Could it really be that my last post was over 10 years ago? Gosh, time sure does fly. In case you are wondering, I left San Francisco in 2011 and moved to the East Coast. I love it here and don't see myself moving back any time soon. This is home now. I even have a dog.
When I first moved here, I did some tango in NYC, got fed up and dropped it for a while, but picked it up again as a social calendar filler in CT. I think my relationship with tango is much healthier now.
Now, back to the usual programming...
Saturday, October 22, 2022.
Buenos Aires
The flight from JFK to EZE was uneventful. I ended up flying on Aerolineas Argentinas since the price was a screaming deal at a little over $700 versus $1100 and up for United or American. I don't know if this is true for all of Aeorlineas's planes, but the seats felt smaller than United or American. Lots of Argentineans on the flight. The thing about this flight though is that it arrives super early (4am! no typo), so your host/hotel will need advanced notice and you should definitely request an early check in.
I sailed through passport control and picked up my luggage in record time, so I was ready to be picked up by 5am, but had arranged for Dante to pick me up at 7am so I could check in to my airbnb at 8am, as any earlier would have been obnoxious.
I always book my round trip airport transfers with Dante since I've been his client for the last 15 years, and I always arrange for him to provide change of my USD for ARS so I can hit the ground running and not have to worry about finding a place to change money, etc. He can change any denomination of USD$XXXX as long as you give him advance notice. Also, crisp clean $100 bills with no ink marking on them are required, lest he reject them. Blue rate currency exchange at the time of this writing is 1 USD = 285 ARS.
Dante picked me up as usual from EZE a little earlier than 7am, so we made it to Villa Crespo, where I would be staying, quite early. So we decided to go for coffee. Dante, being a driver, brought me to have coffee at the gas station, which I didn't know, but quite a few gas stations have a seating area where one can have coffee and eat some medialunas or other small pastries, or sometimes even sandwiches. So that's what we did, even though I don't drink coffee. But I decided to be a good sport and we both had cafe con leche y three medialunas (or equivalents) for ARS$1500 (=less than USD$5) total for both of us.
My airbnb is in Villa Crespo, just a few blocks away from where the Intensivos will be. Work was a good sport and will let me work from the flip side, as the hours work out fine and I did offer to adjust them depending on the workflow (we are super busy the next two weeks while I am here thanks to earnings season). So of course the first thing I did was check out the internet, and make sure my work situation was satisfactory, which it thankfully was. Because otherwise, if I blow it and can't function as if I were back at home, then any future requests to do this would be declined, I am sure.
I didn't sleep well on the plane, but was not tired enough for a nap yet, so after confirming that everything was OK with the internet, I went to the local Coto, only a block away, and got some groceries, as well as the local fruit/veggie market.
After that, I knew I had to rest, as I wanted to go out later to take some lessons at the Escuela Mundial de Tango de Gabriela Elias. So that's what I did.
I originally wanted to take all three Saturday seminars, but though the spirit was willing, the flesh was weak, and I didn't feel rested enough until the last seminar, which is taught by one of my favorite teachers in BsAs, Turco Suaya.
The school has moved as is now on the first floor of 656 Florida, so much easier to get to than at the top of the Galerias Pacifico, where the school was previously located.
Seminario on D'Arienzo and Di Sarli
taught by Turco Suaya, ARS $1600 (=$5.61, my gosh what a bargain!)
We began with some footwork exercises, then incorporated some contra body movements with them. Then we worked with the music of Di Sarli. Forgive me as I am rusty and didn't have my notebook and am writing this from one-day old memory (and I ain't getting any younger either), so honestly don't remember the specific step we worked on. Though we did switch later to D'Arienzo, which of course was super fun. That step included a mini volcada.
I had a great time in class, as I always do. Maestro Suaya is particularly good at teaching musicality and is super passionate about it. The class had some of the same students as when I was last here in 2019, so obviously he has a very loyal and dedicated following.
After class I was famished, so I had dinner at La Casona Del Nonno, a parrilla restaurant in the shopping area at Lavalle 823. I absolutely adore their Patagonian Lamb, so always try to fit in a dinner here. If you like or love lamb, you should definitely try it. It's nothing like anything I've ever had in the US. And only set me back ARS $6200 (ARS $7000 with tip = $24.56), and of course it was delicious.
Back on the Subte (my blue SUBE card still worked, still had pesos on it, but I still topped it up again. Trips are ARS $42 = USD $0.15) to the Malabia stop, even though Dorrego is closer. I wanted to walk around a bit more to get the lay of the land.
I passed by Brozziano, a chain empanada place, and couldn't believe my eyes when I saw that the empanadas were only ARS $100 (=USD $0.35). I had never seen empanadas so cheap! I wasn't hungry after being a total fattykins and snarffling up all that lamb, but I was curious and the financial risk was minimal. So I got six (2 beef, 2 hot beef, 2 chicken), which set me back all of ARS $600 (=USD$2.11).
Back at the airbnb, they went straight into the fridge and I took a shower and then crashed. Because after such a long day, no sleep on the flight, a tango lesson, a delicious but gigantic lamb meal, I was exhausted and slept extremely well.
Sunday, October 23
I woke up early, and decided to check in on work since I am little anxious about things going well. Sure enough, there was some issue with the VPN, so I couldn't log in properly. This has happened before, though in the US, so I figured it was just some glitch. I tried rebooting but that didn't change anything. So I just gave it a rest and went on to have breakfast of the local yogurt (important to repopulate the gut with the local good bacteria as the water in BsAs is very chlorinated. So totally safe to drink from the tap, but you DO need to repopulate your gut bacteria) and two of the Brozziano empanadas, which did not disappoint even though mine were cold since they had been refrigerated. The empanadas are baked, not fried, and had a very nice dough to filling ratio, and the fillings were delicious. So thumbs up for an easy, cheap, quick snack from Brozziano!
As I was already planning on going to El Beso in the afternoon for the Milonga and lesson beforehand at 2pm. There were many hours before then, and I didn't want to go to the San Telmo Antiques Fair since I have already been several times, I decided to scroll through the airbnb experiences to see if anything looked good.
I decided to take the Mate experience, since it was recommended to me by a fellow adventurer on another airbnb experience. And lucky for me, it was just a 20 minute walk away! So I signed up 90 minutes before it was supposed to start, and had a leisurely time of getting ready and strolling over.
airbnb mate experience at Mate & Co.
This was a super fun event. I had tried mate on my first trip in 2007 and thought it tasted like a very strong tea made of dirty grass. So I wasn't a big fan, and hadn't tried it since. The event was good and I recommend it. Even though it didn't foster any type of huge love for mate, I do feel comfortable and confident knowing how to prepare and drink it if I had to.
Off to the subte and El Beso, which is right outside the Callo subte stop.
El Beso
lesson beforehand + milonga ARS $500 (=USD $1.75, a shocking bargain considering the teacher of the lesson).
teacher: Daniel Nacucchio and I believe but am not quite sure, his partner Cristina Sosa (hard to tell since she wasn't wearing her usual stage makeup that I see her in on YouTube).
Maestra started the lesson with various footwork exercises, and then for the Followers doing the turn in just three steps, so forward step, side step, and back step to begin and end in front of the leader. The trick to doing this is to make the forward step and back step cross steps across the body, not just open forward or open back steps, which would require 4 steps to do a complete turn. So follower's should use cross steps (forward cross step, open side step very wide, back cross step to end up in front of the leader). We drilled this with the leaders standing in the center and the follower going around him in three steps.
Then she called Maestro and he taught the leaders' footwork. Back cross step tight against the other foot, pivoting in the center, to end with the feet in back cross tight against the other foot. There are places where you can widen the feet a little and bring them back together to accommodate the pivot either stylistically or because you need to accommodating parts of your body. Leaders feet during his back cross initiation should be more parallel and not perpendicular (so no open/bow legged knees).
Next, we put this together with the leader doing whatever his body needed to do so that when he puts his feet in the back cross position, he leads the follower to initiate her turn doing a forward cross step to the side he has opened up since he did a back cross step, which makes room for her to step. So as he does a left foot back cross, the follower does a left foot forward step around the leader across her body. Usual turn technique applies, so her foot should be angled so that she can step around the leader and pivot easier.
We drilled this on the left side and the right so. Very important that the Leader remember that his step is a back cross, not a forward cross.
To this we added the usual forward steps for the leaders, back steps for the follower into the usual cross.
The porteno I partnered with in class appreciated our partnership, and he was happen that when the class ended he (we!) eventually got it.
The milonga was just OK for me. I got a couple of tandas with some local portenos, but basically sat out the rest of the time. Still, I was lucky to attend since I didn't make a reservation, but that was one of the perks of taking the class beforehand. The folks who made reservations got seats in the first rows of the dance floor and outside sections of the second row, so much easier to cabaceo from there. Those who didn't have reservations were seated at whatever tables were left in the second row, so more difficult to cabaceo and get onto and off of the dance floor from there.
I really contemplated hiring a taxi dancer if I go to some more milongas on this trip based on this experience.
Since I was tired of sitting around and watching the dancers (who were very good, a lot seemed like visitors rather than portenos), I decided to leave.
Off to the Callo subte I went. I passed by Costumbres, another chain that had empanadas even cheaper at only ARS$95 (=USD $0.33!), which of course I had to try! So I got one beef and one chicken. They were both OK, baked, with good filling to dough ratio, but I liked the filling at Brazzino better. Still, the convenience and price cannot be beat, I don't think. It truly boggles the mind how they can sell so low.
Now, off to my day job...
