Salsa!!

It is Sunday night and I am relaxing when I hear music in the distance: salsa music.  It is coming from La Zebra and I am ready.  I was already at the 6 pm class so I have practiced my dance steps for tonight.  And, like a cobra rising to the tune of the flute, I pull myself out of the hammock and head downstairs to check my face.  I was already dressed.  I was only waiting.  Resting actually.  Salsa is a vigorous dance and I know I have an early Monday morning.  But somehow, I cannot resist.

I take my bicycle under the starlit street to La Zebra, feeling the pull of the music and the energy of the dance increase with each turn of the pedal.  When I reach the entrance, I see other people experiencing the same magnetic draw.  We all want to dance.  We all feel the rhythm and we move quickly through the sand to enter the restaurant.  I can see the band to my right as I enter and greet my friends.  The people here are friendly and they know I want to just dance.  To my right I can see the live band.  There are eight of them and they are grooving Cuban musicians.  They are the center of the heat that is rising from this place with the pure Latin salsa.  No one can stand still.  Even if you don’t want to dance you still have to move. 

I go through the restaurant and down the stairs to the beach and the dance platform: palm trees in the center reaching to the star filled sky and the new moon that is rising.  The dance floor is crowded but it is ok, I will be welcome.  I take the first hand that reaches for mine and I start to move.  Then I start to smile.  With each turn I feel a little lighter and my smile is a little bigger.  With each dip I feel a little more dramatic, more graceful and as I come out of a doble entschufla, I am beaming at having remembered my 1 and then 5.  I am still on beat and the beat in Tulum on a Sunday night is only at la Zebra’s, Latin Salsa party.