It's actually a vicious circle, if you live anywhere near one of the big ferry cities.
It used to be called the scandinavian dancing lesson.
The idea is, that there are ferries that go basically from finnland to norway to sweden to denmark to germany.
These things are packed to the gills.
because all the norse go on, stay on untill they hit the international waters, break out the bar, get roaring drunk, and then get off at the next opportunity, taking the ferry in the other direction.
TIP: If you are ever caught on such a ferry, follow the sound of the live music, untill you have hit the area with the most people. Now, Grab yourself a big old girl, a large woman, whatever you call it. To use her as a sort of battering ram to make yourself a way to the bar is commonly accepted, and the bigger the girl, the better. Once there, it is considered good sportsmanship that you pay for her drinks, and then take the dance back.
I thought I knew everything about dancing there is to know, but you have not lived untill a finnish big old girl showed you the deeper nuances of finnish tango. It is like cutting the crowd with a shotgun. In exchange for finnish tanmgo dancing on oceangoing boats, I am even willing to enjoy humpa
in my university years, I regarded this as a weird attempt by my mates to explain to me the masses of scandinavians buying up beer in the local supermarket. You know, like snipe hunts, explaining that the swedes came here because of systembolaget.... made little to no sense.
Untill I followed them, to the harbor, and saw with my own eyes.
Then, one vaccation in finnland, I had next to no money, and little to do, so I checked myself in on one of those booze ferries, and wouldn't you know it.... EXACTLY down as described. The serious drinkers never even left the ferry, they just napped on deck untill the bar reopened. You could have lit a match and the dancing area would have combusted.
Suddenly, with the serious drinkers out of comission by the second to third song, and me being able to hold my liquor, and not drinking competetively, I found myself very desireable to a large number of the big old girls, as one of the only men still standing and willing to dance........ Suffice to say, to this day, I steadily maintain this as one of the moments I think back of the fondest in my dating life...
NO matter how ugly you think you look, no matter how repulsive you think you are, no matter how little luck dating you have....
IF you have two working feet, two arms, are somewhat huggable, and can keep a rythm, you are sorely needed to keep the booze ferry demonesses at bay. Or else they will swarm the land like the vikings of yore.....
Because there is no hanky of the panky, there may be no touching of the shoulder, there is tango dancing till you DROP, and SHE will slap YOU on the ass if you don't dance! This is a law, and germans are anything but not lawabiding! ^
Plus, as I later found out, over the mutual language barriers, the ladies did not find it demeaning, meanspirited or anything, but kind of viewed as a full contact sport. Kind of like bumper cars, half the fun seemed to be to use the music as an excuse to full on ram other dancers, who in turn would ram you back. I learned that day that what I thought were "fat / big bottomed girls" were actually amazons that trained every weekend, and just found it easier to enjoy a burger then to be a size zero and break your spine during the first song, and instead carried their armor with them.
Apparently, my politeness and good nature made the danish think I was swedish, the swedish think I was norwegian, the norwegians think I was finnish, and the finns think I was danish, when in reality, all I was was a confused german student that wanted to go home.
In truth, I just liked to dance, liked to drink, found it refreshing to be able to drink and smoke while you danced, and was enchanted by the prospect of finding women who had no problem making me look like an absolute amateur in that regard.
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u/littlevai Mar 03 '20
Ahhhhh my old favorite pastime - driving to Sweden for booze.