neglected (note to self for next time, foot muscles wearing heels while leaning into a +1 or +2 posture are quick to go), plus some other significant non-tango life events that I won’t bore you with.
But all good now. I went to another of my favorite events, the fabulous tango music festival in Innsbruck last weekend and this weekend there was also plenty cool stuff going on locally. One of the best things about coming back after an absence is to feel my partners were showing they were happy I’m back, and that some have really worked hard on improving their skills. And then there are new faces on the scene.
But also, there’s a sense of urgency: I must dance while I can. While I have the opportunity, and while I’m physically able to, and while I’m still enough in demand. I swear I’ll never again take for granted a decent tanda.
Recovering from a tango drought of 6 and a half MONTHS of practically zero tango. There were 3 practicas of 2 hours each with a rather low level of dancers. That’s it. I finally get back to my ‘tango happy place’, arrange my year’s worth of travel dates to be able to be at the tango events i prioritize, just to get knocked out with a 2-week flu, losing a bundle of money on hotel and festival pass I couldn’t use in an expensive city (Basel), but worse was to miss an opportunity to dance with a number of my top top top favorite partners from far away. The following weeks were a slow start, rebuilding energy and muscles that had been neglected (note to self for next time, foot muscles wearing heels while leaning into a +1 or +2 posture are quick to go), plus some other significant non-tango life events that I won’t bore you with.
But all good now. I went to another of my favorite events, the fabulous tango music festival in Innsbruck last weekend and this weekend there was also plenty cool stuff going on locally. One of the best things about coming back after an absence is to feel my partners were showing they were happy I’m back, and that some have really worked hard on improving their skills. And then there are new faces on the scene.
But also, there’s a sense of urgency: I must dance while I can. While I have the opportunity, and while I’m physically able to, and while I’m still enough in demand. I swear I’ll never again take for granted a decent tanda.
opendoor
Forum Master
The tango memory is very short. My experience as a lead is that after two months of absence, even your former regulars have forgotten you. As a leader, you always feel like you belong to the lowest caste.
Miradamiranda
Well-Known Member
Or they punish you for being away. But I also just experienced that some forgot they don’t dance with you. Two guys who normally ignored me just invited me. Maybe simply bad face memory.
TTanguero
Forum Master
I certainly haven't found that. I was off the floor for six months due to surgery and received an extremely warm welcome back when I returned.
opendoor
Forum Master
First of all, you are a likable person. However, the community has also invested in you and isn't about to give up on that invested capital so quickly. It’s different in my case: people don’t really expect much more from me, and back when I was active, I was generally labeled as selfish.
Sounds like an exception
I sometimes wonder if followers as a species have short memory
TTanguero
Forum Master
I mean, I'm a sample of one so can't judge, but own experience is described here:Sounds like an exception
Another delicious Feast, tasting all the sweeter after my absence
Arriving at the Feast always feels rather like coming home. It’s my favourite festival, and even for me it’s always filled with familiar faces. But the experience of arriving here this …
benlovejoy.blog
My very own milonga traspié, and the power of the three Ps
In tango, traspié refers to an interrupted step typically danced in milonga tandas – for which the literal definition is ‘to stumble.’ After six months off the dance floor, I got to enj…
benlovejoy.blog
JournalInTime
Forum Master
I've had absences for my father's prolonged illness and death (c. 6 months, and while I was able to dance in his city, I was not at home), plus a couple of rounds of surgery, a serious illness, and a serious injury of my own. Tango friends were almost aggressively eager to dance with me when I returned to the milonga. In fact, I've never had a "Who are you again?" moment in my 13+ years of tango.
For that matter, although I don't travel much, there are tangueras I see once a year, when they visit for an annual event. Despite traveling the world and dancing with hundreds of partners, they find me, remember details about my life, and dance with me – even remembering how I embrace and dance. Then, poof, it's 12 months until the next tanda.
I strongly suspect that whether or not this is your experience has nothing to do with tango and everything to do with your personality. I engage deeply and share early. If somebody else like that comes along, we're acting like best friends after an hour and we're aware of major details of each other's lives after two. There are plenty of tangueras I know almost as well as my girlfriend or my mother, and 6- to 12-month absences don't change that . . . but I could say the same for non-tango people, like my friend from 40 years ago who just moved here and picked up as though it were yesterday.
It probably helps that I'm a social-media user. I "add" and exchange gossip and news with high-school and university friends, family friends, former coworkers, people I've met at trade shows, neighbors from several past addresses, and of course everyone I meet through tango. Even if I don't or can't see them for months or years, we remain in touch.
It might also have a cultural dimension. I'm from Atlantic Canada, or as we say, "Down East." Easterners are famed for hospitality . . . I grew up with total strangers being invited to parties, and visitors knocking on the door without warning. Everybody hangs out informally in the kitchen, and there are few taboos in conversation. Where I live and dance now, Québec, the culture is similar – kitchen parties, talking about anything and everything, always having an extra chair for one more person. I realize that there are more formal or staid cultures (or demographics within cultures) where this might not be how things are done, but I've never experienced those myself.
JournalInTime
Forum Master
Doesn't fit my experience at all. In fact, I am much more likely not to recognize and to forget the name of a follower, and in effect to forget they exist, than a follower is to do that to me! Far too many times, I've had women I don't recognize emerge from a crowd at the milonga and say things like, "Hi, JiT! Remember me? I'm Katerina from Athens. We danced once in 2018, at that ball in the old theatre. How is your cat? Did your mom's surgery go okay?" They'll remember my cat's name, where my mother lives, and so on. Meanwhile, I'm there looking stunned.I sometimes wonder if followers as a species have short memory
My experience is based also on interacting with the followers. When I recount what they said about a certain leader a while back and how they have changed their opinion now, they draw a blank and can’t recall. Also I have seen leaders try to ask them and them saying the leader wasn’t interested. I can remember when they danced with a certain leader but can’t remember it. Or that certain leader was present at certain milonga. My list is very long.
I had people on and off tango remember my name. That does surprise me. However that is about the name and not the dance.
There are certainly women who remember. But they happen to be smaller subset. I am also excluding those that are dance friends. Saying dance friends remember you (generic you) is like saying your mom remembers you. Okay that is an exaggeration but you get the drift.
P.S. - I am not a social media user. It does make a difference when you are in touch with a person. I don’t consider one on one communication tools to be social media like say FB or IG are. I also noticed remarkable difference in degree of real world socialization in pre and post social media world.
I sympathise, happens to me all the time too (minus the cat)
JournalInTime
Forum Master
I haven't had cats since 2018, which makes it all the weirder for me . . . "Uh, which cat?"
More seriously, it happened twice in just the past 6 days. And this was with people with whom I am not in contact via social media, and who are not "tango friends." They are people I invited to dance one time and didn't even get a name from. If this isn't universal, well, there must be a major personality or cultural factor at work.