Música y Baila

At last count I think there were 628 different styles of music in Perú and a different dance to go with each one... salsa, reggaetón, merengue (just to name a few) and I can´t forget the music style dejour, cumbia. Each type of music has its own dance whether it´s a few rythmic steps or an entire choreographed performance and it seems as though everyone knows exactly how to move to them on the dance floor. I would love to learn at least a couple of these dances before I leave and I´m hoping to take a class or two (one that would teach me a traditional dance from Huancayo and maybe a salsa class as well). Still, probably the best way to learn the more popular shake-your-thang-on-the-dance-floor dances is just to get out there and obvserve. So a few weeks ago when Faviola, Iris and Victor´s 19 year-old daughter, asked me to go out with her and her friends what else could I say besides, ¨Music, dancing and a beverage or two? Sign me up! I´m all over it!¨ And so the night commenced...


As you can see in the photo, I quickly put on my fancy, I´m-actually-leaving-the-house, Peruvian clothes (new US$7 Peruvian shirt and ridiculously expensive, for Peruvian standards and US standards for that matter, J. Crew match stick jeans). Next to me is the adorable and brilliant Favi. How cute is she!?! During the latter part of July/beginning of August she was home for a few weeks from the University of Lima where she is studing psychology. This photo is also great because it actually shows a bit of the house I live in and for those of you who still think I live in a cave (((shaking my head at you))) you can see that that is not the case in the slightest. If you were to walk in the front door of my Huancayo house this is what you would see. The living room is to the left of the picture. The dining room is behind me. Through the arched doorway is the kitchen and the glass door that is perpendicular to the wall with the arched doorway leads out to the carport. Outside the frame of the picture to the right are the stairs that lead to the second floor and my bedroom.


I just had to put in this picture too... mostly to show you that I´m wearing flats. I was told that I wasn´t allowed to wear heels that night. Can you even imagine me without heels!?! Man, I´m roughing it down here. Anyway, Favi wore heels... I´m only slightly jealous. Also, please note the golden box along the wall behind Favi and me. That is a huge box full of I don´t know how many cans of evaporated milk... because why drink real milk when you can drink evaporated milk. It will help your kids grow tall and strong just as the commercials say... but I´m getting off topic.


After getting dolled-up Favi and I met up with her friends. Here are my adorable companions for the night. From right to left is Favi, her boyfriend Frank and a friend of her boyfriend´s whose name I have sadly forgotten.

Favi and her boyfriend. Cute cute.

Me and Favi´s boyfriend´s friend. I am a little upset that he kind of looks um... dead inside in this photo. I´m not sure if it´s me that made him look this way or if it is just another Peruvian quirk. I assure you that people do smile, laugh and have fun here but when the camera flash goes off they have a way of looking... well, like my friend above.

The second or third bar we went to had live music... LOVE IT! Does it get any better than that!?! I´m really not sure it does... so I was inspried to try a little salsa dancing. It turns out (as if I didn´t know this before) I am horribly uncoordinated... and to make matters worse I tend to contort my face when I dance (my deepest apologies to those of you who have had to dance with me before). Anyway, in the following pictures you can see the many forms my face takes on as I try to produce a little rythm. Oh well, at least I´m having fun, right... although I´m pretty sure the Peruana in the background is looking at me and thinking, ¨Pobre blanquita!¨

This is apparently what I look like when I can´t dance or speak Spanish. I think I just finished saying something like, ¨Sorry, I have absolutely no clue what I am doing.¨ Oh boy...

Finally a move I can do! Thank you Lois and Paige Wahrenburg for teaching me at a very young age how to kitchen dance, aka put one arm in the air and spin in a circle. It is my signature move nowadays after all. Unfortuantely, while spinning in a circle is huge here, putting your arm in the air is not... but really I can´t control it. Ask me to spin in a circle and my arm automatically goes up (and from this picture it looks as though my tongue comes out of my mouth as well). What is a girl to do...

Now Favi and Frank really could dance. I wish I would have taken a video of them but it totally slipped my mind. I mean seriously, there were all types of spins going on I could barely keep track of where the cute couple was on the dance floor. Adorable!

The night finally ended at 4am after a lot of music, a lot of dancing, and a lot of drinking... I was even able to use new phrases such as ¨No me toces!¨ and ¨No me beses!¨ The above photo was taken while I was slumped down on the couch trying not to fall asleep, thinking to myself ¨I am way too old for this,¨ and Favi and her friends were trying to convince me that 6am is a much more respectable quitting time than 4am. Turns out I won the discussion and we went home. Sorry to disappoint.

Either way, my night out with the youth of Perú taught me many things but most of all I have decided that I am more of a comedic dancer than a suave latina dancer. Give me some disco and I can mimic John Travolta perfectly (at least it´s perfect in my mind). 80´s music? Even better! I´m all over it. The only thing I am lacking here are my friends who, without question, will get up and make complete fools of themselves with me. It is why I am friends with them afterall. I need Amy to do the robot or John to bust out his Michael Jackson moves. I need Paigie, Erin or my cousins, Timmy and Chad here with me to do the sprinkler or better yet, why not cross the dance floor doing a little grocery shopping. Need a ride on the bus? Hop on. These moves I can do... easy. Perhaps next time I go out I´ll showcase some of my favorate dance moves taken fresh from um... the privacy of my own home and revolutionize dance in South America. Just maybe...