Tango

There was the worry.

Dublin's Morrison Hotel has gone bust. I read. Or words to that effect. Administration. Receivership. Bust.

“What”, I said to my wife H, “what if the tango do is cancelled?”

“What do, what tango do?”

“Didn’t I tell you?”

“What?”

“We’re going to a tango do in Morrison’s Hotel. Saturday. A dance thing. My friend John the polymath is taking us. I took him to Sonairte in Laytown. He’s taking us to a tango do. Give and take. It’s what friendship is all about”.

“Oh”, she said. “Well the hotel is probably still open. Even if it is bust.”

“Like the country?”

“Something like that”.

*

I’d never been to the Morrison Hotel. But I had heard it was very happening. I do happening. Cutting edge stuff, socially speaking. On the cusp of. Etcetera.

Doesn’t come easy, that role. Happening, cutting edge and on the cusp sort of stuff. Needs planning. I planned. I brought the Louis Feraud from the Italian place to the Dublin apartment. And then I sat in the latter, working out the journey to the Morrison. 

It had been decided…or, to rephrase, H said we’ll go on the Luas…so I examined the ins and outs of that excursion. Instinct told me that there was a Luas stop somewhere near the Morrison. I googled. A little map popped up on the Morrison Hotel website. A little arrow popped up on the little map. The little arrow seemed to point us to Merchant’s Quay, to dead on exactly the location  of the Merchants' Quay Project. Now trust me on this. Whilst I do do happening, and cutting edge, I don’t do projects. Anything with the word project appended to other words is no go as far as I am concerned. Whether that appended word or phrase be art, or travellers, or migrants, no matter. I don’t do projects.

“I thought”, says I to H, “I thought Morrisons was on the north side of the river”.

“It is”, said H.

“No it’s not”, said I, it’s on Merchants Quay. South side.”

“It’s not”, said H.

“It is”, said I, “lookit here”.

I pointed to the screen. She didn’t look at it. She doesn’t look at screens unless Downton Abbey or Casualty is on them. She is not an internet person.

“I know furrafack”, she said, “I know it is on Ormond Quay. I don’t care what it says on that silly thing”.

“But this is my new laptop. I’m running Vista.”

“It is on”. Full stop. “Ormond Quay. Furrafack."

“How do you know?”.

“Morrisons is built in the former premises of the Ormond printing works. I know this. Furrafack. When I was working in publishing I used go there to check proofs of books. Big four colour presses. Pounding away. Those were the days. The smell of ink.”

“Ok”, said I. “One of us is right. The tango do is either in a drug rehabilitation centre or a derelict printing works”.

It wasn’t.

We went.

It was in a bankrupt hotel on Ormond Quay. A very nice bankrupt hotel, be it said. Maybe a bit overdesigned. Oh alright, a lot overdesigned. Just as were the three slender girls wearing Moulin Rouge outfits who greeted us at the door. Their lipstick was very rouge indeed, and they each held aloft a silver yoke containing chocolates in silver paper. And each stood exactly the same. Feet just so. Silver salver held just so. And free hand on hip just so. All in all, just so.

The gathering tango dancers chattered around a large circular table. And the large circular table groaned under half filled flutes of champagne. And I was just wondering whether a half filled flute of champagne is very posh or very mean when my friend John the polymath appeared. He was wearing an orange jacket and yellow shirt. I thought Fossetts. Nineteen eighty six. That guy with the exploding car and red nose and giant shoes. But I held (alongside my half filled flute of champagne) my peace.

John talked to H.

I examined the Moulin Rouge girls 

I noted, a chap does, that they were all three flat chested. But I supposed Moulin Rouge is all about legs and thighs. Can Can etc. Horses for courses. So it didn’t really matter. And remembered that my own aunt  and godmother had been a chorus girl in the Theatre Royal, a Royalette. I wrote about her a few weeks ago, I remembered. And thought how life is a weave. And it all hangs together. And then I shrugged away philosophy. And looked forward to a bit of high kicking later on in the evening.

Yeah right well, look forward I may well do. But I was to be disappointed. After necking back the champagne we all made our way into the ballroom and sat around the dance floor. I bought a bottle of wine for myself and H and John.

It cost €28.

How, I wondered, how can a hotel go bust that charges €28 for a bottle of €6 wine?

No answer.

No Can Can either.

But there was tango. An awful lot of tango indeed. And there was Caroline Moreau. A french chanteuse. She sang somewhat like Edith Piaf. Though without that attractive memory of many cigarettes and prostitution in the voice.

Then more tango.

Some finger food.

Then more tango.

Then out into the night. Traffic and rain. I looked down the quays and thought I saw James Joyce's Mina Kennedy going home from work. But it was dark and raining and I could have been confused. I looked up the quays and raised my arm. A taxi skeetered across through the traffic. It was being driven by what The Irish Times would describe as a new Irishman. We piled in. We shot off. It didn’t take me a hundred yards to realise it wasn’t being driven very well by what The Irish Times would describe as a new Irishman. We shot across O’Connell Bridge and on towards Amiens Street. Hurtling  from lane to lane with joie de vivre, and a dash of  je ne sais quo. All that.

“So…what part of the world are you from?” said I. Conversationally.

“Nigeria”, he said.

“Ah”, I nodded. And found my fingers checking my seatbelt.

Conan K