The Tango-L mailing list archive
Digest from 18 May 1999
to 19 May 1999
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Date: Wed, 19 May 1999 03:00:07 -0400
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Subject: TANGO-L Digest - 18 May 1999 to 19 May 1999
There are 5 messages totalling 282 lines in this issue.
Topics of the day:
1. Tango in Geneva/Zurich
2. Tangopolis: wrong address??
3. Older, plain looking, excellent milongueras
4. (fwd) Tangopolis: wrong address??
5. American women and salons [WAS Re: Older...milongueras]
Date: Tue, 18 May 1999 10:34:47 -0400
From: Nitin Kibe <NKibe @IFC.ORG>
Subject: Tango in Geneva/Zurich
Greetings, List.
I hope to be in Geneva from June 6 to 23, with possible trips to Zurich on
weekends. I would appreciate any information on tango events in and around G/Z.
I have checked some of the websites but I am not sure whether they are very
current.
Thanks in anticipation and regards to all.
Nitin Kibe
Date: Tue, 18 May 1999 17:01:28 +0200
From: pstarm <petra.starmans @SPECTRAWEB.CH>
Subject: Tangopolis: wrong address??
Hello list
Can anybody tell me, where the connection to the Tangopolis-List has gone
to? www.daistech.com/tangopolis gives a server error....was the page
moved?
Thanks for your kind help...
Petra
petra starmans
tobelwegli 67
5616 meisterschwanden
switzerland
tel/fax: +41 56 667 11 46
e-mail: petra.starmans @spectraweb.ch
Date: Tue, 18 May 1999 16:40:14 -0600
From: Naomi Bennett <Naomiben @SWBELL.NET>
Subject: Older, plain looking, excellent milongueras
I just returned from my first trip to BA. As a woman it is a very
different experience from the men. I could only ask to dance with my eyes.
If the men were not interested, they didn't look back. Since I'm American,
this was very limiting. The men wanted to know that you will make them
look good on the floor so strangers are not asked much. It helped to
attend a class before a milonga so that some of the men knew that they
could ask me, they had already danced with me.
My blond hair and blue eyes didn't help. I'm 40ish, good looking but not
an attention getter. All the older men preferred to ask the 20ish women.
I did get some dancing but not like in the states. However, the men were
much better dancers in BA but each had really different marks with their
leads. Each partner was a challenge for the first dance. Thank goodness
they dance in sets of 3 or 4.
I found that the practicas and classes before the milongas were much better
for me as a woman to get to dance. The traditions at the milonga of
dancing "looking good and safe" goes against the newcomer/visitors to B.A.
Every milonga plays almost the very same music. It makes it easier to be a
"good dancing" dancer if you dance the same music almost every night. The
regular milonga dancers that were there every night had a reputation to
keep up among theyselves. On friday night at La Estrella, the classes are
very large (over 80) but over 85% of the men didn't stay for the milonga.
I believe it was because they didn't think they were good enough to dance
later in a more formal setting.
One 70ish B.A. woman was asked to dance every night and afternoon by all
aged men. She was an excellent dancer and she knew everyone. She was a
widow and spent all her time dancing. I saw her almost every night at
every milonga and many times in the afternoon at the Ideal. She was always
on the floor. I recommend the Ideal in the afternoons for a less formal
milonga where you can get asked more.
The foreign men I met of all ages, also asked mostly the younger dancers
too, so it wasn't just the BA milongueros. What can I say, young and
pretty are a winning combination.=20
I didn't bring all of my sexiest clothes on this first trip because I
didn't know what was expected. Ladies, bring your most outrageous clothes.
Anything goes there. I saw women on two separate nights where they wore
their fancy slips out like it was a dress! The dress can't be too short or
too tight. Older women with large hips and stomaches still wore it tight.
They showed them off. Whatever the assets, they advertised them.
Saturday milongas are only for couples, singles stay home.=20
As for a "deep tango" experience, I did have two older men do the dirty
tango with me when they knew that I was American. There seems to be a
world-wide attitude that since we are independent, we are loose too. This
short 70ish man let me know in no uncertain terms that he had an erection.
The other was a bit more outrageous. He did a tight grind with a strong
arm grip around my waist and talked dirty in Spanish. I didn't understand
the words but I got the meaning. I avoid his eyes for the next 2 nights.
This was not the majority of the male dancers, just two. Ah, the Latins.
I was remindered by a man from Miami, that it was only a 3 minute dance.
What can I say? =20
However, many of the older women did do a lot of sitting, waiting to be
asked. This is a tradition I would like to see changed. =20
>On 05/04/99 at 08:06 PM, Melinda Bates <tangerauna @earthlink.net> wrote:
>
>> He was just back from BA and I asked if he danced with a lot of
>> wonderful milongueras. He replied that yes the dancing was wonderful,
but he always follows his father's advice: "Ask the old, plain ones to
>> dance. The young and pretty ones don't have to be good dancers to get
the attention. The old ones are better dancers." He said this works well
for him, and the dancing was great.
>
Colin Brace wrote on May 6th:
>I concur, there are usually a fair number of experienced milongueras in
>the salons of BsAs patiently waiting to being asked, the majority of
>their male counterparts involved in other pursuits, such as buzzing like
>flies around the lastest blue-eyed, blonde-haired, tight-skirted arrival
>from Europe, imploring her for an appointment to "tomar un caf=E9" with
>the "logical" progression thereafter to the local hotel transitorio for
>a "deep" tango experience.
>
>Except of course on Saturday evenings, when everyone is on good
>behavior.
>>--
> Colin Brace <cbrace @lim.nl>
> Amsterdam
Date: Tue, 18 May 1999 22:34:48 GMT
From: Ed Loomis <edl @WCO.COM>
Subject: (fwd) Tangopolis: wrong address??
On Tue, 18 May 1999 17:01:28 +0200, pstarm
<petra.starmans @SPECTRAWEB.CH> wrote:
>Hello list
>
>Can anybody tell me, where the connection to the Tangopolis-List has =
gone
>to? www.daistech.com/tangopolis gives a server error....was the page
>moved?
>
>Thanks for your kind help...
>
>Petra
>
Hello list,
I can't find Tangopolis anymore either. I hope we didn't lose it.
Ed Loomis
--=20
"All that is needed for evil to prosper,
is for good men to do nothing."
Edmund Burke
Date: Tue, 18 May 1999 19:34:40 +0000
From: Carol Shepherd <shepherd @ARBORLAW.COM>
Subject: American women and salons [WAS Re: Older...milongueras]
Naomi Bennett wrote:
>
> I just returned from my first trip to BA. As a woman it is a very
> different experience from the men. I could only ask to dance with my eyes.
> If the men were not interested, they didn't look back. Since I'm American,
> this was very limiting. The men wanted to know that you will make them
> look good on the floor so strangers are not asked much.
I don't think this is because you are blond, American and 40ish, or
because men are pigs ;)
Yes, it's very limiting. But I think this has more to do with the
social habits of all people in group settings (even activities where
there is no dancing). The problem is called "breaking into the room" or
you complain that it was "a tough room to break." Women were
complaining of it all the way back in Jane Austen's time! When you are
a newcomer to a social group and the majority are already familiar, they
view you almost as if you are a guest in their living room or their
private club. You are on their turf in the salon, it takes a while for
people to watch and evaluate and accept you, usually a number of
appearances sequentially at the same gathering. That's unfortunately
not possible if you are only in town for a week. Of course the men want
to watch you dance and decide whether skill levels, height, style, etc
are compatible before asking. Of course they will jump on the young
delicious nubile women, particularly if they are married. Of course the
jerks will try to take advantage of the fact that the new women don't
know about their reputation in that room for bad behavior. Of course
you are in Latin America, you can't ask the men, you have to use eye
contact and wait. Of course it's not fair. Who said life had to be
fair, it's not fair, get used to it, so make some lemonade out of those
lemons! (My high school English teacher's favorite mantra.) When in
Rome, do as Romans do. All over South America women wear revealing,
form fitting clothing. American women look like they are wearing
shopping sacks by comparison and we really suffer unless we go for it
(which can be fun!). One needs to embrace one's feminine form.
The fastest way to break a room is to attend a dance with a 'chaperone'
or mentor, someone who is already accepted there and can "vouch" for
you. When I first started going to Parabox here in Detroit (Latin club)
I got twice as many dances if I sat with ladies from Argentina and
Colombia. If they said no and sat out a dance, the men would turn and
ask me. (I have no pride--I'll be second choice, to get myself
started.) When I was in Spain alone I went into a club, found a lady
who seemed to be alone and who got asked three times in a row, went up
and asked could I please sit with her, I was new to town and didn't know
any dancers who could come to the club with me. I was lucky, she was
very nice (and understood the problem)! She called over two men and
they each danced with me once only, as they were obliged to her to
do--but then, I got seen, and different men asked me off and on all
night. I would have asked that 70'ish lady at la Ideal if I were you :)
If you don't speak a word of the language, use pantomime and at least
get your first name across by pointing at yourself, and be generally
helpless and charming and someone will take pity and adopt you.
I always dance with the first guy who asks so that men see that I can
dance OK. This comes across even if he is not good. And I smile a lot,
I want him to think I'm having the most fun in the world!! even if I'm
not, because I want to dance again, and men want to dance with women who
look like they are fun to dance with. This is even more important if
you don't speak the language, because that can be very intimidating to
men.
American women have the 'reputation' they have, not because all men
think they are loose and will do anything, but because the men know they
can take advantage of your fuzzy knowledge about what is socially and
culturally acceptable behavior. If I get "manhandled" as you describe I
give one warning of "no mas!" like I mean it and then try to stick out
the song and not walk off the floor unless it's very gross and crude (I
have walked off before). I always adjust out of milonguero frame and
take back as much arm's length space as I can, which is the universal
communication for "this man is being extremely rude." I don't worry
what other men think when they see this because they have already seen
the jerk do it with a different woman every time he's there. It is
important to look like you do not enjoy or condone it.
Many Americans don't accept these things about the culture and the
social life. They think they can be assimilated immediately as part of
paying a cover charge, like there's a constitutional right to
participate in a social activity with strangers and receive the same
level of satisfaction and enjoyment as everyone else present. When you
travel to a new city and you are going out in a true "social" dance
setting (as opposed to the "pseudo-social" world in the US of dance
studios, dance instruction, dance competitions, coordinated dance
events, and dance aficionados), you can't even assume you will dance
once, on any given night out. I usually give a place three times on the
same night with the same crowd, before I reject it because 'it was a
tough room to break.'
I agree that lessons before dances are very strategic for single women
picking up new partners, the men in the lesson watch you and the ones
that do stay afterwards already know what your skill level is and may
approach you if you smile at them a couple of times.
Thanks for listening,
--
Carol Ruth Shepherd
shepherd @arborlaw.com
End of TANGO-L Digest - 18 May 1999 to 19 May 1999
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