Even San Miguel failed to deliver

November 23, 2007

Randomness of the crowd continues to astonish me. The only ones among the usual group were Rajiv, Sebastian, Ed, Sharon and Kate (showing up later after St. Paul’s presumably closed). Mauricio and Lorraine was there also – possibly the first time they ran into each other in a very long time. Still it was far from empty – in fact, it was surprisingly crowded even towards the end of the evening.

I think a part of the explanation could be that a lot of people were playing a game of expectations. Many people decided to come because they expected that there will be many people while many others decided to skip it tonight because they expected exactly the same thing and wasn’t excited about overcrowding. The added attraction of having the London gang – Andrea Stewart, Aiste and Joe Davids – was not enough for many.

Cyrille has been AWOL since Coventry. I’m guessing he’s out of country all week – spending his birthday elsewhere. Both Vish and Steph had his birthday on their calendar. I did not – although once reminded of it, I was able to confirm it using the blog.

Dancing early was … blah.

The show was by Duende – meaning Andrea Stewart and Aiste Kalabuchova. I guess Alex was a no-show. I had the best spot for seeing and saw none of it because I was struggling to videotape it. Videotaping was difficult. Lighting was surprisingly low – I don’t think all the lights were on. The dancers were in too close range to the videocamera so I couldn’t get both of them on the screen at the same time half the time. I decided to take an executive decision to keep Andrea on the screen on the edge whenever they were too far apart and hope that Aiste would move closer. The screen angle was poor for my own viewing so all I saw 90% of the time was the outline of the dancers. I think the music used was the same one as the one from Scala, but I wasn’t able to make any assessment of the dancing.

The music was strictly a hit parade up until well after midnight – all classics and many of them slowed down - nothing to complain about really. Pancho Cristal, Se Me Fue, Se Formo Rumbantelo, Quitate La Mascara, La Palomilla, Asia Mood, Merecumbe, Swing La Moderna, Todo Tiene Su Final, Ahora Quien, etc.

Probably the most annoying song was a new Africando one I got stuck with for my first dance with Andrea Stewart. The music wasn’t particularly exciting but it was confusing and tricky – and it was difficult to mask my confusion. I tried for a mulligan and asked her for Ahora Quien couple of songs later, but even that dance was a bit unsatisfying – arguably more so than the first one. I thought the connection was good but not superb – and at this point anything less than good would be preposterous so merely good is not particularly good – albeit making it better than merely good could depend a bit more on chemistry, music or factors beyond one’s control. I thought while we seemed to have common understanding of how to dance to the song but different interpretations of accents here and there resulted in some miscues. Also the environment (different type of floor, mixed crowd with many unpredictable people) probably added difficulty and resulted in hesitation. A few mistakes always happen in pretty much all of my dances, but this one had 2-3 more than I really would have liked. I guess that at least on my part I wasn’t particularly warmed up for heavy-duty social dancing at that time (or any point this evening). Also my best dances almost never are with the performer types anyway – even though my dances with Andrea will have to qualify as the high point on an evening like this. [note: I might have had a dance with Andrea one other time – at Scala. If so my impression/memory is that the Scala dance felt better - perhaps due to lower expectations back then.]

I suppose I could have danced with Aiste, but I didn’t because I decided that Andrea was the rarer opportunity considering how often I see Aiste in both London and Cambridge. Also I would venture to guess that Aiste would get more attention anyway for whatever reason – intimidation factor or attractiveness factor or whatever. I think both of them ended up with three dance partners in any case. Andrea grabbed Rajiv in between my dances with her, and Raj goaded Ed into asking Andrea afterwards (or so I heard from Ed afterwards. Ed thought Andrea seemed used to stronger leads although such thought did not occur to me at any time). I think Sebastian had a nice dance with Aiste.

Vish tried to get me to DJ shortly after the show, but I decided to hold off as much as possible in order to get an opportunity at asking Andrea and possibly Aiste. After Ed’s dance with Andrea (and Sebastian with Aiste at the same time), Vish turned to Reggaeton at Andrea’s request. I deejayed for a short time only after the London gang departed.

Playlist

Decia Que Me Queria – Cachaco
Cuando Se Canta Bonita – Willie Rosario*
La Paella – Jose Alberto “El Canario”
La-La-La – Direct Latin Influence

I don’t think there was much of a Salsa crowd left by then so it all fell quite flat. Vishal came on relief with Merengue, etc. Among his Salsa later, La Vida... was a hit, but not Cali Pachanguero. I tried one Cuban.

Very weird night. Even San Miguel wasn’t very good. The two bottles I had – second one courtesy of Vish – had some nasty tasting bit in the bottom. I think the term used by some to describe it is “skunked.”