El Cafe Latino and the Latin Dance Community in Tokyo (Roppongi)

I find myself walking through the doors of this Latin bar in Roppongi, Tokyo quite often. I'm even planning to tomorrow!

 My image of Roppongi when I first moved to Japan was not the greatest one. I'd only heard crazy stories from friends who often went out clubbing and partying, which isn't really my scene. I remember when I'd started dancing salsa and bachata, I was always hearing about El Cafe Latino in Roppongi as the place to go for latin dance. I'd heard people refer to it often, and measure the level of how crowded a dance spot is as "el cafe on a Friday or Saturday night". It's the place everyone goes to dance, or ends up at after any dance event at another location ends. 

The first dance event I went to in Roppongi was at Pepe (another great dancing spot), when I'd first entered the Tokyo Latin dance community outside of HTDC. Pepe is like a dance studio that also has a bar, but the main purpose people usually go is for dance. Sometimes they have performances, and are a little bit on the pricier side to get in. I suppose it depends on the day and the event, but it usually finishes up at 11:30. El Cafe continues until later, I think until morning on weekends, but I have yet to pull an all-nighter there.

I remember the first time I was wanting to try going to El Cafe was when I was VERY new to salsa and bachata. I hadn't officially started taking HTDC salsa and bachata lessons, but I'd went to their Halloween event, knew a little bit beyond the basics, and had been going regularly to the HTDC Club J social dances. I'd already been bitten by the salsa bug, and the venom was still sinking in. There was a joint lesson and event at Pepe that included a west coast swing dance lesson with the teacher Okacchi who I'd take a few lessons with before. Even though I felt like I couldn't really get the hang of west coast swing, I really liked the teachers and their community, so I thought this would be a great way to get to see and dance with them again, and also kind of get a feel for the Roppongi Latin dance world, along with trying try to dance and learn more bachata out in the wild. But, as I tend to do when I'm excited and going to a new place to try a new thing, I arrived in Roppongi suuuuper early...so I thought I would take a look and see where and what this famous El Cafe Latino place was all about! I found and went to where it was, but I was too scared to go in...it was also really early, and still daylight, but they were open.

 It's so funny reminiscing about this 😆 Now, I walk through the doors of El Cafe on any day of the week confident, greeting, even hugging the bartenders and workers and other regulars offenders, get a drink with my drink ticket, and then grab the nearest person I recognize as a dancer on the upper-floor to dance with me while we wait for whatever lesson is going on downstairs to end 😆

Every time I come to El Cafe, I’m greeted with warm smiles and a hug, and always asked how I am doing 😊 The answer is almost always the same though. No matter how I’m feeling before I walk through that door, I know as soon as I’m there, I’ll see lots of friends, meet many potential new friends, and dance until I can’t dance anymore! 😁💃 So, I always say that I'm great! Or, what I said the last time I came, now that I'm here and going to dance, I'm great!

 If you’d told me when I first came to Tokyo, that I’d be spending most of my nights dancing salsa and bachata in Roppongi, I would not have believed it 😆 But, I am so glad to have found my passion and people who share it here and now in in Japan. It's so crazy to think about the fact that I've never been able to be so into the latin side of my heritage until I came to Japan and Japanese dancers taught me how to move like a Latina XD I love it 💕 Today I danced with a guy from Russia who told me there’s no way I learned how to dance like this in Japan, but, actually, I did, so I told him! Thank you again Hiro and Taku 😆

Weekend of Dancing and a Fancy Hilton Sushi Lunch

 My legs and abs are sooooore, but I'm happy. I've lost 2 kilos since getting so much into dance recently, and my whole weekend was spent dancing! 

It started off with Midsummer rehearsal. We had an extra long rehearsal day, so I already knew couldn't make the weekly swing dance event I usually go to. The fairies didn't have too much to work on, so I requested that we work on the dance a lot, because I am majorly sucking at it, even though I've been doing so much (totally different genre) dancing lately. I don't have a lot of space to practice at home, and watching the videos of the dances doesn't help me very much, and I wanted to practice as a group. We did it so many times, and I think I've (maybe) finally got it! 

Then on Sunday night, starting late, as all these latin dance events always tend to, the event that had West Coast swing and bachata in Roppongi last week happened again this week. It's every Sunday at Studio Pepe hosted by Pa' Lante Dance company, but the lessons change. The bachata lesson always happens, and it quickly covers basics for the newbies, then usually a new intermediatish level move after. At least that's how it's been the past 2 times I've been so far. Before the bachata lesson there is another type of dance lesson, and this week was a zouk lesson which I skipped because I have no idea what zouk is or if I wanna try to learn it. I danced LOTS and it was really fun! I met some of the same people from last time, plus some new faces. I have noticed that there are a lot more briefly passing through travelers and new arrivals now that Japan has opened back up.

Then on Monday, me and husband finally used our amazing wedding present from the Moband members! It was a dinner ticket to like a suuuuper fancy place and it covered a $300ish dinner for 2. We ended up choosing this really fancy sushi course thing that was at the Tokyo Hilton hotel. It was DELICIOUS, but these fancy course meals always leave you hungry XD This one gave a decent amount sushi-wise, but we both agreed that we could have easily eaten a whole second platter of the sushi, each.

This was mine, because they asked us at the beginning if we had any food allergies or things we didn't like, which I did, so they accommodated my pickiness

This is the original

Then, red miso soup that was super yummy!

They noticed that husband is left-handed and placed the dessert spoon accordingly for him!

Black sugar ice cream, red bean paste, and mochi

After eating, we went home and cuddled and read together for a bit, then he took a nap while I worked a little on the Midsummer costumes. Then, I went to my second salsa social dance with the HTDC salsa people in Ebisu! I went for the first time on Halloween. It's every other week on Mondays, the social dance, and I'd been super looking forward it! Their first trial lesson is free, and I already knew the basics, so I just went to the social dance this time. After Midsummer is over, I think I want to start taking salsa lessons with them, because they are so good at dancing, teaching, leading, following, and they're just all such cool people! I was talking with Taku, the teacher guy, and right when a new song began, I asked him to dance, and he said he was just about to ask me to dance! We've danced together 3 times in all, but it's funny because always right when I decide to ask him to dance, he asks right before me, but this time, I beat him! The dance teachers always know what they're doing, and the dance will definitely be fun because they know how lo lead well, even if you're a noob like me XD. 

It's always fun to watch and see who you think is a super good dancer, and then don't be intimidated, just ask them to dance! It's how you can learn new stuff, build your confidence dancing, and the best part? Making friends! Like seriously, everyone is super nice and patient if I can't figure out a move that's new for me, and some people even teach me how it goes and then try it again. Many people in the latin dance community can speak English, and are patient with my Japanese either way. 

West Coast Swing and Bachata in Roppongi

Hello world! 

So…

As I mentioned before, I was planning to try west coast swing again at an event along with bachata.

We had rehearsal for Midsummer on Sunday. Husband was practicing the fighting and action scenes after rehearsal, and I was talking costumes with people. He was still rehearsing, but I had costume stuff I wanted to shop for so I decided to go early. Off I went to the Nippori area which is (hahahahahaha, I knew this already and totally forgot) closed on Sundays!

So, I decided to head to Roppongi early, before the dance thing and wander a bit, because I don’t know Roppongi at all.  It felt like a whole different country.

I went to find where the event I'd planned on attending was, and walked past it to hang around Roppongi station, and read my book and drink some wine by myself while I waited for the thing to start. Then, I headed back and paid the fee to enter. I saw the cool West Coast swing couple I'd met, and got checked in by another guy I didn't know, who I later learned was the bachata teacher.

I was super shy at first, but the West Coast Swing lesson was the super basics that I'd already known, so I felt better. After that was a basic bachata lesson, which I also felt pretty ok with. I don't know much bachata, but it weirdly feels really comfortable and easy for me to pick up. We learned a kind of complicated move after the basics, and he moved quickly with the lesson which was fine with me. 

Then the social dance began! Lots of people joined by that point, and the majority of the dance music was bachata, with a bit of west coast swing thrown in.  I danced maybe my first successful west coast swing dance this night probably XD There was some merengue also thrown in, but I didn't remember what I'd learned of it as a kid, so I skipped it. Also a few salsa songs were thrown in too! I was excited and asked someone to dance right away, and they asked me "1 or 2?" and I was like "...Huh?" and they said "New York or LA?", which I misunderstood as like a "where are you from" question, so I was like NY because that's where I was born, buuuut then he started leading something I did not at all understand, so that's how I learned that there are 2 types of salsa.

I danced with an Australian guy and mentioned that I was an English teacher, and he said there's a whole group of English teachers there, and he introduced me. One girl was super excited to see that I also have a tooth gap! I have a love/hate relationship with this little feature I was born with, but she made me feel happy to have it. Also, on the topic of my natural features that I have love/hate relationships with, my hair was a star this night. 

I mentioned that I was half Dominican, and they all got excited and introduced me to their Dominican friend, and then I found out that the bachata teacher also is Dominican! They told him, and he lit up and asked me, in Spanish, if I could speak Spanish, which I could understand what he was asking me, but my natural reaction was to respond in Japanese to tell him that I didn't know Spanish, and everyone laughed XD

Anyway, I danced nonstop, met many amazing people, fell even more in love with bachata, and am planning to go again this Sunday (and maybe swing too if rehearsal lets me)! Then on Monday, I plan to go to the salsa place I went to in Ebisu again! 

My work life is a crazy hectic mess, but I'm looking forward to the days I can dance to get me through the week.