the Jungle

It's dark. Humid. Your head is swimming a little. Okay, a lot. A bead of sweat trickles down your forehead. You wipe it off nonchalantly with your forearm. While trying to look like you're not scanning the others, you scan the others.

Around the outside, males stand with a beer in one hand and the other in a pocket. If possible, they lean up against a wall. On the inside, females in groups of 2, 3, 4, giggle and sway their hips. A few of the braver or perhaps more shameless males slide to the inside, awkwardly moving their shoulders and inch closer. You know where you are? You're in the jungle baby! You're gonna die!!!

Actually, it's a night club dance floor, which is essentially the same thing (you're not gonna die either, I just couldn't not finish the lyric.) This particular dance floor happens to be in Prague, but though the languages are different and more varied, the dance is the same.

Prague is an incredibly fun city, but it needs to be said that the music is terrible. The DJ in this particular joint is playing Fergie singles (not the good ones) and remix tapes of Elton John choruses (good) and replacing the verses with Czech rap (shit). Often the music is too slow, or just plain bad. It's work to actually dance. But that's not really what we came here for, is it?

Saturday night I went to La Chateau Rouge with my flatmates, Atila (Albanian, and yes, named after who you're thinking of (her father wanted a boy)), and Julia (Polish, and the "J" is pronounced like a "Y"). This place is right in the center of town, just off of Old Town Square. Thus there is heavy traffic from tourists. British stag parties are brought here by their "party coordinators" (usually a Czech girl hired to take them to various hot spots). They order a "malé pivo" (small beer), watch the dance floor for a few minutes and then head to the next destination. There were also large groups of college-age Americans, which I correctly guessed were exchange students here for the semester. Toward the end of the night, we saw one of these girls, who had lost her ticket, angrily call the Czech coat check guy a "fucking idiot" after refusing to give up her jacket. He screamed at her to "fuck off." Then she cried.

On the floor, I stood with Atila and Julia, and tried to make the best of the music. My moves mostly consist of the head-bob, not unlike a chicken, which increases in intensity depending on the song. I keep my hands in loosely held fists around my waist while shimmying the upper body, kinda like a boxer looking for an opening. This probably sounds cooler than it actually looks. I was "taught" by friend Shannon, a former Northwestern University "Lady Cat" to "grind." The majority of her instruction consisted of her saying, "looser, looser!" as I held onto her hips.) Point being, I'm pretty stiff out there. But the important thing is that I don't care. There is no such thing as a bad dancer, only an inhibited one. And to quote Marvin Gaye in his greatest song:

As long as you're groovin,
there's always a chance,
somebody watchin',
might wanna make romance.

In the room, girls were outnumbered by guys, but on the floor it was about even. Usually the rule is the more attractive a female, the more withdrawn she will be. We noticed one girl bouncing around, eyes frantically searching, which is of course a huge faux pas. She eventually found a quite dapper but also quite pissed Englishman. Latching onto his sweater vest, they twirled wildly, bumping into Atila a few times before finally spinning to the ground and landing hard in a pile of drunken knees and elbows.

At another juncture during the night, a couple of dudes crept up on us, and one asked Atila to dance. She complied briefly, then retreated back to the safety of myself and Julia. But her former partner didn't give up, and appealed to her with folded hands for another go. His buddy moved in on Julia. Because the girls were standing with me, an incredibly good-looking alpha-male, I was impressed by their gumption, so I tossed the young bucks a reward. Using my hips and pelvis, I bumped my flatmates closer to the predators. The girls glared.

"You're supposed to be protecting us," Julia said.

They wanted a break. I followed them past the two dudes and we moved towards the outside. As we passed, Atila's partner bowed his head and I saluted by flipping two fingers off my eyebrow. The other guy returned his attention to the pack.

Sitting on a bench, I was able to take it all in. What a strangely familiar place. The females are there to attract (at the very least) attention, and the males are there for the females. Most of the pursuers are ignored, but a few of those being pursued also allow themselves to be engaged. The rules out there, though not non-existent, are primal. Want to grab that girls butt? Want to rub up against that guy? No speaking. Do the dance and you just might be able to.

You know where you are?