Claudia Machuca

As a child, Claudia's father taught her salsa and other kinds of typical dances from South-America (vallenato, gaita, porro, cumbia, mapale, etc). Her father was her inspiration and she fell in love with dance.

And because Claudia lived in Margarita's Island she had a lot of contacts with latinos from different countries of the Caribbean and so she learned a lot of typical steps. Her grandfather, who gave dance-lessons to students in Colombia, told her that there are approximately 40 basic steps. In Latin America the people use the dance as a way to meet people. Persons who dance very well have a lot of success. At the age of 27 she fell in love with Marc; she gave up her job (teacher) in the University and she came to Belgium. Because she loves dancing, she decided to start giving salsa lessons in Leuven , in the way that Latin people learn it, without counting and focusing on the rhythm. Claudia teaches a mix of salsa basic steps from countries as Venezuela, Colombia and Cuba, with emphasis on basic characteristics of styles such as position of the hands, stepping, taps and arm and bottom tension.