Mutual aid? Be prepared!

Thursday was opening night of Valentango, one of the best tango events anywhere. But when I walked in the door, fashionably late, some kind of disco was playing! Huh? Christopher looked at me and asked "do you have any CD's with you?" Apparently the complex and expensive sound system, which was rented, had no cables, so he couldn't hook-up his iPod.

I remembered humbly the first Milonga I hosted at The Tango Center, where I just put on some kind of Tango compilation, and people started complaining. Luckily Alex Krebs & Andrew Burt both had their music with them, on CD & laptop. Within 30 minutes or so, they'd taken charge.

Since then I've DJ'd, I dunno, a few hundred milongas, but I don't travel much, so I didn't really think to take my music & cables. Sure, Christopher should have his back-ups with him ... but what if those failed? Or if he had some emergency? 250 people were there from around the world to dance Tango. Robert, Alex, Jaimes, Andrew, myself and all the other DJ's there ... some of the best in the world ... we should have had our gear with us. Luckily Ward didn't live very far away ...

It's a good lesson.