Day 5 – Salsa!!
After a lazy morning mostly spent on the net sending blog entries and pictures to Nuno (he is the webmaster of our blog while he's still in Geneva, then we'll both be working on it during the rest of our travels), I came back to the flat and bumped into Matt, an English guy who is staying in a neighboring casa but likes to have breakfast in our casa as it's a big nice meal (I had already opted out from this choice after the 3rd day, as although a lot of food, the cost is 5 CUC, and for this you can get enough food in the market for all the day's meal).
Matt suggested I come with him for his salsa class as it is in a private place where you need to be introduced to be let in. At 10 CUC per hour, I thought it a bit expensive (considering that my one-to-one Spanish classes cost 5 CUC per hour), but I figured that I would give it a try.
And luckily I did. Although they hadn't known I would be there, and each student has a private teacher, the quickly managed to find a teacher for me so that I could join in with the others a mere 10 minutes late.
Really cool class. In just one hour, I felt like a progressed from having no clue, to actually being able to dance, albeit under the lead of an expert. And it was so worth the 10 CUC! I agreed to come back on Monday for my next class and am planning to take classes that whole week – so hopefully at the end I will be dancing like a queen ;)
So, can I now tick off one of my 99 experiences – the one about dancing with a Cuban salsero? Well, I'm not sure that paying for classes qualifies. So that's why in the evening, I danced with about 5 different Habaneros at a outdoor party down by the sea in the middle of the 3-lined street that had been closed off for traffic. At least one of these was a real good dancer, although I quickly realised that although the Cuban salsa class of the same morning reminds me of the salsa I've seen danced in Europe, it was nothing like the salsa danced in the streets!
Also danced to some reggatone, and drank rum directly out of the bottle, swaying my hips in my small Havana style shorts – so perhaps I'm starting to melt in. At least as much as a blond, blue-eyed, tall gal from the north could ever do.
A great day all together, where the only touristy thing I did was to check out the University. The rest of the day was calm, with an hour of salsa, a peso lunch of pizza and beer in the shade, two hours of Spanish, and a night spend drinking rum and dancing the night away on the Malcón.
Oh, and the night finished with another downpour. But this time we managed to seek cover in time.
Matt suggested I come with him for his salsa class as it is in a private place where you need to be introduced to be let in. At 10 CUC per hour, I thought it a bit expensive (considering that my one-to-one Spanish classes cost 5 CUC per hour), but I figured that I would give it a try.
And luckily I did. Although they hadn't known I would be there, and each student has a private teacher, the quickly managed to find a teacher for me so that I could join in with the others a mere 10 minutes late.
Really cool class. In just one hour, I felt like a progressed from having no clue, to actually being able to dance, albeit under the lead of an expert. And it was so worth the 10 CUC! I agreed to come back on Monday for my next class and am planning to take classes that whole week – so hopefully at the end I will be dancing like a queen ;)
So, can I now tick off one of my 99 experiences – the one about dancing with a Cuban salsero? Well, I'm not sure that paying for classes qualifies. So that's why in the evening, I danced with about 5 different Habaneros at a outdoor party down by the sea in the middle of the 3-lined street that had been closed off for traffic. At least one of these was a real good dancer, although I quickly realised that although the Cuban salsa class of the same morning reminds me of the salsa I've seen danced in Europe, it was nothing like the salsa danced in the streets!
Also danced to some reggatone, and drank rum directly out of the bottle, swaying my hips in my small Havana style shorts – so perhaps I'm starting to melt in. At least as much as a blond, blue-eyed, tall gal from the north could ever do.
A great day all together, where the only touristy thing I did was to check out the University. The rest of the day was calm, with an hour of salsa, a peso lunch of pizza and beer in the shade, two hours of Spanish, and a night spend drinking rum and dancing the night away on the Malcón.
Oh, and the night finished with another downpour. But this time we managed to seek cover in time.
Comments
Puss puss fran Geneve, sakar dig