Jenna Emerson, Professional Salsa Dancer

Well, I am currently skipping my first class in Chile. Yeah, yeah, yeah, I know it's only the second week of classes, but I have good reason. I'm skipping Salsa, for two reasons. One, I didn't know that there was class today until kinda late. I wouldn't have know at all, but I was talking to some fellow American classmates who share Fonología and Salsa with me, and they told me there was class today. I had thought it was just on Tuesdays, but apparently not. However, even after they told me, I probably still had time to make it there. What I was lacking, however, was the mental preparation necessary to make myself attend class. You see, the reason for this particular blog is to share with you how my first experience with the class was.

Class started last Tuesday, but I wasn't yet signed up for this particular class and because of this I didn't go all last week. However, I went for the first time this Tuesday. The class is part of the School of Law, so I hopped on a bus from home to ride to their main building. However, I'd ridden by on the bus many times and noticed it a few, but never really payed attention to exactly what's around it in the way of landmarks and that sort of thing. As I was riding the bus I began to feel like I may have missed my stop, and got off, only to realize that I was about 2 blocks early. No biggie, I can walk two blocks to the main building.

I walked to the main building and, fully realizing that it's a large campus and I probably wouldn't know exactly where to go, I went straight to the information booth and asked a guard how to get to the classroom. ''Oh'' he said in a tone which I mistook for knowledgable and helpful (maybe that part was lost in translation, I don't know) ''That's a different building. This classroom is in the law school's gym. You need to go down this street you're on right now to the end, then you'll find Dominica. Go down this street, oh, I don't know, a block or so, and you'll find the gym. It's on the left.''

Sweet. I'm going to be a little late, because I only gave myself enough time to get to this building, but it shouldn't be too big of a deal. The other day, I sat in an empty classroom for half an hour waiting for my biology class to start, after arriving what I thought was late. Too bad it's starting to rain.

I walked for probably 7 blocks before I arrived at the end of the street, and then found Dominica. I started down this street, searching for No. 83, which was the address of the building. Unfortunately, the numbers seemed to jump from th 70's straight the 110 and beyond. I walked back and forth in front of the same stretch of road four times before I finally stopped to ask someone why I couldn't find No. 83. He didn't have a clue why I couldn't find it, either, but he did happen to know of a gym on the street that may be the one I was looking for. I was skeptical that it would be the correct gym, because there seemed to be several private gyms in the area and they were all on the right hand side of the street --clearly not what the guard had told me. I walked a few blocks to the building to which the man had directed me, and lo and behold it was correct. Right there, on the right side of the road, nestled NOT in between No.s 81 and 85 but in fact in between No.s 75 and 96, was my building.

(Just in case you're thinking ''That silly Jenna probably just misunderstood the guard,'' the Spanish words for left and right are izquierda and derecha, respectively. Not words that are easy to confuse with each other.)

Too bad I was now ONE HOUR late to a class of an hour and 15 minutes. I went in and approached someone who didn't already have a dance partner, and they started teaching me the basic steps. The rest of the class, meanwhile, was working on some complicated twisty-turny flashy whatsamahouzit. I was there for about 5 minutes, just barely catching onto the basics, when the professor told everyone to circle up in pairs, girls on the inside and guys out. Turns out the plan was for everyone to do the move once, then pass the girls around the circle so that we would all dance our way around the circle as the music played. Too bad I had NO IDEA how to do the twisty turny move!

Any clear thinking person would have stepped outside of the circle at this point, and watched what the rest of the class did. Apparently, however, I can't be described as a clear thinking person, 'cause I decided to try anyways.

It was a disaster. Most of my partners were plenty kind enough to try and help me out a little, but when I got to the professor for a dance partner he pretty much freaked out instantly. It was quite obvious I had no clue what I was doing, and instead of trying to help me through it he crossed his arms and counted loudly ''uno dos tres'' for the rest of the class while GLARING at me and occasionally making exasperated sighs and eye rolls. Luckily it couldn't last long because the music kept playing and the students kept dancing, so I was soon on to the next partner. Except. When the song finished, he stopped everyone and pointed me out, in front of the whole class, and said ''And YOU! YOU need to PRACTICE!! Let the man LEAD YOU!! But you still need to KNOW what you're DOING!!''

He restarted the music and we continued for one song more, and after that class was over. I left, in the rain, walked about 13 blocks to a bus station, in the rain, and waited for 20 minutes, in the rain, for my bus to arrive. When it did, I got on, COMPLETELY soaked to the bone, and rode it to my stop, where I got off and walked 4 blocks home, in the rain.

And that, my friends, is why I'm not in class today. I'll go on Tuesday, don't worry, but I need a little bit of mental preparation before I can do it. I just didn't have nearly enough advanced warning today. Until that day, (which I will be dreading until it comes) I think I'll just stick to the kind of salsa that goes with chips.