[Tango-L] Smoking section at a milonga in Buenos Aires

[Nina Pesochinsky]

Hi, Lucia, Caroline, and everyone on the list,

I think that both of you are correct with your 
assessment of the multi-faceted phenomena of tango.

Something has occurred to me as I was reading 
these posts.  I suddenly understood, once again, 
how brutal we women are.  We get on a public list 
of a 1000 people or so, such as this one, and 
begin to dissect in abstraction the dance 
experiences that we have in regard to the AGES OF MEN that we dance with!!!

If the men did that, we would have been mortally 
wounded!  Just imagine what would happen if some 
men wrote on this list: "I like dancing with the 
ladies in their 50s and 60s, but sometimes it is 
boring.  They have arthritis and can't move as 
well as they did when they were younger."?!  I am 
sure that vivid pictures are passing through your 
minds right now about the possible consequences...

Gentlemen, you are real gentlemen because we have 
never heard such things from you.   It just 
proves that one should never expect gentlemanly behavior from the women!

On another note,  dance and dancers have a lot to 
offer.  Men and women who cannot move because of 
their age are still able to embrace their 
partners. Whjo cares about the age?!  You can 
just stand there to the music in a gorgeous 
embrace, if nothing else is possible.

On the other hand, if embrace 'like you mean it" 
is not possible, then there better be some nice 
moves, conversation, something...  There needs to 
be something (no tongues in ears, please).  If 
there is nothing, then reading a book might be the a much better thing to do.

Basically, we don't dance with abstract 
partners.  These are people, unique and very 
different from each other.  Their skills and 
limitations are both a part of the experience and 
we choose to share that experience with them voluntarily.

I propose that we choose people as the most 
important part of the experience, and not 
sacrifice them to what we have in our heads as a "good' dance experience.

Warmest regards to all,

Nina






At 04:46 PM 11/20/2006, you wrote:
>Hi Lucia,
>
>donºt put words in my mouth that i never said. i 
>said i was a BIT bored, not bored to death.
>
>I do love dancing with many older gentlemen and 
>I love how expressive they are. Just read the post I wrote last week.
>
>I was speaking specifically of men now in their 
>70´s and 80´s who can barely move due to being 
>handicapped by aging joints. They are getting 
>even too old to be able to express physically 
>what they are feeling musically. That was all I said.
>
>Just as I love dancing with men in their 
>fifties, forties, thirties and twenties. They 
>all have something to bring to the floor. To say 
>that only milongueros know how to dance tango 
>properly is getting a bit stale and outdated and 
>probably offensive to all argentine dancers who 
>are not older than 70. To say such a thing means 
>completley eliminating all the younger 
>generations who had learned from those 
>milongueros. That is the kind of blanket 
>statement that I am not appreciative of, itºs 
>like saying all black men and only black men can 
>play basketball. Itºs bullshit and itºs 
>narrowminded and it's offensive. I've danced 
>with some milongueros who couldnºt dance worth a 
>damn and their technique was lacking even if they feel moved by the music.
>
>Iºve danced with some indigenous dancers in 
>their twenties who were incredible and dancing 
>with them made me feel as though I were flying, 
>not at high speed but coasting through the 
>skies, dipping here and there. It was so much 
>fun and not to be confused at all with nuevo tango.
>Why does one must always associate youth with 
>athletics and acrobatics? Thatºs not true at 
>all. yes, some do like being more athletic and 
>some like good old fashioned social tango. Some 
>of the younger men made me think of how 
>milongueros must have been like back in the day 
>when they were young enough to do more than what 
>they are physically capable of doing now.
>
>Next time, please read what I actually said 
>before jumping to conclusions about what I never said at all.
>
>Caroline
>
>
>
>Secondly,
>
>----Original Message Follows----
>From: Lucia <curvasreales at yahoo.com.ar>
>To: Caroline Polack <runcarolinerun at hotmail.com>, tango-l at mit.edu
>Subject: Re: [Tango-L] Smoking section at a milonga in Buenos Aires
>Date: Mon, 20 Nov 2006 17:29:40 +0000 (GMT)
>
>Caroline,
>
>   In defence of old age one may say that those elderly dancers, who bored
>you to death,  listen and dance THE music and 
>the spirit of the  lyrics ( for they don't have 
>to really listen to words know by heart.)  To do that
>one does not need many steps. And if you'll get 
>lucky,  one of these geezers will whisper words 
>of lost love in your ear while  dancing....
>
>   Lucia
>
>   PS Unless of course you prefer the athletics :->
>
>Caroline Polack <runcarolinerun at hotmail.com> 
>escribió:  Not to put down Lo De Celia but I was there recently. I am sure the
>milongueros were very good 5 or 10 years ago but they are now in their
>seventies, perhaps eighties and as such, showing the effects of their age.
>There were very very few men younger than that at that milonga. It seems a
>friendly space to be sure, and the people congenial but I did find myself
>getting a bit bored doing the same six steps over and over again with men
>too old to bend their arthritic or rheumatic joints. I found myself wanting
>to dance only with men in their sixties or younger because they are young
>enough to dance without being hampered or stiffened by age.
>
>I know Janis likes to say that the only real tango is the milonguero style
>but honestly, tango is not restricted to just six steps or to men who are
>beginning to be quite limited physically because of their age. Milongueros
>of times past are now getting very old and as such, are no longer able to
>put as much into dancing as they could once. Would have liked to be here ten
>years ago and see what they were like then. Whatºs very important to
>remember is that milonguero style evolved from two things: lack of space of
>milongas and age. If Argentine Tango is only about doing six steps in total,
>it would not have been as popular as it is now. Iºve heard that at practicas
>where there is much more space, that there is more variety in tango steps.
>And when I look at movies of tango of even only 20 years ago, Iºm seeing far
>more variety of Argentine social tango that I see now.
>
>I hope that when Iºm in my seventies and eighties, that I will still be
>going out dancing like the men at Lo de Celia or at Salon La Argentina but I
>wouldnºt expect the younger generation to be saying that only people of my
>age can dance the tango well for I would be too old to be able to do what I
>could once. Not even the world's best dancers of any dance style will be
>able to dance as well as they did once, itºs not possible. Instead, what we
>could hope for is that milongueros will pass down to the younger generations
>the beautiful feeling of a good embrace and expressive musicality and hope
>that the tango of times past will continue to be the tango of times to come.
>
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