La Viruta is a milonga that J recommended we not go to, so it was with some curiosity that we arrived at Centro Armenio to investigate. At first, I thought we were in the wrong place at the wrong time; we got to the bottom of the stairs, to the entrance, to find it was the backstage area of a seriously dramatic looking play. We stood in the darkness and watched from the wings, while it appeared to reach its climax, the blackout came, and there were the curtain calls. Then it seemed to me that the entire audience left up the stairs we'd just come down.

I had suggested to A that we sneak away and go somewhere else, but she had the courage to ask the coat-check lady if there was a milonga here, and it turned out that there was, and that it was free entry. So we entered the subterranian room, which turned out to be alot bigger than I thought it was, and lo, there was a milonga just starting up.

We had arrived so late that there was, of course, nowhere to sit. I guess because it's a free milonga, there was nobody to direct us to a table, so we stood at the bar drinking beer and taking it all in.

We could see why it would offend J's orderly sensibilities - the place was full of young people (and some older people too), most of the guys, and some of the girls, were wearing sneakers, and the dress standard was certainly casual. We were still trying to spot a free table, but it was impossible because, although there were many with nobody sitting, the occupants may have been dancing, and because there were no cortinas during wich everybody returned to their table, we just had to watch the occupied tables until we saw somebody leave.

The music was pretty good, I thought. The dancefloor was chaos! There was a little movement in the line of dance, but there was alot of crazy stuff going on, with huge sweeping moves and changes in direction. There was practicing off the dancefloor - two women together, which I haven't seen anywhere else.

A thought that it was like a cross between a milonga and a student pub.

Then suddenly it was rock-n-roll music, the dancefloor cleared (for the first time) and was quickly refilled by exuberant rock-n-rollers. A thought it looked like fun, and we thought maybe after travelling all this way, maybe we'd give up tango to take up rock-n-roll (then maybe go to North America to take up Viennese Waltz, then perhaps Europe to learn Irish dancing...). He rock-n-roll lasted a long time, but finally there was tango again, some Biagi that got us wanting to try the dancefloor.

Unfortunately, by the time we got our bags checked in to the coat-check (heeding ubiquitous notices about the management taking no responsibility if your stuff got stolen from your table), the music was some kind of Piazzolla or something equally undanceable, and it stayed like that for a long time. With no discernable beat, people seemed to be ignoring the music and practicing all of their wackiest moves. And with not discernable line of dance (and an ice-rink floor) I was quickly hating every minute of it. After about four of the same, we gave up. The coat-check was almost closing, so we made ourselves scarce.

I was left with the impression that La Viruta was the wild jungle of milongas - you had to take your chances - it might be great or terrible, and you couldn't rely on anything but your own wits. In the right mood, probably this is exhilirating. But not for the faint-of-heart.