Happy New Year!

Ok I just had to get that out of the way. So, starting from last Friday night, I went to Andres and his other dance partner for a private lesson. It was interesting, although I feel he has a heavy emphasis on steps. Luckily we were able to talk about effective practice, and ideas behind nuevo tango, like taking a traditional figure and twisting it into something new. Here's a pic of us:

After that, I went to Villa Malcolm for Gabriel's intermediate and advanced classes, and I went to La Viruta afterwards.

Here are a couple of pics of a parade memorializing the death of all of those young people in the overcrowded club that burned down a couple of years back, and subsequently shut down a lot of clubs temporarily.

At Villa Malcolm, I was invited to a house party by a German woman, who happened to invite a bunch of friends of mine, so my New Year's was set. Here are a couple of pics of people toasting to the new year with plastic cups and champagne at Villa Malcolm:

Saturday I woke up around 2 pm, and I proceeded to go to Bacco, my favorite bakery, for a delectible cake with cream, a bit of alchohol, and reduced fruit. We had a small party celebrating the German new year which was a few hours before the Argentine one:

The pic above made me cringe a bit, since I have mediocre posture in it, and I'm "chueco". Oh just a reminder, click on pictures to get bigger ones.

Later that evening, I went to the house party with cake in hand, via the bus system and about 7 city blocks of walking, due to the fact that it was damn near impossible to get a cab, much less call one. When I got nearby, a couple of shirtless guys set off something stronger than an m80 (firework) about 15 feet away from me, and I was less than pleased.

Arriving at this bohemian apartment, with a bell pull instead of a doorbell, I chilled out on the candelit terrace in a hammock passing the time with my fellow tangueros.

A good time was had by all, and we hit up the champagne about 5 minutes before New Years due to someone with a fast watch. The entire barrio lit up with fireworks, for at least half an hour. They also have this little paper hot air baloons, which I like to call fire hazards, They're diamond shaped with candles at the bottom in order to get them to float, and I spotted about 6 over the course of the evening. One of them was hit by a firework, and fell in a gout of flame.

After the New Year began, we headed downstairs to dance, and it was definately good:

There was a three person dance with Alex from San Fran (now living in BA I think) Tatyana from Spain, and Isaac from Colorado, where they traded Tatyana around, or orbited each other. At one point, Isaac was leading both Taty and Alex.

Off to the side was a futon on the floor which I used to give one nice young lady from San Francisco a massage. This was definately fun, since I combined massage with some trance work, and she felt as if she was on "e" at the time.

Around 4 AM we (12 + people) went to another party about 6 blocks away:

We stayed till about 6 AM:

I finally shared a cab back to Pallermo with Naoko from San Fran, although it was a stroke of luck to find it at the gas station filling up.

I woke up today around 12:30 pm, and went back to sleep half an hour later, waking up at 5:30 PM. Now it's time to head over to an outdoor milonga called the Glorieta, where Leo will be meeting up with me. I am thinking of doing a going away party at the house where I'm staying, Monday night. Anyway, happy New Year to all, and to all a good night.