It is easy to distingush the regular miloungueros and tango tourists. One of the ways is to at look how they dress. It is not uncommon to see tango tourists, especially men, dress in t-shirts and jeans; women though, no matter where they come from, are usually impeccably dressed.
Also, the younger generation of local tango dancers also like to dress down; with singlets, cargo pants and dance sneakers. But the old milongueros, you almost always see them sharply dressed in suit, pants and suede dance shoes.
There are some milongas however, you have to dress up because if not, you will feel mightly out of place. One such milonga is Nino Bien on thursday nights.
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Best Place to Go: Nino Bien, located at Humberto Primo 1462, houses one of the most posh and classy milonga. The only other place I can think of that matches its grandeur is the newly renovated Bien Pulenta (Pte Peron 2543).
The place looks like a grand european ballroom from the yesteryears. Brightly lit, superb wooden dancefloor that is about the size of one and a half basketball courts and elegantly decorated walls. But the single most important reason that Nino Bien is such a posh milonga is that the people who comes to the place all dress up as though they are going for their senior prom night. It really seems like you walked into the middle of an annual company dinner.
It is so popular and crowded and you have people seated up on the elevated stage due to lack of space. Reason that everyone goes? Its the most posh and hip milonga in town for the entire week!!!
Dancers: Mixed level of dancing. Once again the energy of the dancefloor is very uneven because of the number of dancers who wants to standout. Instead of feeling the dancers are dancing in harmony, it is common to get bumped into in Nino Bien.
I heard from Royce and also some other dancers that the dancing level in Nino Bien used to be very high. Cacho Dante told me he used to go there a few years ago when it was calmer. Now there are quite a number of inconsiderate dancers that think nothing of stepping into others.
But because it is such a chic place, many milongueros come here to hangout and to be seen. I have seen Osvaldo and Coca, Facundo and Kelly, Julio and Corina, Tete, Dany, El Pibe Avelleneda, El Pibe Sarandi, even Alicia the owner of Comme Il Faut!
Floorcraft: Not too good, coupled with the popularity and crowdedness of the milonga, you can only get to enjoy dancing early on when the milonga starts or after 2am in the morning when the crowd thins out.
Music: Good music. Nino Bien is one of the few places that plays milonga frequently and well into late night. Most milongas you need to wait 4 or 5 tandas before you hear one 'milonga' tanda. In Nino Bien they play it every 3 or 4 tandas.
What I Like Least: Definitely the bad navigation. Two of the ladies I danced with on separate occasions got stepped and cut their feet by the back stepping men in front of me.
Memories: My second milonga in Buenos Aires, the first time I ever asked a lady to dance, she was Melissa, a friend from the States, I was so nervous and the place was so crowded; we were shoulder to shoulder to the surrounding couples, all I remembered doing was sidesteps on the spot!!
Other Nice Places: Maipu 444, which hold a simple and calm milonga. El Beso on Thursdays are very good too, with the same crowd as El Beso on Sundays.
