As students walk through the door into Gerlinger 242 on a Wednesday night, the chalkboard lit only by a strand of colorful plastic pepper-shaped christmas lights draped across the top reads “Salsa Libre.” Chairs with attached desks line the walls of the room. The chair-desk hybrids usually occupy the entire classroom floor, but for one night a week the center of the room turns into a dance floor for anyone willing to slide in.
Before the 7 p.m. scheduled salsa lesson began, two students take center stage on the makeshift dance floor while about 10 students there for salsa lessons watched them swing their feet back and forth almost perfectly in synch. The two students continue to dance, holding hands as they swiftly shift their weight from one foot to the other, following the other’s movement with a mirrored step.
University of Oregon students Ben Reid and Maya Benezer decided to create a student-run group to teach salsa dancing when they noticed a lack of students in the Eugene salsa scene.
“A lot of students have taken salsa over the years with Florabelle Moses in Salsa 1 and 2,” Benezer said. “But then no one knows where to go.”
Benezer says the only other place to in town to practice salsa dancing is the Veteran’s Club on Willamette Street, but it’s catered toward the older crowd and costs $10 to get in.
The group is not an official UO club, at least not yet. Reid and Benezer plan to make it so in the fall.
The two met in Salsa 1 a little over a year ago. Benezer has only been dancing for a year and got more into salsa dancing when she studied abroad in Israel last fall. Reid and Benezer reconnected in a salsa class this spring and have been dancing partners on and off since they’ve known each other.
“They’re great. Ben’s been doing it forever, for five years and you can see that and Maya’s really talented,” said UO student James Wilkinson. Wilkinson has attended five of the six lessons that Salsa Libre has hosted so far this summer.
Reid started dancing during his freshman year when the girl he had crush on dragged him to one of her lessons. Although nothing happened with the girl, Reid kept learning salsa dancing on his own and has been doing so for five years now.
Because Salsa Libre is not an official UO club, its members aren’t allowed to reserved a room over the summer. That’s why they contacted the ballroom club — its president has been reserving Gerlinger 242 for the summer lessons according to Salsa Libre marketing manager Sydney Fournier.
“Nathan (Zelick) offered to help us find us a room, which was really helpful,” Fournier said.
The free dance lessons start with an hour-long session with Reid and Benezer teaching basic salsa dance moves. After the lesson, the lights go off and the music is turned up — it becomes an open dance floor for another two hours.
“You learn something new every time and then afterwards you get to try it out,” Wilkinson said.