December 4, 2005
This was by far the best of Washington D.C. Salsa scene I saw in this trip. I enjoyed this outing very much. It was highly reminiscent of SOS in London. I am not completely sure but I think there were some on-2 dancers present. Earl Rush of Stuck on Salsa is well-deserving of the praise of local dancers who stated that he can be counted upon to throw a good party every time. The cover was $5 and included complimentary unlimited soda and water (However, I suspect that giving free drinks is not fiscally sound, so I expect this will not last long).
The venue (Avenue Night Club) at quick glance looked spacious and covered with wall-to-wall wood floor that could accommodate well over 30 or maybe even 40 couples – or about half the size of Mary Ward Hall (home of SOS or Salsa on Sundays in London) and somewhat smaller than the Grad Pad in Cambridge University. I initially was quite thrilled with the feel of the floor (nice and smooth) until I started dancing upon which I discovered that there was a severe tilt to the floor with the far end of the club being at noticeably higher elevation compared to the entrance of the club. The sloped floor caused me to upset my balance during some spins (almost falling towards downhill several times) for the first several dances; I was getting dizzy and possibly even seasick. I would imagine that the followers had it even worse. I started to despair that I would not be able to take advantage of the space this venue offered and high quality of followers present at this party. Fortunately, I adjusted to the curious floor problem (some parts were worse than others) after about half dozen dances and ended up having a quite good time. I daresay that everyone went through some adjustment period.
The dancers at this party were very good – on average almost equal to London’s SOS. There were slightly more beginners here than at SOS – this I did not mind at all because all of them were really responsive and very friendly. I loved the fact that everyone seemed to be having a good time and that no one was acting bored or being inattentive to my leads; this hadn't been so evident or frequent in my other D.C. Salsa outings. Probably the worst case tonight involved a follower who consistently tried to do more turns than what I was leading (I don’t recall seeing such a blatant case - I interpreted this as her showing off or trying to prove something), but even this dance worked out alright because her technique was generally sound. I estimate that I danced with approximately 90% of the followers present in the course of under 3 1/2 hours; the event ran from 4 PM to 9 PM with an hour of class (including a on-2 class) at the beginning, which I missed. Initially, there were relatively small number of dancers (albeit many good ones not seen at other places), but many more people came in as hours went by compared to small number of people who left early and the floor became more crowded (but still very manageable) for last 1.5-2 hour or so.
Near the end of the evening, I asked a charming follower (nice package of skill, attitude and grace -- ummm, actually there were quite a few of them but...) for a dance and received a reply that she was about to leave and head off to another Salsa club called Polyester. I was invited to come with her group of friends. I wasn’t interested in much more dancing but because I had never heard of this place, I thought it might be useful to check it out. Unfortunately, I was given a wrong address (12th and H), so I took off after searching in vain for 5-10 min after parking on the corner of 12th and H. I tried to look up this venue on the internet afterwards, and found out after a while that the club is called Polly Esther’s and is located at 12th and F, not 12th and H – I only got as far as the corner of 12th and G, which was just one block away. There is no indication in the internet that Polly Esther’s plays any Salsa.
Sergio had told me that next weekend in D.C. should be great for Salsa dancing because of a group of New York dancers coming down. There will be a set of parties celebrating release of two DVDs – Ismael Otero’s “Advanced Turn Patterns with Jamie Matos" and Toronto’s Magna Gopal’s “Turns by Magna”. Somewhat amusing factoid (to me) is that Ismael Otero's nickname is "Man with Million Moves". (I don't know who came up with it first - Otero or SuperMario, but Otero has been teaching Salsa/Mambo long before SuperMario started learning Salsa.) Anyway, the Dual DVD party's first D.C. stop is Earl Rush’s 50th birthday party on Friday. Earl (who by the way is a good and humorous dancer) tried to talk me into coming next weekend but I will be back in Cambridge by then. Based upon tonight, I have full confidence that Earl’s party Friday (and Saturday) will be great. Same goes for his monthly Salsa social in the future (I believe this was the second Sunday social overall for Earl, but first as the start of it being a monthly event) – especially if the event were moved to a venue with more level floor or if everyone can get accustomed to sloped floor very quickly.
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