Last night was a confirmation of just why I love life in Austin. One pivotal member of the tango community, especially the part of the community that takes classes at EsquinaTango, has been suffering health problems along with the accompanying exorbitant costs. As a creative fundraising idea, one of our regular milongas was turned into an entertaining cultural event where all the proceeds went to Tom.
A committee was formed to plan out the evening, which consisted of Indian themed cloth to decorate the space, a group of Bollywood dancers who practiced especially to perform for the evening, Indian food and of course, our tango teachers performed.
I arrived just in time for the tango and Bollywood performances, which meant that I totally missed the tango dancing for the evening. Nonetheless, I had danced about 6 luxurious hours of tango in the past week; so I didn’t feel that I missed out on too much. Besides, when I entered, the tango line of dance looked far too crowded to be much fun.
I went to the back room to change shoes and returned to the dance hall to pour myself a glass of wine and enjoy the performances. I was so delighted to see Tom again and he seemed in such good spirits that so many people would come together in his honor. Here’s a man who tirelessly gave a lot of his time and carpentry skills to renovate the space that we all have come to love.
We were forewarned not to expect a speech from him, but Tom was so moved by the turn out and mix of people that the room hushed to hear his wise words, advising us that if we enjoyed multicultural events such as the one we were currently attending, then we should do all that we could to support our little tango school. I couldn’t agree more.
Not only did the tango and Bollywood communities had come together, but many of us reached deep into our closets to retrieve our Indian attire for the event. So often at milongas, people stick to dark colors, especially black, and usually contrast black with either white and/or red. What a visual relief to see bright greens, blues, yellows and oranges. The festiveness of the swirling colors added to the positive fun energy.
After the performances, the crowd thinned since most of the pure tangueros left. Those of us who stayed did our best to dance to Indian music, which had quite a range from traditional to hip-hop and reggaeton. A few salsas and cumbias were mixed in, but every single song inspired sweat-drenched movement.
Before I left, I cooled down with a glass of water in front of a fan and I also suggested to one of the tango teachers that Esquina should have an ethnic-themed milonga at least once a season. Monthly would be a little too often, but we should not wait until one of our members needed help. We should be proactively embracing the talent and cultural population that we have.