The San Miguel Gang and friends at the Scala

November 4, 2006

After the first half of my 20-mile bicycle ride, my legs felt like jelly. As I started the second leg of the ride around 4:10 PM, I thought I might end up exerting too much energy trying to get out of 60 mph section of A1301 towards Greater Shelford/Stapleford without a bicycle path before I lost daylight. [Consulting my map later revealed that I should have taken my bicycle into Sawston with little loss of time and for greater safety.] When I received a text from Cyrille outside relative safe confines outside Waitrose in Trumpington, I imagined that my legs should feel pretty dead by 4 or 5 AM in the morning. I suppose it’s no Tour de France, but it might have been only my second time (and certainly no more than third) time riding such distance; the first time was just over 3 years ago. As I trudged in with groceries, I met and chatted with Ali (my landlady’s … companion and/or friend??), who suggested that I should have taken his car instead of biking and that I should feel free to use the car whenever needed. What an offer! I think I will try not to take advantage of his generosity though. [The offer was repeated Sunday by the landlady.]

Cyrille picked me up next to Churchill College around 10:40 PM. With him were Sylvia and Mila, who arrived at Stansted only 5-6 hours prior to it. Zern, Euvian and Aurelei met us at Wolfson College. I recognized Aurelei by face but only learned her name only tonight – I have seen her around for a fairly long time now but not for several months. After refueling Cyrille’s car at on of the gas stations in Trumpington (We were concerned whether we would be able to find a place open at that hour, and Cyrille was running very low. I knew of the existence of the gas station(s) especially as I had bicycled past them only several hours beforehand), we were on the road by 11:10 PM or about the same departure time as 2 weeks ago. Cyrille drove the leading car with me as the guide, and Zern followed. I think that for both, it might have been their first time driving to London. Thus the drive felt a little less smooth compared to 2 weeks ago but was sans a comical interlude at Grays Inn Road. Many of the songs Cyrille played in the car were from my playlist; Cyrille said he uses my list to look for more songs. The language of choice in the backseat was French – as opposed to Swedish.

We arrived shortly before 12:30 AM. There were many more people from Cambridge compared to 2 weeks ago. Rajiv and Susie were apparently there since around 9; first time for Susie. Rico and Natalie (presumably with Drew) were checking their coat when we entered the bar area. Others I recognized with Cambridge connection were Anastasia, Zeynap, Anna and John. I reflected that when I went out to London more than a year ago (or for about the first 10 times or so), I saw fewer people from Cambridge. In fact, I sometimes went to SOS to primarily to escape what I perceived as scary hostile waters of Cambridge Salsa scene (which is great and friendly for me now of course). Sometimes I was the only one. Other times, there would be just the people I went with (e.g. Sean, Johnny and Serap). Occasionally I would have seen Liam or Jay’s group. Now there’s a glut. Tomorrow at SOS for example should be filled with Cambridge people – especially with a big group from the Salsa team. [Note: Two people contacted me about SOS as I am writing this entry - I had to decline as my car is still dead. I am a little sorry to be missing out on the spectacle caused by their invasion. I also met some of them on their way to SOS at the Cambridge station on my way to work in early evening next day.]

We only caught the second and third performance. I didn’t have a great view of the Duende Dance company (one of the trio was Aiste) despite climbing up the stairs early for a better view. During the introduction, Joe talked about the Guardian getting in touch with him to get his take on the Salsa segment of the BBC celebrity dance competition show; he remarked that he couldn’t give them a usable sanitary quote. Because of darkness constraints leading me to be at home at unusual hours, I caught the tail end of this show earlier in the evening for the second time ever. Two the three dances I watched were supposed to be Salsa (squeezed in between was Peter Schmeichel doing Viennese Waltz – simple but nice enough for a beginner). The music for Salsa dancing was unrecognizable as Salsa. The first couple for Salsa I saw was unwatchable. The second couple (last one of tonight’s show) seemed to have fun at least (when they managed to get over the wardrobe malfunction episode slightly reminiscent of Tonya Harding). I had better luck staying at the front row for the Laith Sami’s UK Congress Group competition-winning team doing a performance a la Mortal Combat. I couldn’t hold a guffaw here and there – I misheard the introduction as Late Sami (dearly departed) at first and some of the stunts were simply funny. Also where I stood for this performance made it convenient for me to ask Martina for a dance afterwards.

The main dance floor seemed at least as crowded as last time around. I am not sure if overall attendance was any higher though. One of the big highlights was super cool air conditioning. It certainly beat any other place I have visited in the UK in keeping me dry. It was also very nice dancing and not getting stuck with anyone who was dripping with sweat – an experience I would not mind having more often.

Overall I had even better time dancing tonight than 2 weeks ago – there were too many awful dances last time even though the quality of my best dances were about the same. Also there seemingly were more people I danced well with. Sylvia for one was very pleasant to dance with – Mauro for one seemed to like how I danced with her and he seemed pretty friendly with me throughout the evening. The second of handshake with him led me to having a brief chat with Eva about her propensity to sleepiness; I recall her asleep under the table at SOS one time they moved the venue to the South side of the hotel. There was a slinky blonde heavy in demand and seemingly into enjoying tactile senses; she turned out to be a much better follower than I expected – although certainly not at professional level (then again, not everything works perfectly with many of those professional types – they just do more styling generally). I danced with fairly large number of people I haven’t danced with – more so than in recent past. Another dance of note was dancing to the second half of Bandolera by Hector Lavoe (which still left 5 minutes of dancing as the song is over 9 minutes long) as the second dance with someone new.

Memorable moment #1 – I turned myself invisible to Euvian. Mila was a witness – I danced with her instead. Rajiv saw it too and seemed highly amused. I think I heard him mutter, “That was so bad,” as he walked up to Euvian to talk about the zaniness of the incident. She later claimed that she was asleep.

Memorable moment #2 – Some guy left his partner in the middle of the dance apparently to pursue an argument and possibly a fistfight. I don’t think anything happened afterwards, but she seemed to find it especially memorable (I thought I heard her talking about it with her friends as we were leaving). I had planned on asking her for a dance next as I saw them dance, but she seeemed too stunned and asked for a reprieve for a song when I did ask. Unfortunately I gave her a longer reprieve and then never got a chance to get back to her.

My feet were getting pretty sore by the end but I was not as tired as I thought I would be. As we were leaving, Joe said, “I’ll probably see you… Monday,” then added that he was going to be here Sunday as well for some lesson(s). I probably will find my way somehow come Monday. In another goodbye, Aurelei after exchanging some pleasantries on the way back to our cars said, “I’ll probably see you at Club Salsa another time – maybe 3 months?” Oh whatever! On the other hand, I actually appreciated the indefinite timeline – it’s in many ways nicer than hearing see you tomorrows or see you next weeks and then not seeing them for weeks or months. With 3 months, I could easily take it to mean 3 weeks, 3 months or 6 months or more. Also I suppose if I had my wits about me, I could have thought to say something like, “Hopefully sooner than that,” as a reply.