Jennifer Bratt from Close Embrace Tango in New York puts out a regular newsletter. In the latest one, Ney Melo (a teacher in NYC) gives some of his thoughts on milonga etiquette. I thought occasionlly I might add one of his paragraphs here for a different point of view. So here are Ney Melo’s thoughts on the “Penalty Box”....hope you enjoy it!

THE PENALTY BOX

Rejecting someone does bring a consequence along with it. This is the rule that if you reject someone for a tango, you cannot dance that same tango with someone better who comes along. You have to, at least, wait for the next song or preferably for the next tanda. You can think of those minutes of waiting time as being in hockey’s “penalty box”. Sometimes this is a double-edged sword because let’s say you are in the “penalty box” but then a really amazing dancer who never asks you to dance finally asks you. You know that if you turn them down then you may never get your chance again, but if you say yes you will look like a jerk in the eyes of the first person that asked you (and then THEY may cease asking)! Sometimes you just can’t win…

Ahhh Tango, whoever said it was easy never really tried it hmmm?? Maybe in Australia we’d have the tribunal rather than the penalty box! Kidding….