Dancing the tango in Argentina takes more than just a command of the steps and some semblance of rhythm. You also need to understand the subtle signals that regulate life in a milonga, or tango hall, where tradition still holds great sway. With one misstep, you may kiss finding a partner good-bye.
Partnering up
The man always invites the woman to dance, but not verbally. Instead, he tries to catch his desired partner's eyes from across the room and nods, a move called a cabeceo. This allows a woman to avoid a man she doesn't want to dance with and saves the fragile male ego the humiliation of being turned down publicly. "Some even consider it a faux pas to walk over to a woman's table when she is not looking at you," says Julio Balmaceda, a tango dancer and instructor in Buenos Aires.
After a woman accepts a man's cabeceo with a nod or a smile, they meet on the dance floor. A tango at a milonga is essentially a 12-minute date -- pairs usually start dancing at the beginning of a three-to-four-song set called a tanda and then switch partners during the musical interludes that separate the sets. Breaking off a dance in the middle of a tanda is considered an insult. A pair who dance together for three tandas in a row are proclaiming themselves off-limits to other prospective partners.
"Unless you want to dance with the woman you came with all night, you have to make signals to other men that it's all right to ask her to dance -- by dancing with other women yourself or sitting at separate tables, for example," says Marina Palmer, author of "Kiss & Tango: Diary of a Dancehall Seductress."
Dressing up
Sneakers and jeans are acceptable at some informal dance halls, but at traditional milongas, men wear suits and dress shoes and women opt for clingy dresses and spiky heels. "People with beat-up shoes don't get asked to dance -- it's similar to smelling bad or having stained clothes," says Alicia Muñiz, co-owner of the Buenos Aires tango shoe store Comme Il Faut. BudgetTravel.com: Buenos Aires trip coaching
Manning up
