Exhilarating Salsa Day - Rueda Practice

The evening got to a hilarious start on my way to New Harbour, our designated dinner place.

I had e-mailed everyone in my rueda class my contact number so that they can contact me should they have challenges reaching us at our designated meeting places in our programme for the evening. Not only had I contacted my rueda class, I had also contacted many other friends to join us so that we would have a decent rueda circle no matter who's not available at each song.

I was searching in my bag for my handphone to contact a friend, when I spied my handphone pouch. Ok, I reassured myself, if my handphone poach is inside, my handphone should not be far off. However, much as I riffled through the contents of my handbag, I couldn't find my phone.

"Oh no, I've lost my phone!" was my first thought

Then, "Oh dear, how can my friends contact me!!!" was my second

I reached our meeting place early, where I spied on my friend who's attending the Argentina Tango class at En-motion. Quickly calling my home, I discovered to my relief that my handphone is at home. My mom however stood firm in not helping me find the contact list of the key people I would need to contact for the night. *sighz*

Dependable Do-do arrived early. "Do you have B's number?" was my harried question. He doesn't. So we went on a friend chain search. Calling ukigeta, I asked, "Do you have B's number?", he doesn't. So I asked for C's number, who is B's friend. As we waited for him to sms C's number, my mind turned on how to contact the rest of my rueda classmates.

And this is the reason why all Singaporeans should make it a point to be on time for appointments!

As my mind turned on how to contact my rueda mates, what should happen but everyone of my rueda mates who were supposed to eat dinner together turned up at our meeting place on the dot. It was such a relief to that I would be letting down less people with my forgetfulness. Also, they were so wonderful in contacting the rest of the rueda mates who would be meeting us later in the evening I could kiss everyone of them.

Starting off with wonderful company over wonderful abundant food, we made our way into union. That's when we got into a bit of a surprise there. Union had started a system of collecting money for the first drink before we can enter union. Not a huge biggie, but something to be aware and take into account of in planning to get into union on a friday before 9p.m.

On entering union, we wasted no time in starting our rueda circle and we bonded over laughs of our gaffes over all the moving rueda steps (e.g ocho, izequiera, el zero) and misdirected partnerwork.

Then we proceeded to JJSalsaRengue at their bi-weekly social night on Friday evenings where we met up with another classmate who had arrived. The music being played was some sort of wierd zouk-bachata variety, which gave us time to change our shoes and gathered together. But when the first salsa song was played, we quickly gathered into our rueda circle and practise our steps. The teamwork as we executed our moves, giving grace to callers who may not be leading the circle on time and patience as we teach each other the way to do the partnerwork is a wonderful, wonderful experience. Jackson was smiling from ear to ear when he saw our rueda circle.

It was nice dancing salsa one-on-one with my rueda classmates and super fun to dance with Ronnie who executed alot of unexpected moves. My stamina gave out though before the end of the song and I felt so bad. *blech* Do-do gave me a breather and an opportunity to express myself through open-hold bachata and cha-cha. Ukigeta is getting better and better at choosing nice cha-cha songs as a DJ. :)

I left at 11:40p.m, much later than I had planned because I had lost track of time! Super, duper fun, let's have rueda practise again soon!