First Cali style lesson.

After going out to buy some French bread at a bakery behind the hostel we sat down to break fast of bread, jam, pineapple and a blackberry smoothie, feeling quite full (and healthy for a change!!) we decided to get some some blogs up to date before our first lesson in cali style. We had been informed that it 'not possible' to walk to where our lesson would be, we're not sure if this is because it's dangerous or they think it's too far, so we caught a taxi from the hostel and set off. When we gave the address to the driver however he quickly told us that it wasn't correct as the street address didn't correspond to the neighbourhood listed. He asked if we had a phone number for the lady, which we did, and then stopped by the side of the road to use a phone, something we have seen all across South America is lots of people standing by the side of the road with mobile phones which anyone can pay to use. He was on the phone for about 10 mins trying to get the correct address as the streets here are all either Calle or Carrera which on the phone must have sounded very similar!! Anyway he eventually got the correct one and we arrived just before 2 o'clock and also 2 mins before our teacher. After some quick introductions we quickly started with learning the basic steps of Cali style salsa, of which there are 6. We then progressed to a little bit of partner work and as we picked it up quite quickly we also learned some more advances steps. We also learned a little of a very strange dance called Salsa-Choke which is a fusion apparently with music that sounds a little reggatonish and has a basic step like a fast bachata. It was very hot in the room and by the time the hours lesson was over we were both drenched in sweat, but very happy to at least be dancing again!! We talked with Jacqui some more as we looked for a taxi back to the hostel and she invited us to watch one of her performance groups rehearsing that evening and join in a sort of Zumba class she does which includes all the basic steps from various dances which would allow us to practice. We agree to this and said our goodbyes for now as we got in another taxi back to the hostel. By this time it was around 4 and we just had time to have a shower each, go to the supermarket for some tomatoes and cook dinner of spaghetti with a tomato, onion and garlic sauce (NOM!!) before we needed to catch yet another taxi back to the studio arriving for the last 20 mins of the rehearsal. The group we were watching is her 'beginner' group who have been dancing for about 8 months and are now rehearsing for a performance which they will be giving tomorrow night, Jacqui, who is lovely and really enthusiastic, of course invited us to this as well and we of course agreed to go. At about 10 past 8 the rehearsals stopped and we all lined up for the class including about 6 other who had come solely for the class and the performers. This class lasted an hour and just like she said included all the basics we had learned that day as well as basics in some other danced including bachata and merengue. We finished the class drenched once more and sat down to rest for a while. Eventually when we had caught our breath we asked if they would like a short demo of kizomba as they hadn't heard of it, so we put some music on the ipod and danced around for one song. After this we were then asked to do a short demo of the things we had learned as well as a sort of crossbody/Cali style fusion. All our demo got a warm round of applause from the students after which they decided they should get back to rehearsing. We stayed until about 10 when Jacqui asked what we were planning to do now. We told her that we were thinking about finding a salsa club and she quickly offered to go with us, first though we went back to her house by taxi so she could get changed and we watched several youtube videos from last years 'World Salsa Festival' which takes place every year in Cali. When she was ready, us, her and her son caught a taxi to an area of town called La Alameda where there are a few salsa clubs, after checking that none of them had shows on tonight we ended up in one club briefly, until we found out how much they expected us to spend on drinks just for being there (over $40) this is far above our budget and actually more expensive than many clubs in London so we quickly left. Slightly annoyed at these ridiculous prices and with nowhere cheaper available we were forced to give up on this idea and catch a taxi back to the hostel.