My First Tango Week Milonga

So, I went to my first tango week milonga, the Opening free milonga last night. It was definitely an experience. Serena, Andreas, and I carpooled up, and Martin met us there later after his class and I rode home with him at midnight. There weren't too many people there when we got there at 7:15pm, so we leisurely looked at shoes from the vendors on display. I really liked the shoes from the guy from Miami, but his smallest shoe, was alas too big for my foot :( It was almost perfect except being a bit too loose. It was a very soft, cushy black shoe, very comfortable, and only $89! The Comme Il Faut were $160 and while they had several size 4 shoes, they were either close-toed, or way too tight for my fat toes, or highly uncomfortable. So... no shoes for me! Perhaps some other vendors will have some shoes that fit my feet, otherwise I'll just have to wait for our trip to Buenes Aires in September.

It was kind of weird seeing everyone I'd met over the last 7 months in the tango scene. I was actually very nervous in the afteroon beforehand, so I couldn't even eat dinner. I had a liquid dinner. But then seeing Serena and Andreas eased my nerves a bit, and once I got there and kept seeing familiar faces every two minutes, it was comforting. Some of the early people I ran into were Ed, Nora, Jerry, Francis and Gina, and Ricardo. Francis and I had two warm-up tandas, and then I danced with Vijay and Ricardo. One thing I'd do differently next year is wear shoes which I have danced in before and am comfortable dancing in. I don't really have a pair of shoes like that right now, which is why I'm so wanting to find new tango shoes. I'd been wearing some street shoes for the past few months, but they aren't very supportive, especially to my ankle, so I think those are worn out and past their time. My old tango shoes, which I ended up wearing at the end of the night are closed-toed so they keep bruising my last two pinky toes. I decided to wear my new Comme Il Faut shoes for most of the night, but I'd only danced a couple songs in them during practica prior, and the bottoms were pretty slippery from being new leather. So, I didn't feel I had a very "on" night dancing. Also, the vibe was kinda crazy weird. The place is so huge! We were all getting hungry around 830pm so Serena, Andreas and I went downstairs to look for food and ended up at the bar having some tasty spring roles and gaining some sustenance. When we were done, we went upstairs and our eyes widened as we approached the Ballroom and saw the floor covered with maybe hundreds of people... not like it was when we'd left an hour earlier. Wow!

Martin arrived soon after, and we ended up dancing most of the rest of the night together. By then it was super crazy jam packed, and I'd never experienced so many collisions in one night before. There were just people everywhere. Every 30 seconds or so I'd hear Martin curse from under his breath, a "f***" or "sh**"! It was very, very cramped, and some people who weren't even dancing would walk right into us on the dancefloor! I didn't have any bad tandas that night, except for my general issues with my shoes and not feeling "on" last tonight. I got to dance with all good dancers: Francis, Vijay, Ricardo, Sergei, Andreas, Martin, and one or two people I didn't know but were really good as well.

Definitely, if I go next year I'll arrive early again, but probably leave early once it gets super crowded. So, I'm no longer a tango week virgin :) I look forward to taking Sundays classes at Tango Weekend with Martin. Again, this will be a really new experience for me and I hope, if my feet will last we can do all of the classes that day, and perhaps there will be other shoe vendors with size 4 shoes! *fingers crossed*

I keep thinking that today is Saturday since it is a holiday, so I keep thinking I have conflicting activities tonight. But it's just a really long, nice weekend! One of my co-workers has got me hooked on my first Korean drama series, Save The Last Dance For Me, so Martin and I stayed up late watching more of that last night.

Well, I'm off to my parents for BBQ, and then going over to Martin's to see fireworks!