1532  Notes from Bueno Aires 9

Date: Tue, 15 Jul 2003 01:10:56 -0500
From: Rick McGarrey <RICKMCG@FLASH.NET>
Subject: Notes from Bueno Aires 9

Guemes Street. 7mo piso. CP 1425, Buenos Aires,
Argentina.

1:38 AM.
What I am writing tonight is unauthorized. My
previous posts have been, for the most part, a team
effort. Alejandra's contribution has been from
beginning to end. She translates this maddening
language for me, I pick her brain about tango, and
then she reads everything I write and she cleans it
up. A voice of reason. But I hate reason. I am
sitting here in my underwear in a very bad mood. She
takes all the good stuff out of my writing. She
emasculates it. Bowdlerizes it. Takes out everything
interesting. You wouldn't believe how much trouble I
would be in if my ego and bile were allowed to vent
unchecked in public, on this list. I couldn't return
to the U.S. I would be attacked the minute I walked
into the milongas down here. But she reads, and says
calmly, 'You cannot say that.' 'It is very
aggressive.' Or, 'When did that happen? It never
happened.' Well in my mind, those things happened.
So tonight, watch out. I am writing uncensored. And
worse, with a couple of drinks under my belt. Or
better. Down here they call them 'dstornridlooe'. Or
something like that. It means 'screwdriver'. They
don't drink much here, but beware of the mixed
drinks. So I sat in Plaza Borges tonight, outside in
the rain, and had two distorn. Very strong ones. At
least the air was finally clean. Each must have had
at least 3 shots of vodka in a tall glass of fresh
squeezed Oj. But I had to get out of the house. My
cigarette induced cough has turned into some kind of
strange immune system revolt that causes my lungs to
cease up everytime I smell almost anything. Perfume,
cleaning products, car exhaust, food frying. And try
to get around in this city of almost 20 million souls
living stacked one on top of another and to avoid
those things. Walk down a sidewalk, and someone will
be walking in front of you sucking on a cigarette like
a drowning man gasping for air. The cars and buses,
never more than a few feet away, will be spouting
exhaust. The parrillas will be spewing wood smoke.
And I am still not sleeping well.

Enough. What I want to talk about is Alejandra. We
have been cooped up in this small eighth floor
apartment in Palermo, waiting for the revolt taking
place in my lungs to finally run it's course. We
can't go out, and I think she is beginning to fear
me. I have nothing to do. Yesterday I threw a
magazine across the room. We are in a tiny boat,
adrift. The kind they find drifting in the current,
empty, thousands of miles off course, with no sign of
the nice young family that set out for Tahiti 2 months
earlier. I have cabin fever, but there is no cabin.
No Yukon blizzard. No ocean. It is the buses, and
the thousand smells of the city holding me prisoner.
One tiny sniff, and my lungs seize up like a hamstring
cramp in the 400 meter high hurdles. Like a heart
attack in the lungs. For the first time in my life I
have real sympathy for what it must feel like to
suffer from asthma. I have never felt this before.
My lungs actually ache! I am from the wild west, used
to being outdoors on a bike or a windsurf board
several hours each and every day. But here I am. So,
I write obsessively. I tell her it's therapy, but she
keeps coming in to check on me, checking the screen.
I know what she is doing! I am unshaven, and very
touchy. She has seen a lot of movies. I know what
she is doing. She is checking to make sure I am still
making sense. That I am not writing the same thing
over, and over, and over, and over, and over, and
over, and over, and over.... but all work, and no play
makes Jack a dull boy. So now I will have some fun
and write what I feel like writing, and to hell with
the consequences.

First, I am a little tired of these guys down here who
have made it big in tango, and don't dance any more.
They sit at their tables with their entourages and
troll for tourists. And when someone with a little
status comes in, like Alejandra, they finally get
enough energy to decide, well, maybe I'll get up and
dance with her to show off. We were in Porteno Y
Bailarin last week (translation into English: Wolf and
Caribou) and a couple of them were sitting at tables
next to the floor. I thought I kept noticing each of
them watching us dance, but I just thought they were
transfixed by my expertise. My pinta. Taking notes,
as it were. We sat, and Alejandra said, 'Uh oh. They
are looking.' I said, 'Well they can't do that,
right? We're a couple, and it's against the rules.'
But they kept looking, and when she finally waved one
of them off by returning the stare, and then
deliberately looking away, this man was so mad he got
up and left. I saw him shake his head angrily, and
actually leave the room. Alej said, 'Well, I'll never
dance with him again. But its no big deal. He just
wants to show off, and the last time I dance with him
my back hurt the next day.' The other big shot,
encouraged by his rival's defeat, began looking even
harder. Now I know this is another country, right?
But this is hypocrisy and disrespect. First of all,
if I was a milonguero, they would never have tried
it. And second, I have a friend from Prague who was
new to the milongas last year and made the mistake of
asking one of the women who was sitting at one of
these men's table to dance, without even knowing she
was with them, and these guys did their best to make
his life miserable for the rest of the evening. And
for some time thereafter. So I'm a little annoyed,
but they seem to run the show down here, at least in
the downtown show off clubs at night, so what can you
do? Except have a drink and write about it.

And I want to say one more thing, before the active
ingredient in the distornallos wears off. Alejandra
is a very good dancer. I just learned that Celia
Blanco, who is no slouch (her story is coming up next)
has said that Alejandra is a better social dancer than
she is. Before I knew her well, I was always amazed
at the amount of dancing she did. She never sat. She
really seemed to be the most popular partner in town
for all of the dancers in the clubs. Of course, she
is a great dancer, but I think it's more than that.
The Argentines want their tango dancers to look like
tango dancers. Just look at the Zottos and at Carlos
Copello. There are lots of beautiful women in the
milongas who are young enough to be her daughter, but
Alej has a look and manner that the men of the
milongas seem to find irresistible. They seem to
chose her every time. And of course, the fact that I
now have her as a partner, means that this is bragging
about myself, at least indirectly. But another drink
and it wouldn't be so sneaky. You would get an earful
about how great I am, and how screwed up the rest of
the world is. Here comes Alej now to check on my
writing. Time to click the 'send' button, and shut
down.

Next up: I will blow the lid off of tango teaching in
BsAs. I will call it, 'Notes from the dark side.'