Drive

My Japanese hair stylist recently moved her salon downtown.  Since she is the only one who could make my bowl cut more like Mia Wallace and less like Edmund, Duke of Edinburgh (or, at the very least, an acceptable compromise between the two - I have tragic hair), I followed. 

I have been with the same hair stylist for so long that we have run out of things to talk about.  Or so I thought.  Traffic that day had been messed up by the heavy rain - but Man Yung still got me to the hair salon on time.  I was one of the only two customers that morning who didn't miss their hair appointment.

"Did you drive?" asked my hair stylist.

"No, Man Yung did," I replied.  And added: "I would drive, but Man Yung won't let me!  He claims that the way I drive scares his pants off!"

"Oh my god, my husband is exactly the same way!"  She mimed gripping the dash with both hands and mimicked the stretchy long Munchavian face of pure terror.  "Whenever he is in the passenger's seat he is constantly going berserk and screaming, 'You're going too fast!  You're going too fast!"

"Tell me about it!  I never go above 10 over the speed limit, and yet Man Yung keeps on thinking I've floored it.  How about this one: Does your husband also think you are following too close?"

"Yeah, the other thing he screeches while I'm driving is, 'We're going to crash!  We're going to crash!'"

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I think men like to complain about the way women drive.  Man Yung likes to point out that one friend of ours goes from zero to sixty in two seconds - within school zones.  Another drives at exactly the speed limit in the fast lane (regardless of the honking and hollering of the drivers behind her) because the lane next to the curb 'is too bumpy'.  Yet another languorously waits for all left-traveling traffic to pass when turning left out of a private lane - with the back half of her car blocking all oncoming right-traveling traffic.  Road Rage? Everyone hates the 'Grey Power' lady.  And Tailgating?  Apparently the new international pastime of Womenkind.

Sorry to break the news to all you guys - statistics disprove all your "anecdotal evidence".  Women are actually safer drivers compared to men!  And don't women get lower car insurance premiums? (Yes they do)

But here again, the chorus of frightened men: "I saw your bad driving with my own two eyes!" 

Women are wonderful drivers - until that is, they are bombarded with the negative energy (and distracted by the high-pitched shrieks) of the freaked out men scrunched down next to them in the passenger's seat gnawing fretfully on all their nails.  I tell you, that kind of fear is contagious.  When Man Yung gets that way, it makes me so nervous he's lucky I don't wrap the car around the nearest stop sign. 

So chill out!  Give us women some trust.  Don't buy the stereotype.  After all, when you are driving - whether it's on the road or on the dance floor - WE trust YOU.  When we are dancing, we sometimes even close our eyes and hand ourselves over to your lead, body and soul. 

You have our trust - there is therefore no excuse for being an idiot driver.  This means that leaders should be extra careful to treat followers well on the dance floor.  No driving under the influence.  No going at a hundred above the speed limit.  No sudden braking or cutting into lanes.  No bumping into or elbowing other couples to shove them out of the way.  And for the acrobats among you - no wheelies, no burnouts, no bar-tricks, no hyperspins, no switchbacks... 

 No! No! No! No! No!

 
And everyone please, no tailgating!  You must leave sufficient space in between yourself and the next couple.  If the floor is uncrowded, this means lots and lots of space. The last thing you want to do is be all over the couple in front - when there are only two couples in the whole room.*

* That happened recently at one of the milongas we were at - we danced a whole tanda with this couple right on our tail.  It was midnight, and there were only two couples left, total, on the dance floor.  So annoying!  Then Man Yung had an idea.  He accelerated right around the room and started tailgating the guy who had been tailgating him.  Otherwise how else would that guy ever get it?

As for really crowded conditions - that is not an excuse to jam yourself right up against the people around you either (no matter how strong your urge to hump everyone around you).  At least one step's space in all directions around each couple (make this a half step in hyper-crowded Buenos Aires milongas) - left, right, forwards AND backwards* - is sacred space.   Don't step into it unless in a case of emergency.  Just like cars in a traffic jam, everyone should have a little wiggle room of safety. On the dance floor, it's in order so that couples could turn and do giros on the spot to wait for space to open up in front of them in the line of dance.  In traffic, it's just enough room to turn out and change lanes and perhaps even exit - especially if the traffic is backed up on the 401 from Mississauga until Windsor!

* Another dumb thing we've seen on the dance floor is when clueless leaders, having read some half-baked tango rulebook somewhere, dance right up behind another couple - and then look outraged when the other couple crashes into them when turning.  "You were stepping back!" they glare indignantly.  No silly, that was a turn.  And guess what?  You were tailgating. 

Tango Fear: A Pictorial Journey

I was going to send a sketch on a 3 x 5 inch piece of paper to Kerstein Klein for consideration for her "What are you afraid of" project. 

But then, I discovered I had way too much to be afraid of.  O wonderful, beautiful, magical tango...O spinning, soul-sucking maelstrom of paralyzing fear.  Many a time I have woken up in the middle of the night, terrified and screaming, in the midst of a dream of a milonga with horrible dancers, bad music, and couples dancing exactly like one another...and I couldn't for the life of me find the exit!

So, without further ado, I present to you:

IRENE'S WORST FEARS IN TANGO: THE ILLUSTRATED GUIDE TO IRENE'S PERSONAL TANGO HELL

 

I'm afraid that once the milongueros have all gone to heaven, the only way women can experience tango is by dancing with nutty underage taxi dancers who only want to dance Nuevo.

I'm afraid that my parents will take up tango and then I will have to find other milongas to go to so I won't be embarrassed by their fishnet stockinged, rose biting, sequined fringed, high-kicking low-dipping disco ball ballroom bopping antics.  Yes, my mom has dyed her hair purple.  No, she doesn't look like Dame Edna - it would be a lot funnier and less excruciating if she did.

I'm afraid that Man Yung will accidentally get his limbs bitten off by a swarm of rabid kittens and then, until eternity on weekends, instead of dancing, we will be watching every "Die Hard" movie in existence.  Over and over and over again.

 I'm afraid that all the Tango DJs will stop playing popular and danceable music just because they want to be clever and "different from the rest".  They will make us listen to tanda after tanda of either Canyengues or "Alternative".  This makes me want to kill myself.

I'm afraid that Man Yung will find Fabio so alluring, he will run off with him on a horse into the setting sun or something.

A cameo appearance

Sally Potter, director and star of "The Tango Lesson", posted on her blog about watching three couples dance an exhibition at Nino Bien one night:


At a milonga called ‘Nino Bien’ that we visited on our last night, three couples performed at 2am (normal timing for such things in Buenos Aires, the most night-oriented city I know). The first couple performed with all the rapid fire athletic skill we have come to expect from ‘Nuevo tango’ or in most of the virtuoso tango shows. It was impressive but kept one at a distance, the distance of admiration. Then a tall, thin, older man affectionately known as ‘Flacco’ (the thin one) performed his speciality, an agile milonga, fast rhythmic and old school. It was touching and impressive in a different way.

Finally an elderly couple slowly walked out onto the floor. The stooped man began by bending down and gently kissing his short plump wife on the lips. Then they began a delicate, subtle, un-showy tango together, saturated with tenderness, with pauses and silences full of ‘waiting’ (a compliment by older dancers in the tango world where frantic activity is frowned on as an inability to truly listen to the phrasing in the music.) Tears streamed down my face as I watched their tiny, delicate steps, the gentle flow of their movement, the embodiment of the sad beauty of age and experience, a life shared, bodies that have suffered in nameless ways and now transcend their difficulties with beauty.

When they finished the crowded hall erupted in applause, a collective roar of approval. As the couple left the floor I could see that the man was struggling for breath, a longstanding condition of some kind.

Nights like these induce the love for Buenos Aires that tango lyrics express. The city somehow feels like a long-lost companion, an ageing lover…yes, my darling Buenos Aires, you feel like singing, I may leave you but |I will surely return.

Great piece of evocative, nostalgic writing....I wonder who was the elderly couple who made the cameo appearance (and made Sally cry)?  And when can we expect the movie to come out?

Here they are performing at Glorias Argentinas last weekend: