The story behind the floor

I have had a chance to explain the situation to some but by no means all – so I wanted to let everyone know what has happened and why I have decided to cancel the Revolution until I am sure the situation is resolved.

Basically the floor in our first milongas before Christmas 2017 was not an issue at all. But then over Christmas there was a candlelight service and this caused a large amount of wax to be spilled on the floor – which of course became gradually trodden in.

Our January milonga was the first time we knew anything was amiss. The floor was totally unacceptable – to everyone’s credit you all made the best of a bad job – but basically this was a real personal disappointment.

After the January Milonga I met with the church and they assured me that the cleaner would be focussing on repairing the floor. I inspected the floor in early February and indeed I could see that many wax splashes had gone – although with over a week to go clearly there was still some grime in certain areas.

You might like to remember that of course the church has 200 chairs in the hall – so it is not so easy to check as you might think. In any event we went ahead – and the last Milonga was really a worry for all. I know that this spoilt the evening for many people – particularly the followers. I am so very sorry for this.

We were in fact fortunate that no-one fell, and perhaps with hindsight I should have stopped the event as soon as we knew it was still unacceptable – but fortunately no-one did hurt themselves and once again everyone took everything in great spirits.

Since then I have had many fruitless conversations with the church – who basically feel that the floor is fine for normal use – and it is only us as dancers that have a concern. I have offered to clean the floor myself – hiring cleaning equipment at my own cost – but they in fact worry that we will damage the floor – or leave parts of it different colours to others. I have also spoken to a professional company – but their quote was out of our reach, the church won’t contribute anything and the firm would not work saturdays and wouldn’t move or put back 200 chairs – which I do understand.

Today I had the final meeting with Father Andrew and he was definite that he could not allow me to hire equipment and clean the floor at my own expense – as in previous churches he has had experience of well meaning amateurs causing a lot of damage. He has plans for the church to redo the floor in 2019 – but this is at a cost of £18,000 which shows the magnitude of the task. In my mind there is considerable doubt this will ever happen – but we shall see.

I do understand his concerns, but this leaves me in an impossible situation as I cannot take any risk with the enjoyment – and ultimately of course the safety – of our dancers.

4 Comments

  • What a shame! The floor was great before and the venue is really nice. And the music and athmosphere was great. So a reall loss. Well, thanks Nigel for trying all you could. The vicar has a point, but that does not help us. I hope an alternative can be found. Thanks for working on it so hard.
    Best wishes , Rose

  • Hi Nigel,

    Thank you for this explanation. I can see that Father Andrew did not want you to hire equipment and clean the floor as he had bad experience of amateurs causing a lot of damage. Is there not still a possibility of using a professional company? We could move and put back the chairs and I would like to know their quote to see if I could help with a contribution and maybe a few others would too. For me it is the nicest venue to dance in and it is worth a lot…

  • Hi Nigel

    Thanks for explaining what happened. It’s a shame as the hall itself is so lovely. Thank you for all your efforts to try and make it work. I hope we find somewhere else to continue the fantastic spirit of Tango revolution xxx

  • this is a real tragedy.
    Revolution was uniquely good and there,s nothing quite like it locally. Thanks to Nigel for creating such a beautiful milonga. I’ll never forget it.

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