On tuesday I went to check out the local salsa venue and there were about 10 ppl there. I wore my trainers and had a few dances… then last night (thursday) I went out again to a proper night there. It was absolutely heaving and I got turned down by at least the first 5 people I asked! I was starting to lose my mojo when finally

“Do you want to dance? C’mon! I’ve come all the way from the UK and I can’t get a dance!”
“Do you know how to salsa?”
“Oh, I KNOW how to SALSA! It’s getting santa barbara girls to dance that I can’t figure out”
“Oh, I’m not from santa barbara”
“Well, we’ll be fine then!”

After that I started getting warmed up, but it was uphill all the way! More getting turned down and a few more dances, then when the third person said “do you know how to salsa?” I said “what is it about my face that says ‘this guy can’t salsa?! ‘” to which the reply was “well, we don’t know you…” so THAT’s it! They’re all just a bit cliquey and a bit timid! Or maybe they get lots of drunk gringos coming in for a grope… So from then on, I decided I had to use tonight to make my mark and loosen this crowd up a bit. I made sure I did my best moves in full view of people who I’d already figured for good dancers… by the end of the night I’d impressed a couple of girls, left a couple indifferent, and resolved not to ask certain girls again for a week or two!

They dance a sort of L.A. style salsa, which led to some interesting interpretations of my lead, but also they nearly all do cha-cha-cha, machata and merengue like you’ll never see in leeds! Much faster and though it still looks funny, it doesn’t look funny-crap but funny-cool.

One girl had her birthday so they played a salsa “happy birthday” and she danced in the middle of a ring of loads of guys, who each cut in in turn - I thought that was really cute!

I heard a couple of tracks that I want to track down and bring home. The DJ was up on a high plinth and spoke spanish all night so I didn’t get to ask him who and what they were… but I’ll have a browse and seef I can come back with some…