Hours (or maybe minutes) ago these troops were out there on a mission, shot, heard enemy’s guns. And now, still wearing the same uniforms and tired, but smiling countenances, they are dancing tango, circling the floor to a sensual tune. This is not a film fragment. This is this war’s reality: soldier Oleksii Havrys is teaching his comrades-in-arms to tango during pauses between missions. Havrys (callsign Foxtrot), private of the 12th Territorial Defense Battalion, now attached to the 26th Brigade, was able to set up a tango school virtually on the front line. Also, he invites his fellow soldiers to take free lessons in his own dance school Aliento del Tango (“Breath of Tango”) in Kyiv after demobilization. In his opinion, this is the best kind of rehabilitation and adaptation.
A DISTRACTION FROM CANNONADE
The first classes at his school in Kyiv stated in late September, and Havrys is looking forward to seeing his former fellow servicemen among his students. So far, none has applied, and this came as a surprise to Havrys. Back on the front line, he managed to find students pretty soon. “Half a year after the mobilization our fourth company of the 12th Battalion was stationed in Starobilsk. The routine was that we would leave our quarters for missions and come back to the base. Being deputy company commander for personnel issues, I spent more time at the staff quarters. Then it occurred to me that it would be fine to offer the men a kind of pastime that would distract them from the sounds of cannonade when they came back from missions. And I would also like to keep them busy in the evening, so they would not hang around looking for booze, but instead would do something healthy and fun. And then I thought, why not, I can dance (and teach) tango, why not set up a school?”
Havrys had been a professional tango dancer the last five years. Together with his partner he opened a dance school and also worked as a tango DJ. He is a professional translator who graduated from the Kyiv National Linguistic University, and he also completed a military training course at the Taras Shevchenko University in Kyiv. “I am an army translator and I graduated in the rank of second lieutenant,” shares Havrys. “I volunteered to serve in the army. The first time I came to the drafting office I heard that army translators are of no use in this war, the second time they sent me away again, but advised me to join the 12th Battalion to defend Kyiv’s strategic objects. But I wanted to take part in real warfare. So, when I went a third time, I again got to hear about the 12th Battalion. I was like, ‘I’m not going to guard bridges.’ They said, ‘Tomorrow you will be leaving for Luhansk; mobilized today, dispatched tomorrow.’ I agreed, but they asked me several times if I was prepared to be sent to Luhansk without any training.”
WHERE ARE ALL THE GIRLS?
Havrys has been only a few weeks demobbed, and he is eager to use his front-line tango school expertise in Kyiv. He recollects getting a permission from the battalion commander to give tango classes at the base, and that’s how dance became part of the front-line routine: “The school was right on the front, this was not technically the front line, but rather an intermediary point some 40 kilometers away from Shchastia and the demarcation line. Our men had missions in Shchastia, Triokhizbenka, Stanytsia Luhanska, but the evenings were free. I managed to make a deal with the local social center in Starobilsk, so we could use their premises for free. I also tried to invite girls, students of the Luhansk University, which had moved to this town, and I hung ads everywhere, but no one turned up for the first classes. Meanwhile, we had been studying already two weeks, but only two ladies showed up: our doctor and a volunteer who helped our unit.”
The gender problem was luckily soon solved: after some talks and meetings at the local medical school, students began to attend our classes. “Our boys loved dancing with real girls at last, because they had had to dance with one another before. But around that time we were forbidden to leave the premises of the base. However, the medical school was just across the street, and my battalion commander let us have classes there. So we did for a month and a half. Then there was a hard period, hard work, I fell ill, one serviceman was killed, I had to deliver his body to his family, and one thing added to another, so in the end I went down with pneumonia and ended up in hospital. When I came back, our unit had already moved out of Starobilsk. We returned to Berdychiv for rotation, and from there to the training grounds in Rivne, then to Artemivsk, a new place. There we were in the fields and bushes, not in town, and the situation was tense, so I saw no way I could go on with the classes. By the way, a lot of locals conspicuously supported the Ukrainian army, I saw many people wearing t-shirts with the Ukrainian trident and colors.”
“TANGO DISTRACTS, CALMS DOWN, AND HELPS CONCENTRATE”
Havrys relates that most of his camouflaged tango students were doing quite good, even if they had mixed feelings in the beginning. But as days went on by, the teacher heard increasingly often that the men liked dancing and that they were grateful for this opportunity. It helped create an illusion of peaceful life. “It distracts, grips, relaxes, it gives an opportunity to mix with women. Tango is the music of the 1930s-1950s, it seems a bit boring at first, but then you fall in love with it. It relaxes you, helps concentrate and gives a better idea of your own body and that of your partner. It is also an embrace – I think no therapist will deny the good that a hug does,” tells the dancer. By the way, he is always carrying his music with him, be it on his cell phone or memory stick. That is why music accompaniment was never a problem on the front.
Now it is mostly volunteers who react to Havrys’ offers to teach the troops to tango. Maybe, they can better see the advantages of such a pastime. Some even suggested teaching tango to men with prosthetic limbs, but Havrys says the teacher has to undergo special training for this, and medical advice is also necessary. At the moment, he is busy with his school, Aliento del Tango, and looking forward to seeing his comrades-in-arms in class: they simply have to try at least. And in the end, he shares a secret with us: whoever comes to class at least once, will stay for long.
