Rueda 101 - for dummies and uncos (uncoordinated people)..

Last week there was no Rueda ... it just goes to show how much attention I pay to all of the notices read at the end of class - as I turned up when no-one else did. So by the time this week rolled around I was hanging out to try some Rueda moves and even have a go at calling.

Calling is a lot harder than it sounds - as I mentioned earlier the calls are in Spanish, which some people may be surprised to know, is not one of the two languages I speak (that's Kiwi and Ozzie). I have to spell the calls phonetically or make up silly phrases to remember them. For example - one of the calls we learnt this week is Daiquiri, which easy to remember as it involves alcohol (the first time I tried to call it I said Margaritar and everyone looked at me dumbfounded). The call to get out of it is recoger, which I pronounce wreck-her-hair.

Unfortunately being a male, my brain is only capable of doing one thing at a time. Whilst trying to remember calls in foreign languages it stops communication with the ears and the legs. The result is the caller (myself) being out of step with the music and (even worse) calling one move and performing another. The usual excuse for stuffing up a move is the call was misheard, but strangely, this is not acceptable when you are the caller.

The real trick to calling is timing of the call. The call should come on the one count. This gives the other dancers six counts before executing the manoeuvre and in my case six counts to have my partner explain the call. The other important thing is to make the calls clear - or in other words call real loud. To help in this there are hand signals that go along with some of the calls. For example: El Centro - point to the centre of the circle. The usefulness of this was demonstrated on Sunday at the practice session when Del, who was suffering from a bad case of the flu and had nearly lost her voice, was asked to call. We managed to make it through an entire Salsa song without hearing a single call.

Calls this week -

Daiquiri/recoger, Dame dos, dos con dos