Anne's Birthday

For her birthday this weekend Anne decided to go seek out a salsa bar as a change from the usual hip-hop clubs. Despite having work this morning, of course Me and Emma decided we had to go for an hour at least – it had originally been Emma’s suggestion after all. The plan was to meet at 10 o'clock, so we'd get there around 11. By twenty past, everyone was ready except Heidi. By half past, just as I was thinking about not bothering after all, Heidi arrived. Then it emerged Sharon was still missing. After protracted discussion, the first wave of us set off. We would each make our own way and meet up at the bar.

On route to the bus stop, the group somehow fractured further still, so that only five of the original thirty made it onto the bus. Some of the others got the next bus, others got taxis into town but then split up again as some had to go to the bank. Is this how it used to be before mobile phones were invented?

I was amongst those on the first bus, and was trying to persuade the others that we just head for the nearest bar, as we were already 45 minutes behind schedule, and the salsa bar (two connecting tubes away) would be closing in a few hours anyway. I almost had them won over on the steps of the subway, until I challenged Christa (who would not be swayed by words stubborn) to a round of rock-paper-scissors (rock-paper-scissors is huge here – the kids use it to settle all disputes, and nobody ever questions the outcome). Rashly, I went for scissors. She beat me, so we continued. We couldn't find it. We asked westerners, we asked Koreans. Nobody had a clue. Again I suggested just going to any damn bar, but they resisted still. Instead we went back to the tube station to await the others. To my surprise, they were there. Half of them anyway. The rest had missed the train and turned up 10 minutes later. Then of course we had have another 10 minute debate on what to do next, at the end of which I was about ready to slip away by myself, but as if by magic a mobile appeared, a called to information was placed, and we finally did reach the bar at about midnight. It was deserted. Literally. But it was a bar, and there were enough of us left to make the place seem at least half-full. It would turn out that we were just early, as the Koreans appeared a little later. And despite my bitching all the way there, it was fab. They played salsa and bachata, which nobody but me and Emma could dance to, but everyone enjoyed it nonetheless. We taught them as much as we could, and danced until we were nearly the only ones left (most of the others had gone on to a hip-hop after all). If you didn't know it already, Salsa Rocks.