In the ancient chinese mythical story of "Journey to the West", Xuan Zhang, Sun Wu Kong (monkey god) and his fellow disciples made a westward journey from China to India to search for buddist scriptures. I would make a similar trip to the west some 3000 years later; just that I'm not a buddist monk, neither am I searching for scriptures. I'm just a guy born in the year of the monkey, in search for tango in its birthplace, Buenos Aires.
I finally got out of army on the 31st of July 06. And 15 days later, on the 15th of August, just after touching down Singapore from my last overseas army trip to Taiwan, my journey to the west begun.
The direct geographic between Singapore and Buenos Aires, Argentina is exactly 15,920km
( www.indo.com/distance/index.html ). The Malaysian Airline one year return ticket which cost me SGD2,500 ( www.misatravel.com ) would take me first, from Singapore to Kuala Lumpur, then to Johannesburg, Cape Town South, then finally Buenos Aires. Total flight time would be about 30 hours.
My first month in Buenos Aires was orientated by Royce and Jean Michel, whom were here for holidays. From ordering food to how to take a cab, they showed me how to navigate in this city where I was essentially just a little better than a mute.
The early days when I do not speak spanish, I remembered the awkward moments during milonga, where people chat up a bit during the start of every tango. I would stand in front of the disinterested silent lady to whom I try to communicate with my best Marcel Marceau imitation.
And the early days were chaos. I was being greedy and tried to cramp at least three group classes everyday and milonga everynight. I was struggling with my tango, during the classes and milongas. The weird milongas, bad teachers, and feeling unconfident about my tango everytime I go for classes.
As someone who only learnt close embrace tango and have no idea who are the good teachers in Buenos Aires, Royce advised me to get my hand on some of the tango magazines and pamphlets handed out during milonga, to scout for the teachers.
So the first thing one should do when touching down Buenos Aires is to get your hands on a tango magazines. The three main tango magazines are 'El Tangauta' ( www.eltangauta.com ), 'La Milonga' and 'B.A. Tango Magazine'
Armed with these magazines, scouring through the hundreds of advertisements, I chose a list of teachers that I heard about, sounded good, took pictures with good poses or taught milonguero close embrace. And I filled up my days running around for classes. Within 2 months, I would have taken classes fom over 30 different teachers.
One thing I had difficulty adjusting to was the inpunctuality and unpredictability of the tango classes. Coming from a clockwork society and a clockwork work environment; Singapore and Singaporean Army. There were many times I arrived at a 8.30pm class finding myself the only there, and the teachers with the rest of the students showing up 15 minutes later. But soon, I got so used to it that even cancellations on arrival did not bother me anymore, do it the argentine way, always have a backup plan.
Another way to find who is teaching where is to go for milongas and pick up the pamphlets laid on the table. They are usually contain the most up to date information and the most interesting teachers. Most of the times, famous teachers travel around the world. They come back to Buenos Aires, their home for a few months. While they are here, they give ad-hoc classes and instead of advertising in magazines, they put it up on the pamphlets and distribute them at the main milongas.
Tango being more of an art than science, every teacher has a different demand. Soon I found that it was impossible to incoporate what every teacher wants. Also not all the teachers suit my taste or taught the kind of tango I imagine myself dancing.
I started out with 30 over teachers and today, I only take from two. Cacho Dante and Javier Rodriguez. Next up, I shall talk a bit about my experience with the different teachers.
