dos cosas

one.
tango.

so we´ve had two classes of tango. we also had a woman visit to talk about the history of the tango which involved her singing awkwardly out of tune in front of us without accompianment and later her dancing by herself. but it was educational and funny, she was very comfortable with herself and obviously just plain in love with the music and the stories she was sharing. first of all, tango´s just fun to watch. couples dance real close and they just flit acorss the floor in perfect time (if they´re good) and every once in a while their ankles flitter up towards their knees. second, it´s fun to dance. so far we´ve learned four variations on one eight step theme. the normal, the figure 8, the figure 8 accompanied by the hombre and the sandwichito. dancing strikes me a a strange form of entertainment because it´s experienced so differently by the people performing and the people watching. they´re using exactly opposite sensory operations. unless you have a mirror, then you get the best of both worlds i suppose. let me tell you, our tango professor loves to look at himself in the mirror. i honestly don´t know if it´s a dancing thing, an argentian thing or just him. but it´s strange.

two interesting side notes on tango. it was the first dance in which people put their legs between one another.....racey. in addition, it started out as a very machisto dance, women couldn´t even participate. now the women, as in many dances, must be good followers rather than leaders. you have to have a good man, a good leader who knows what´s up and can avoid accidents and the women has to trust the man to do these things because tango with two leaders isn´t possible. and let me just say, as a mujer, having a good man makes all the difference in enjoying dancing.

two.
ferias.

today is a national holiday- one of the two independence days of argentina. i´m not exactly sure why there are two but the ninth of july is one of them as well. the two main streets that divide buenos aires are the two independence days- 9 de julio and 25 de mayo. what that means for us is that all of the ferias or street fairs are super big and super busy. i went with my brothers, javier and andres-who call me emi, to la feria de mataderos. mataderos is a barrio on the west side of the city that is names ´the killers´, which my sister told me is because people kill you there. oh thanks, hun, for that. i guess it´s not that safe aside from the fair. it was a fairly poor area with the expected trash, poorly kept buildings and streets and such. it is also an older neighborhood so it has actual houses instead of just apartments as well as brick streets. fairs here are all-inclusive. you have the miniature horses and occasional llama or chama as they pronounce it here. there´s a section of stands that is more or less an outdoor walmart of clothes. then you have the regional foods section with cheeses, breads, wine, and lo que sea. at each corner there´s a stage with older men dressed up as gauchos playing folk music. then there´s the junk stands of little gidgets you would buy to berak the next day. later on we have everything and its mom made of leather, then all the wool, the wood, and later on the silver. it´s all good.

argentina somehow makes everything very packed and very slow. i don´t know how they do it but it´s a special kind of busy. an almost livable busy.