Latin Americans - is there any point me taking salsa lessons in Europe to try to connect to my Latin American friends and eventually start dancing with them at our parties?
I have a large amount of Latin American friends, and though I have never traveled to Latin America I would love to. In general I've grown up and lived in many different places in the world but my first dance exposures were to gamelan music and ballet classes. My Latin American friends all danced at parties and it seemed so much fun. In particular, some Colombian friends tried to teach me a bit of salsa. However, I was very unfamiliar with the movements and the rhythms, I find it a bit tough and felt a bit dispirited when they tried to explain how to dance because I didn't get it. Most instructions were like 'feel the music' 'move your hips', which for someone who danced completely different rhythms and body movements all their life is very hard.
I started lessons here in Europe but I get the impression that my Latin American friends think that people learning salsa in Europe are doing a kind of fake version. I love the music, I want to connect to my friends, but I feel a bit discouraged. Is it worth it?
P.S. I have kind of low dancing self esteem (ballet trauma!) where I think I'm terrible but funnily enough, when I've been drunk and just vibing to music, allot of people commented that they liked my dancing. So I think it's with overcoming these issues.