Some Floors and Milongas

Confiteria La Ideal may possibly be the most beautiful milonga space in Buenos Aires.  Chances are you've seen it, in some movie that involves tango and/or this city; it's an icon.  Large, mainly Second Empire space, with a barrel vaulted ceiling, marble columns, chandeliers, the works.  They tell us that some of the milongas there, especially in the afternoons, are very good.  We went on a Friday night and quickly realized that it was tourist night, and--whoah--we were the dinner show!  Most of the clientele was not there to dance.  Flash bulbs, video cameras, generous applause, strange musical selection.  It was worth the experience, and the knowledge that, back in Japan and Germany people will be showing videos of us dancing tango to their in-laws, saying "look, authentic Argentines, doing their charming tango thing," but we left after a very short while.  It should also be noted that the marble floor is gorgeous but not easy on the feet.

The classic, nigh cliché beauty that is La Ideal

We're very fond of El Beso, where they hold a number of milongas through the week, El Beso, Las Morochas, Zorro Plateado...  To begin with, it happens to be walking distance from our apartment, and it's nice not to have to deal with taxis and "walk to the milonga" every now and then (has a really nice sound to it, no?)  But also, whenever we went the music was very good.  Rather small, nice wood floor.  But, here's the thing: on the Saturday, the dancing was excellent, the dancers glad to dance with us, and the whole thing just perfect.  On a different night (Tuesday, we think it was) everything promised to mount up to a good night but then all these milonguero personages were there, very loud and full of themselves, playing to "the crowd", and the crowd kinda playing to them, which distracted from a good solid tango night.  We saw the same kind of thing in Porteno y Bailarin (see below), and heard that it happens a lot at Nino Bien, which we chose not to patronize.

We've also always had fun at Gricel (current milongas: Gricel, La Cachilla, Lunes de Tango...), even though the sound system is a bit uneven.  Come to think of it, everything about is a bit uneven: the DJing, the leaky roof, and certainly the nicely springy wood floor.  It seems that every single floor plank has a slight camber, which, it must be said, is useful in dispersing the water in the couple of leaky spots on rainy nights.  Of course this unevenness also tends to throw you and your partner off your balance, but there are plenty of cracks and gaps to catch your heel and right you again, most of the time.  If not, no worries, the floor also tends to slope slightly upwards towards the edges, which keeps everyone pretty much penned within the dancing perimeter and off the surrounding tables.  But no, it's fun.  Large, attractive, and pretty friendly.

We had a fine enough time at Porteno y Bailarin (also walking distance from us) but we probably don't need to go back.  Good music, nice enough people, two rather small floors (linoleum, kinda hard on the feet).  I think we felt it was a bit pretentious, paying attention to the "in" crowd, which in this case consists of some old milongueros.  Great that they're around and that they seemed to be having fun (although they basically weren't dancing), but it just seemed that the place was geared towards them, and the people who came to look at them.  We tend to like places where people come to dance or to hang out enjoying other people dancing.

There's a particular downside to this catering to personages and tourists, especially in the case with Porteno y Bailarin, which is a rather small space.  They seat these "important" (mainly non-dancing) people, and the odd table of (also non-dancing) tourists, right up on the edge of the dance floor, and the people who want to dance end up in the back, where sight lines to potential dancing partners are impeded by these (usually inconveniently shaped) personages and tourists.  OK, so we get to see the odd "important" person (we guess), but we don't get to dance as much, which to us (call us old fashioned) persists in being the point.

It's for this that we particularly liked the Sueno Porteno milonga on Wednesdays at Boedo, and La Milonguita on Sundays.  Well attended, unpretentious, full of people who wanted to dance, good music, and no one you're supposed to recognize anywhere around.  We were glad to close those places every chance we got.

One night we went to Viejo Correo by Parque del Centenario.  A real neighborhood milonga, especially that weeknight.  Nice people, good music, everyone from the neighborhood, so we were clearly the out of towners, strict cabeceo, and at first it seemed that there would be no way we would get to dance with anyone but each other* but the organizers were extremely welcoming and friendly and they personally went over to recruit a dude to ask Melody to dance, and nudge a milonguera to dance with Marcos.  After that ice breaking there was no stopping the intermixing of cultures and a great amount of fun was had.  Everyone was very sweet and eager to explain things and find reason to point out convergences; "my son is in Philadelphia, at Drexel," "a cousin of mine works at a restaurant in New York," "I was watching an American movie on TV just last night.."

* Especially in more provincial locales, if an Argentine dances with Melody then the neighborhood women may snub him for the night, and local women may avoid Marcos for similar reasons.