Rueda in the Park in the Paper

Those of you who have read my older posts know that I already did a little bit of coverage on the casino rueda salsa group called Rueda in the Park. I did a slide show of the Santa Clarita/Newhall chapter, which meets the 2nd and 4th Sundays of the months and teaches the fun Cuban style of salsa, rueda.

Well, I took it step further. Here is an ARTICLE I wrote profiling the Newhall chapter and telling the story of how it sprouted out of the original Griffith Park group. It came out in The Signal, the Santa Clarita newspaper I where I am interning/freelancing.

Stay tuned. More insight into the world of casino rueda is coming very soon...

2008 L.A. Salsa Congress

This weekend marked the 10th annual Los Angeles Salsa Congress. For those of you who don't know what that means, let me translate--4 days of nonstop salsa.

The event is held at the Radisson Hotel near LAX and consists of classes by professionals during the day, salsa music and dancing by the pool in the afternoon, performances at night and live music and dancing until 4 in the morning.

It's an entire weekend of being surrounded by people with the same crazed salsa obsession. You're sure to find people randomly dancing in the lobby, the parking lot, maybe even the bathroom.

Besides the great shared salsa vibe, a large part of the appeal is that you get to dance with people form all over the world. According to the L.A. Congress coordinator and a well-known L.A. salsa promoter, Albert Torres, teams from 47 different countries participated in this year's Congress.

I went to Congress Friday night and heard Cheo Feliciano and the New Swing Sextet perform live. I danced with people from Montreal, Mexico City and probably a lot of other countries I would have known about had I asked each person I encountered.

It's a great way to step out of your usual salsa circle, but you have to make sure you do just that. Since the event is held in L.A., it's still easy to get trapped in your usual routine, dancing with people you recognize from Steven's Steakhouse, the Granada, the Mayan or wherever you dance. If you dance a lot in L.A., you'll probably see a lot of familiar faces.

But for those of you going tonight and next year, here's my advice--take advantage of the diversity and dance with someone you don't know. Salsa with someone from Japan or Argentina or Puerto Rico. I'm sure it's not something you get to do every time you throw on your dance shoes.