Cabezada is the 'eye-contact-and-nod' way of asking someone to dance here. It has the advantage of being a mutual way to ask. Being a pretty shy and retiring kind of guy, it's one of the most gruelling experiences of my life. There is of course the fear of rejection, although one of the advantages cabezada has over the just-go-up-and-ask method is that if you're rejected, only two people in the room know, and one of them is you. The more nerve-wracking possibility is that of accidentally asking two people to dance at once.

When there's a group of only women at a table (as there usually are in the traditional milongas) and they all want to dance, the chance that more than one of them is looking at you when you raise your eyebrow enticingly is quite high. Unfortunately, it seems to be almost certain that it's the other one who stands up first when you head towards that table. When this first happened to me, at Confiteria Ideal, I of course danced with the lady who was standing - it would be much more humiliating for her to sit down again, than for my actual quarry to simply remain seated. However, I suspect that this is cold comfort for the lady who thought she had a dance lined up, only for it to slip through her fingers at the final moment. The lady at Ideal never looked at me again.

Tonight at El Beso I was angling for a dance with a lady who I'd danced with in the class beforehand. She was, of course, sitting with a lady friend at a far-away table. One strategy is to approach the table while cabezada-ing, to get a clearer shot, but to walk coolly by in the event of rejection, pretending to be heading for the toilet or the bar. Unfortunately, I was leaning on the bar and the toilet was behind me, so this wasn't an option. I just had to wait until she was looking while her friend was not.

This took quite a long time (a couple of tandas), and when it finally did happen, she looked away again. I thought maybe she couldn't see me properly, or wasn't actually looking at me, so nursing my preparing-to-be-bruised ego, I persisted looking in her direction, but looking away when here friend (infuriatingly frequently) turned towards me. A couple more possible rejections later, she was reaching for her sweater and her hand bag, and I decided that perhaps she couldn't tell whether it was her I was looking at. The only thing for it was to get closer.

I started towards the table, knowing full well that if she didn't look at me before I got there I'd have to ask her verbally. Forcing a woman to dance with you like this is, of course, the height of rudeness (and the chance of verbal and quite embarassing rejection is correspondingly high), so of course there was no way I could do this. I had no idea what I might do if I got as far as her table without an accepting nod.

Ignoring the danger, I strode on, staring right at her, ready to nod and put out an inviting hand at the first flicker of attention, still with no plan B.

Fortunately, she did turn, she did smile, and she did nod. And her friend didn't.

Unfortunately, with two paces to go, another woman stepped into my path. She was right in front of me and she was ready. So of course I had no choice but to keep the shocked expression off my face, and go dance with her.

By the time I got over the surprise of this sudden turn of events, we were on the dancefloor, and the second shock was that she was quite improbably beautiful. Jet black hair in a bob, black mini-dress with sparkles in it, and another tiny sparkle from the jewelled pearcing below her welcoming smile.

I had collected myself again by the time we began to dance, and the first tango was divine. She was a lovely follower, always there and ready, reading my mind. She wasn't just passively following - she was adding plenty of herself into the dance, but never over-doing it. It was fabulous.

And then as the last chord of the tango struck, I remembered to be anxious about the language barrier that was imminently going to ruin everything. I had a tiny hope that she could speak English, but this was immediately dashed when she sweetly asked "¿Vives aquí en Buenos Aires?" (I had to get her to repeat this, because the first time I couldn't hear over the sound of my heart sinking). I said yes, and confessed to having terrible Spanish. She said she was from Spain, and only staying for 5 days, and it was when she said "cinco días" that I heard the charming lisp of Spanish Spanish.

As we danced the next tango, I realised that I'd found her "cinco", her sparkles, and her fabulous dancing all little too charming. I have inwardly scoffed at men who say they've fallen in love on the dancefloor (I should know by now that it's not 'pride' that comes before a fall, it's 'inwardly scoffing'). But the '3-minute romance' was finally happening to me, for the first time. And it was all a little bit much to believe.

Of course I wasn't going to let this implausibility to get in the way of dancing, and we danced the remaining two tangos blissfully. The only terrible thing that happened was that she apoligised for my mistakes, but even then, I danced on.

At the end, as I led her back towards her table, I glanced at the table where my intended partner had been sitting, but she had gone. I felt a pang of guilt, and resolved to dance with her on Friday at Canning, if she'll look at me.

So I accidentally had a blissful tanda in Buenos Aires with a sultry Spanish beauty, barely speaking to her, and never to see her again. I have scoffed at the self-delusion of the 'Tango dream', but now I've lived it.

Perhaps that means I can go home now...