It is Saturday evening. I am in a large, dimly lit room with a smooth, hardwood floor. There is music playing. It has accordians, violins, guitars, and people singing in Spanish. I am sitting at a small table to one side, slowly sipping an Irish whiskey and watching the main activity on the floor. Like many of the men here, I am wearing a dark dress shirt and pants, a dark sports jacket, and dress shoes. All of the women (and there are more of them than the men) are also dressed formally. The average person is about my age, but there are people in their twenties, and others in their forties, fifties, or sixties.

Talking with my occasional companions at the table, I learn that in the early 1900s there were a large number of migrant workers who came to work in Argentina. Most of them were male. In Argentina, they developed their own music and their own style of dance. The music was a mixture of many different cultures. While what I am listening to has a very definite Latin sound, the accordian reminds me of polka and the female singers have an operatic quality to their voices.

The dancing is very close. People's cheeks frequently touch, and one woman appears to press and lean into her partners as they hold her. Steps are gliding with occasional kicks. According to my companions, the man has the more difficult job. He is in control. His steps guide hers, and pressure from his shoulders directs her. An accomplished male dancer can make an inexperienced partner look good, just using body language to show her what he wants next. It doesn't look that difficult, but apparently it takes months to master even the basics. There is even an art to asking a woman to dance. Perhaps because it originated among immigrants who did not speak the same language, a man is supposed signal a woman that he wants to dance with purely with his posture and his eyes.

A milonga is an event where one does the tango. A milongeura is a woman who dances at the milonga, and a milongeuro is a man who dances at the milonga. I am not a milongeuro tonight, but I am enjoying myself, and I've met some very nice people who I wouldn't mind spending an evening with again. So maybe I can overcome an old phobia and make some new friends. I guess it depends on whether I get a second date out of this. Regardless, it has been fun.