The Writer’s Corner features poetry, essays, short stories, satire and various fiction and non-fiction from SCAD Atlanta students. To submit your own work for the Writer’s Corner, email features@scadconnector.com.
‘Cali’ by Alejandro Bastidas.
“But … it’s Wednesday,” Madison said as we entered the salsa bar.
La Topa Tolondra, one of the most famous night clubs in Cali, Colombia, was packed with two hundred people around nine in the evening. The usual.
“So?” I said. “It’s always a good day for salsa. You said you wanted to know Cali, the real Cali, so here it is. You only get know a place when you know its people, and caleños never wait until the weekend to go dance.”
“I wish it were like this back home,” Madison said as I led her into the club.
“What’s it like there, anyway?” I yelled.
With hundreds of people smashing the floor tiles with their lightning-fast feet, and trumpets and drums blaring on the speakers, it was the only way for her to hear me.
“You go to your regular 9-5, fueled by nothing but caffeine and the fear of getting evicted next month, drive home in the collapsing interstate, get in a fight or two with some redneck who doesn’t know how to merge properly and can’t use the damn blinkers, arrive home, wave at the neighbors who you don’t really like, dodge their dog’s s*** on your lawn, and go inside the house to heat up leftover pizza in the microwave — and then you do it all over again.”
“Sounds like s***.”
“It is s***. That’s why I needed a break. To get as far away from Maine as possible.”
“Well, now you’re about to dance on a Wednesday until your feet start hurting and you become less tronca than the typical American.”
“Tronca?”
“Log. Tree. Stiff. You get it. Americans can’t dance by default. Yelling and jumping isn’tdancing.”
“People in Maine would disagree.”
“Whatever. But not all hope is lost. See that guy over there, with the bucket hat?” I said as I pointed with my lips, as caleños do.
She flashed her eyes at the stranger and was bewitched by his speed. “How does he move like that?”
The man spun like wheel in the eye of a hurricane, graceful and sure of his every step, consumed by a music foreign to his land, but all too familiar to his heart.
“That’s the Ducthman. Came here five months ago and tripped with his own feet when he tried to dance. Funniest thing we had seen in a while. Then he fell in love with a Colombian woman who would only go out with him if he learned how to dance, so he came here every single day, and became one of the best. The guy can dance better than me and I was born here.”
“Five months, huh? Can’t spare all that time. Gotta go back to my job.”
“That’s the big problem. It’s why you people are troncos.”
“What do you mean?”
“Always thinking about work work work, money money money. You just can’t forget about it unless you get wasted at some bar. That’s why you hate your life back home. There’s more to life than just work.”
“I have bills to pay. Quitting everything to dance my life away won’t help with that. Gotta eat, gotta pay rent, gotta—”
“I know, I know. I’m not asking you to leave everything behind. Not literally, at least. But you have to learn how to leave it behind, at least for a while, in there,” I said and pointed at the dance floor.
“I don’t even know how to dance.”
“The Dutchman said the same thing. Tronco mentality, tronco movements.”
“Will you teach me how to dance, then?”
“Thought you’d never ask. But first, tell me you see when you look at all those people.”
Madison paused to study the dancers, countless strangers merging into a spinning crowd, swapping partners, laughing and singing.
“They’re happy,” she answered. “It’s like nothing else matters to them. Their bodies are so sure of what they’re doing. And how can people smile so much? You do that in Maine and they’ll think you’re a creep.”
“Right now, it’s just them and the music. That’s a celebration of the little things in life. They have bills to pay too, families to maintain, problems and sorrows like the rest of us, but this is their sacred space. Their temple. You gotta learn how to find those in your life.”
“Your friend’s right,” said a bald guy to my left in perfect English, his Hawaiian shirt three sizes too big for his slim body. “Mind if I show you how to let go?”
Madison failed to contain her scowl.
“I—I’m good. Thanks, though.”
The man smiled and asked another woman to his right. She took his hand and led him into the dance floor as she sang to the pregón of Héctor Lavoe that played through the speakers.
“That was kinda creepy. He doesn’t even know me.”
“Half of the couples dancing together don’t know each other. It’s not creepy, just normal.”
“I doubt that.”
“People come here because they love salsa, not to find a random person to hook up with. That goes down in other clubs, yeah, but not here. The guy just wanted to dance like the rest of them.”
“Fine, fine. Enough with all the weird social analysis. Teach me some basic steps so I don’t embarrass myself with the next stranger who asks me to dance, ” Madison said and stood from her chair.
