Tango and traveling
People who are dancing tango, are aware of the power of this dance. The embrace has a healing effect, and tango is able to get you into the „flow” state. Once we are dancing more and become confident at the milongas of our city and country and we start to try out local tango festivals and marathons. and we get to know dancers from all over the world. And we begin to travel to international events in different countries spending more and more time at the airports.
Tango-dancing at the airport Facebook group
It isn’t a coincidence that Steve Slavsky was thinking on the same when he created the Facebook Meet-up group „Stranded at an Airport”. As „stranded” means shipwrecked / stalled, his idea was to address people who are waiting at an airport and they would like to dance tango meanwhile. The idea became so popular, that the group has today ca 16.000 members.
Here is a short description of the group:
Sitting at Midway Airport during a lightening storm, just sensing there is a Tanguera here with her Comme Il Fauts in her carry on waiting on her flight. And we miss the opportunity to dance.
This group is to make sure that never happens again!Stranded At An Airport, Tango Meet-up
©2013 Steve Slavsky (just in case!)
How does it work?
It is very simple. You are waiting at the airport for your departure, and you know that you have to wait for some time. There is a high chance, that at the same airport there is a tango dancer, who would happily join you dancing. You post in the facebook group that you are at xy airport, and would like to tango :)
For example:
“Leader at STL (main terminal, gate A8) until about 8:15am. Anyone around? EDIT: my flight is delayed for a couple of hours, I’m probably here until noon or so”
or:
“Four tangueras stranded at Brussels airport. Terminal A for the next three hours. Get here quick before we drink too much wine…”
Many times there is a positive response, and the dancing takes place. There are many examples of recorded videos in the mentioned facebook group, where you can watch this happening. Sometimes, there are even cases where two people were at the same milonga-marathon, but due to the high number of participants, they only meet at the airport and dance together
Interesting cases
There are plenty of this kind of stories in the group. I just want to show you two lovely examples:
1. Tango DJ at the airport
A really great tango DJ never lets his dancers down. For example Goran Nikšić from Zagreb, who created something astonishing at the Torino airport. He has 10 years of piano education, and just improvised it by having listened that milonga before.
After marathon Eroica Tango Marathon 2°edition… It’s not easy to stop dancing ♥️ Music: Goran Nikšić Dancers: Mahdad Eghbaly & Monika Katalin
Video: Natasa Djordjevic-Tadic
2. Tango Harmony Budapest Orchestra playing at the Airport
The Tango Harmony music band went on tour to Buenos Aires and they stopped in Rome to practice :) They also posted at the „Stranded At An Aiport” Facebook-group, hoping that other dancers will join them.
11.08.2018
Fiumicino Airport – Rome Waiting for the flights to Buenos Aires
Piazzolla: Michelangelo Tango
Harmony Budapest (Katalin Bartha, Alejandro Szabo, György Lázár, Ottó Nagy, Peter Bartha)
photo: Bartha Kata
11.08.2018
Fiumicino Airport – Rome Waiting the flights to Buenos Aires
Piazzolla: Michelangelo TangovHarmony Budapest (Katalin Bartha, Alejandro Szabo, György Lázár, Ottó Nagy, Peter Bartha)
