Tango Train - Arrival and El Cielo Cafe

El Cielo cafe and bar, looking from the entrance towards door to the dance salon

In December, shortly after Christmas I went to the Tango Train milonga festival in Amsterdam because:

• There were lots of regular milongas
• There were no classes
• There was variety of hosts and venues
• It was easy to get between the milongas (I hired a bike)
• There was no registration. You could just turn up.
• There was no list of dos and don'ts, which I think are unnecessary and set the wrong tone
• There was variety of dancers and they were not the hand-picked preferences of encuentro and marathon organisers
• Because there were no classes it attracted social dancers, not class dancers
• Being just milongas, it was relatively cheap
• It was in a city, with other things to explore and a good place for a solo dancer not to stick out, compared to in e.g. Sol de Invierno which I also considered but which was hosted in a village.
• Many Dutch men are tall
• I knew one or two Dutch people who might be there
• In general I liked my experience so far of Dutch people and culture!

My husband had kindly given me the hotel points he accumulates with work.  I stayed then, feeling very lucky and very pampered in a smart hotel bang in the centre with lounge breakfast and evening drinks/hors d'oeuvres included.  If that had not been so, Amsterdam accommodation being so expensive, I doubt I would have gone.  Another version of this kind of festival of local milongas would be great in a cheaper city with a good vibe.

I was delayed in my plans to get to the El Cielo afternoon milonga on Tuesday 27th but went anyway to meet Albert at the cafe there for dinner.  He said to hurry up - there were a lot of extra guys that day.  In the event there was not much time left to both have supper and dance.  The salon looked nice and from the cafe DJ Oliver's music sounded good.  I knew that Oliver can no longer dance and it was sad but instructive to see his choice of track on his DJ page, Tanturi's La Vida Es Corta.

 This milonga ran in the afternoons of the Tango Train festival.  The cafe here was run by at least two different catering outfits changing over on different days. One was the CousCousClub  with the intriguing rubric:  Couscous and cocktails, slow food and fast fun. There was also, a picture of a naked woman.  It seemed very Dutch.  Prepare to be confused!  There were vegetarian and meat options and the other company provided something similar, I forget what exactly but I think there were some nice looking salads. The food was simple, cheap, popular. You ate it at rustic trestle tables with other dancers. 

Albert told me he lives in Friesland right in the north of the Netherlands but said he is moving to near Utrecht to be more central for tango. There will be trains that will get him back from out of town for 0130. From that location he will be able to dance all over the Netherlands.

In the cafe Albert introduced me to very tall Hans from Friesland who, amazingly, remembered me from TangoMagia some years before. "You picked the guys" he said and I smiled nervously wondering "What does he mean?", remembering that I probably had been fairly overt at that time. But Hans seemed amiable and easygoing. Then he said - we were all sitting down:  "You are very long, no?"
"Yes" I said, smiling.  Albert told me Hans has a milonga up there in Friesland.  I think it is the Salon Amarillo in Leeuwarden.  I liked Hans. He was careful in what he said and very quiet.  He was a nice dancer I found later.  We all discussed the options for the evening. There was Los Locos which many people had told me about, run by, among others, Wim who I knew.  There was some kind of tango-art milonga which had a lot of people interested on Facebook but did not interest me much and there was La Bruja.

I wanted to see if it was going to be as difficult there with the men as last time. I did not want to feel crushed by that milonga.  If milongas were like people I wanted to feel I could look at it full in the face and not be the first to look away or to leave it on good terms or at least to walk away without feeling beaten by the guys there.  I just wanted to see if it was going to be possible to have a good time there with the guys as well as the girls.  Why does entering some - many - milongas feel like being a stranger in a cold, unwelcoming land, even when the host does not seem to be like that?  Also, that contrast is unusual.

Luckily, on this evening, I was not alone.  Albert, who has danced for years surprised me by saying he had not been to La Bruja and Hans had been I think only once so we decided to all go. Albert had his bike too so he I and cycled part of the way together until he went to get his car.  Hans wanted to dance longer until the end of El Cielo so we me him there later.