the first 2 nights (wednesday and thursday nights) were spent working so we didn't get to go out at all. the supposedly last night, friday night was the only night we have to actually go and have some fun. luckily my senior colleague (yeah he tagged along for the s@lsa hunting adventure) suggested that we stay another day, since (i) it's so far away, (ii) he brought a camera and hasn't used it at all, (iii) we're already there, (iv) we worked so hard, didn't get to enjoy ourselves at all and (v) it's weekend anyway. hehe. i called MAS in malaysia (local office was closed) and rescheduled our flight to sunday morning, so there - we got 2 nights to hunt. (s@lsa hunting, what were u thinking? :p)
friday night itself, 7pm i went online, finished typing my reports to our manager and i searched for s@lsa spots in taipei. i looked at soo's email to me (i asked her for information previously, and her email was very helpful) and hongkongs@lsa's yahoo site and i got 2 possible places to s@lsa in taipei. there was 2 more but they were in taichung and tainan respectively, too far away from taipei.
i decided to go to the first one coz it's the nearest to my hotel, the second one was 3 times further, so i thought i'd probably go there on saturday. The first one is in Westin Hotel, called S@lsa@Seans. It's a pretty good place, but a quite small dance floor. Not as big as El Nino, probably around S@lsabor's size. There were an elevated dance floor but that's probably fit for one or two couples. To my disappointment, they play so much more merengue than s@lsa. And when s@lsa song is played, there weren't that many people doing s@lsa on the dance floor. Only 2 couples were doing it (looked like beginners), the rest just gyrates. At a corner, there's a girl showing some people steps but they were so far away so I didn't get to dance with her. Finally, when the band stops playing and it got to the resting period for the bands, I danced with one of the band members. According to her, they were from Cuba (I think... can't really remember :p) and the other 2 singers also know how to s@lsa but i didn't get to dance with them coz after we danced, the band starts again and it was the final period for them to play.
All in all, it's either the s@lsa group didn't show up or it's a lousy day to s@lsa. Whenever merengue music comes, people would rush to the dance floor and dance but whenever s@lsa comes on, only 1 or 2 couple. How sad. And when the band asked them which one to play, s@lsa, cha cha or merengue, the crowd chants of merengue, full of enthusiasm. there is these group of closely knitted people, who seemed to be good in merengue so i thought they might know s@lsa too. i didn't get to dance with any of the girls coz there were so few s@lsa songs and i couldn't actually gauge which one knew how to dance. and u guys should know i suck in merengue so i didn't dance that. hehe, what a waste. *sigh* when i left at 2pm and approached one of the band members and asked why there weren't much s@lsa, he said that he had to comply with the crowd, and he said that if i'd asked for it, he'd play it. i understand the first part, if merengue is the one that sells, he will have to play it. for the second point, i said to myself, i will probably return the next day.. with a vengeance....
i asked him whether he knows of any other place that i could dance s@lsa at and all i got was... negative. he didn't know.
the next morning was sight seeing time, so nothing to tell u guys about :p.
night time, it was about 7pm when we headed to this night market, and surprisingly, we bump into this group of people i said were good in merengue. apparently they saw my colleague and thought that he's a Latino. they thought i'm local :p. anyways, we found out that they came from Dominican Republic, and were there studying. I don't think they're members of any classes that teach s@lsa.. I asked them for places I could s@lsa and I got another place which is nearby. I decided to go there since they said they were going there. According to them there will be a party there, which starts at 9pm.
At 9.30pm me and my colleague headed to S@lsa Latina, somewhere in town. When we got there, there were quite a number of people there and a table set with food n stuff. Apparently it was somebody's birthday party -_-, but luckily there was s@lsa songs! 2 couples were on the dance floor, 1 couple, the guy were teaching the girl (simple steps) and the other, the girl teaching the guy (also simple steps).... (oh no....). So I and my colleague waited for the crowd to come, and much later the crowd starts to build up, apparently more of the birthday boy's friends rather than frequent salseros. (oh no...). anyways, when s@lsa music plays, i asked to dance with this girl (the one in one of the 2 couples dancing that were teaching the guy simple steps) who looks like a caucasian. to my surprise she knew s@lsa, and to my surprise (again) she came from russia and to my surprise (again!) that the s@lsa scene is much more active in her hometown (st. petersburg, russia.. i didn't know people s@lsa in russia.. hmmmmm) than taiwan. she told me that she came to taiwan for 9 months, and that is the length of time since the last time she danced proper s@lsa... of course.. until i asked her to dance. hehe. the other guy (who is a south american in the other group, teaching another girl simple steps) didn't know LA s@lsa and he was confused (he asked, "this is s@lsa?") when she showed him the steps. and she said nobody knew what was rueda.
she said she couldn't find any place to s@lsa, and she was disappointed when she came to taiwan. hmmm, i can't give much opinions since i was only there for 2 nights, but it seemed as if people loved merengue much more than s@lsa there. i wonder where all the frequent salseros gone. got several more dances with her while my colleague were chatting away with her pretty japanese friend, hehe. couldn't danced the night away with her coz it was 11pm and the pub had to lower down the music coz they're in a residential area and with the noise, u can't hear any music at all.
anyways, i went back to S@lsa@Seans at midnight and the group from Dominican were there (yes!)... without the girls. (oh no....) i requested for s@lsa songs with the bands, and happily obliging the request, they played it (yippee!), saying that it was a special request from their "cina-friend" to which they asked where were i from (yes, from the stage.. and u guys know how shy i am), and to which i answered malaysia. when they started playing, i knew that i had to make it a worthwhile effort on their side (if they play it and nobody dance, and the requester, yours truly didn't even dance, then probably they might not play anymore s@lsa). so i looked around for somebody to dance with, and i saw this girl who were at the S@lsa Latina earlier and who seemed to know the steps (she danced with a guy from Venezuela earlier, didn't get to dance with her earlier coz she disappeared.) so i asked her to dance. other than us, nobody else danced s@lsa (me and my colleague came late, midnight so probably the frequent salseros might have gone home) so i was pretty much disappointed.
all in all, i think that people liked merengue better there. people cheer for merengue, unlike in malaysia where we cheered for s@lsa. i mean, i'm not against merengue but i think there should be balance... on a more positive note, at least there *is* s@lsa after all. giving taiwan the benefit of the doubt, maybe the salseros there came earlier or maybe i came at a wrong time.
if it weren't for SARS, i would've stayed longer and taken a detour trip to hong kong. and i probably would've asked sasha (the russian girl) along.
