Happy New Year to everyone! from Julien, Franck and Kirstin at La Xpresionlatina!
We don't know about you but we are looking forward to starting the salsa classes after the Xmas and New Year break and it feels like forever since our last Sunday Salsa Social since we had a rest in December. We have been getting withdrawel symptoms! We are ready to hit the dance floor full throttle
The dates for your brand spanking new 2009 diary are ;
2008 was a great year for La Xpresionlatina. We hosted the salsa meets culture holiday to the french carribbean island of Guadeloupe, brought great guest teachers from all over europe to teach at our Sunday Salsa Socials, we had our official One year Birthday!
We are looking forward in 2009 to great salsa classes, great Salsa Socials, great guest teachers and most of all great company. We are looking forward to seeing old faces and hopefully some new faces in 2009 and having a ball as usual. Until we see yopu again, please keep in touch via email and the website, its your website as well as ours!
http://www.laxpresionlatina.com
click on Photo Gallery to check out the latest photo postings. Leave a comment if you see yourself!
click on LaXL News for the latest in our Blog Entries, why not leave an entry yourself or sign the Guest Book.
click on Classes and Events for full class and event listings including directions/maps
The New Year Sunday Salsa Social on 18th January is the same as usual; food buffet style is being provided, there will be two salsa classes with dancing until late and the guest teacher this month is Desire from Paris, France. Desire is back one year on by popular demand., if you want to read more about him click on Salsa Personalities on the website.
How to keep in touch...if we do not have your email address and you want to keep in touch, either register on the website or email xpresionlatina@googlemail.com and ask to be put on the mailing list. Alternatively, send a text message with your full name and area on to 07973 110004 - we will send your text alerts with things like class changes, event listings etc
Happy New Year again from all at La Xpresionlatina!
see you soon and keep dancing!
Ok Ladies (I am focusing on ladies as we tend to be the guiltiest but men should keep reading as well) Answer honestly to the following questions:-
Q. Have you ever left your handbag, shoe bag, coat either on or under or beside a table, chair etc and gone off dancing?
Q. Would you ever go into a normal club and do the above?
Quite certainly the answer is a ‘YES’ and a ‘of course NO!’
So why do we do it ?
Initially we usually are quite cautious as salsa newbies or if we venture somewhere new as to where we put our stuff when we are dancing,... but then we see other people leaving their belongings and we feel safe and then we fall into a pattern.
We rush into our regular salsa haunt, we mingle with our usual salsaros or salsaras, we get excited about the salsa music and in the heady rush to burn the dance floor- We change our shoes and fling our bag in a corner, quite often not seeing our bag again until chucking out time.
The problem ?
Its a moral dilemna - dance or look after our bags!
We soon get too complacent. People are always friendly at salsa classes, clubs and events and we can get easily lulled into a very false sense of security. We leave our precious personal belongings, out of sight and out of mind in a public place.
This leaves all of us vulnerable to unscrupulous and in particular opportunistic people, both men and women. People who can move about noticed and snatch not always a bag, which is easily seen, but the more valuable contents; purse, mobile, keys, etc
The Solution ?
Prevention is much better than cure and the heartaches and bother when our bag is stolen. We can all take precautions to ensure that we are not the victims of this crime and that thieves are not given the opportunity to steal in the first place.
Make sure that you only carry the most essential items with you and there are several options
If the venue has a locker room/cloak room facilities USE them
Ask a friend and take care of each others stuff – take turns to be the ‘designated bagwatcher’
Keep your valuables with you at all times – is the best options. This can be really difficult though especially as ladies don’t tend to have very practical pockets for purse, lipgloss, hairbrush, perfume, makeup, mobile, keys etc. You can buy special ankle/armband wallets for your money to wear whilst dancing – Eddie the Salsa Freak is often sporting them.
If the worst does happen to you, make sure you report it to the venue staff immediately, they will do whatever they can to help but remember at the end of the day that you take the risk yourself when you leave your possessions unattended.
Also, lets look after each other and ourselves - if you see someone acting unusual or someone not from your regular class acting suspicious, or not, you must inform someone. I am talking from experience and we need to be alert.
AND HAVE FUN AND KEEP DANCING
