learn to salsa dance

we still haven’t gone to a salsa club. i’ve forgotten most of the steps by now. but we went to two weddings & we danced together (normal goofball dancing) & we were more in sync (i think) than usual.

we’re getting better! i’m not sure i can dance without the instructor yelling out the beats, but the next step is to go to a salsa club. if that’s fun, we’ll sign up for the next level class. meanwhile, i’ve been telling friends about the classes & they sound interested. it’d be nice to be able to go out & do something other than drinking & eating.

we danced like shy broken robots. the faster the music got, the more we stumbled, & the more huge the teacher’s grin grew.

it’s still pretty fun. i was all excited at one point, like, ‘hey i can feel the beat! this music makes sense!’ but then i saw that i was a half-step behind everyone else.

oh & the shoulder rolls are also embarrassing, but there was a new struggling student & the teacher left me alone this time.

salsa is a lot of fun! the bf & i are doing east coast/new york style/club salsa. we thought it would be fun to go out to the clubs (the other main dance scene in the city is swing). maybe we should’ve listened to the music more first or actually checked out a club – i can’t feel the beat at all. east coast style is syncopated – the instructor says it ‘feels slower’ but it still feels pretty fast.

the other 3 couples dropped out last class, so it was just me, the bf, & 3 other girls.

there are always more girls at these things.
if you happen to be looking…

every time i danced with the instructor, she found new wrong things to tell the class not to do:

round 1: ‘ladies, keep your arm straight or you’ll elbow yr man in the face when you turn.’
round 2: ‘ladies, don’t raise your arm, the man raises yr arm for you. you are not leading. and keep your arm straight.’
round 3: ‘ladies, don’t duck under your man’s arm, he will raise it high enough to go over your head. ducking is not sexy.’

she’s very funny. & short.