The Riverlands

So, as if I don’t have enough on my plate already, I’m wondering where I can continue learning flamenco once I get home?

Don’t worry–I probably won’t attempt it.  But it really is a blast.  Right now we’re learning “sevillians,” which, as one girl defined it, “is like flamenco, except street-style.”   What that seems to mean, practically, is that they’re basically Andalusian folk dances, done in couples, but with flamenco steps.  And, actually, the steps are harder to get than I would’ve thought.  They’re not complicated, but the flow of movement is completely different from Irish dance, and I always want to transfer my weight to the wrong foot and things.  What’s worse, I think I mentioned I’ve been fighting a sore throat.  I wasn’t feeling that bad, but my throat was a little dry, and once we started moving in class, I came down with this horrible coughing fit and everyone thought I was really sick and, I think, saw me as a bit of a walking germ bed, and my partner didn’t exactly want to take hands during the take-hands part.  Despite that, however, I really had a blast.

I haven’t been back to ballroom because Thursday I was cooking fajitas for everyone–did I talk about that?  We’ve all been taking turns cooking dinners for the group with food from our countries, so I did a fajitas-and-bean-dip night Thursday.  It was a bit hard–I had to improvise on a lot of the ingredients, since they don’t have refried beans or sour cream here–and the sour cream came out liquid–but it tasted pretty good.  The fajitas were great, and I actually found tortillas for them at the grocery store.  Everyone at least claimed it tasted really good.  And if they’re lying, well, their loss!!!  Because I can tell you those were some great fajitas!  It was kind of funny, though–I didn’t cook them that spicy, but I was told that they were pretty spicy.  I never thought of myself as having a particular immunity to spicy food, but I guess I have more than I thought!

So, anyways, I missed ballroom dance that night.   But I’ll be back tomorrow.  Oh, by the way, I forgot to mention that last Tuesday we learned the official difference between Argentinian tango and a “regular” or the “national” tango.  Basically, as the teacher explained it, with the regular tango there’s air between you and your partner, and with the Argentinian tango there’s…not.  I’m rather glad to say we’re focusing on the “national” tango in class.  Paucity of males or not.