Pablo Veron, known from the movie ‘The Tango Lesson’ and a maestro who regularly visits Brussels, had a very unpleasant encounter recently with a Russian woman who wouldn’t take no for an answer.
It was a Saturday night, I finished a whole day of workshops and I was exhausted because I took a plane at 5AM from LA the same day. I went anyway to ANM to enjoy the company of a few friends that insisted I go and relax a bit, talking and dancing. So I was sitting with my friends in the corner and that woman (NB) came at me from across the floor with the purpose that she must dance with me. She could not accept I did not say yes, even with her aggressive way of asking. One could hardly imagine she’s so sophisticated and elegant like Jurgen says, with her red scarlet dress, walking hard toward me through the middle of the floor where people where dancing, Interrupting abruptly the conversation I had with my friends, she spoke loudly and rudely to me, asked if I was Pablo Veron and said that she wanted to dance.
My instinctive self protecting reaction was to say “No, I’m not” and my friends start to say the same, that I’m a guy that looks like him. They had the feeling right away that I was embarrassed and felt in a very uncomfortable situation. She ask me for lessons and I say that tomorrow, Sunday, I’ll give a workshop, she could consult with Karina Romero, the organizer. She says, “No, I want a lesson now, I want you to dance with me now,” and I explained to her, traditionally, in tango that it does not work that way, and Rosa also made an intervention saying so as well. She says, “I am from Russia and that’s the way it works in my country,” and just kept insisting saying “I’m here to dance with you, come dance with me now” using her finger in a very offensive manner to describe the way I should come from my chair to her.
Continue reading ‘When you get invited, you can say no’
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