rain

It's raining cats and dogs here. There are poodles everywhere. Including the one left my my upstairs neighbor's dog. The rain should give a good soak to the ground for the wine. I was here last year so knew to expect the cool wet days of winter. I rather like it. Perhaps after 8 years in the high desert I like seeing grey mists. My favorite season in Santa Fe was spring, when the clouds drop down into the mountains, young and gentle and not yet the anvil heads of summer.

I just came back from Que Pasa, a salsa bar downtown. John runs the place and teaches lessons on Tuesday, Thursday and Saturdays. His style is different enough from mine that he does things that I've never done, which is fun. The intermediate class today was a two hand connected right pass into a back-to-back copa. I've done that before. But afterwards he went into a reverse hammerlock then a double turn into a regular one then a cross-body for her followed by a paddle turn for him with left hand connected coming back into closed position. Got it?

That was neat. Then there was the advanced course, which was based on Tuesday's lesson. I went to tango instead. So I had to catch up. This was much harder because there were several moves I've never done before. First a right pass in closed position (I've forgotten the name though). Continue into a cross body lead with left hand on shoulder. The new part was this quick 180 turn with the lead and follow essentially going in a circle swapping positions (he walking in a curve backwards while she's forward). It isn't LA/line style but it is John style. From there the lead does a full right turn swapping hands to handshake position. Lead her into a broken left (via a start into underarm turn then check her into reverse; I just figured out now that we were doing a broken left). Take her into a cross body while he comes around in reverse (to the right instead of following her). Then do this spin thing with her arm - I don't know the name of it - to step facing away from the line and lead her into an cross body lead inside turn. Stop her when she's done one turn (so in sweet-heart). Then do a turning 1-2 so she's facing forward on the line into a cross body double inside turn finishing with a spot turn for him back to two hand open position.

I barely got it by the end and should practice it some more. One problem was there were only 7 women and 11 men in the class so we had to stand out often.

I enjoy the Cape Town dancing. I think I've written this before but I'll do it again. The Sweden and UK salsa dancers are technically better than the people here, but I have so much fun in Cape Town. There is something to the stereotype of most Scandinavian people being reserved while here it's more .. playful? Flirty is probably the best word, though I don't think of myself as a flirt. Looking it up I see the ambiguity in the term: one place uses "playful behavior intended to arouse sexual interest" while another says "talk or behave amorously, without serious intentions" while wikipedia says "casual conversation with a romantic touch, but it need not be spoken interaction". The last feels like the best fit.