Diva in LA - Who Knew?

The Coast Starlight train goes from Seattle to San Diego, the entire West Coast of the USA, courtesy of Amtrak.

I was traveling between San Jose and Los Angeles, a journey of 13 hours which was for the most part, incredibly scenic. Through Salinas and down to Santa Barbara, along the coast down to Northridge and down in to Los Angeles Union Station.

The ride cost $49 which considering the fares, taxes, fees and charges the airlines slug you with, is cheap.

Hello - you want to check a bag? $30.
Hello - 2 bags? You need to speak to your Financial Advisor.

The part where the train went along the coast and being able to see the sun set while eating above-average train food - spectacular.

The part where the train was filled with rednecks and other funnies who ride the train - priceless.

Unfortunately, Amtrak reinforce how terrible travel is these days - like the airlines who point blank refuse to be civilized or helpful in any way, shape or form ("MISERY IS IN THE CONDITIONS OF CARRIAGE - NEXT!"). However planes are generally easily traced and delays, while frustrating, have some kind of associated reason or estimated time.

Amtrak are unable to know when or where their trains are expected to show up, so getting to the station early cemented my new philosophy in life to never ever take another optimistic stance when I'm trying to get somewhere on public transport.

For 2 hours a recorded announcement kept saying "The Train has been Delayed by 15 minutes" until the train eventually arrived. Call Amtrak the eternal optimists, they never gave up hope that the train *would* come.

Sometime, Someplace.

Across the aisle from me was Grammaw with her 2 unruly grandchildren. Initially Grammaw managed to convey some kind of olde world train sophistication, but after about 30 minutes it was clear that she was a one trick pony and sophistication wasn't it.

Her grand-daughters were total shits and after about 30 minutes of trying to be disciplinary, she gave up on that trick as well.

It was time for Grammaw to open her old bag of tricks, go to the cafe car and get some hard liquor.

Gram-maw got drunk and spoke of how dignified train journeys *used* to be, and she should know, her father was a train driver. This indicated to everyone within ear shot that her grand-children were shits who had no concept of their heritage and deserved to be run over by the train. Certainly not be allowed to ride the train, at least not with her.

Amtrak do not believe in letting people sleep.

I honestly believe that the train staff have an obsession with hearing their voices over the PA. This little obsession ensured that every 5 minutes someone had something to say - whether it be announcing how the dining car operates, to calling the coach attendants to bring their brooms to the lounge - repeatedly over 2 hours - obviously coach attendants are above sweeping, or the railway rednecks are especially dirty.

At one point they thought the PA had broken so they tested that for about an hour and even went so far as to stop the train so they could check the connections between carriages. You know, in case someone missed out on hearing the business processes associated with running a Dining Car.

"the dining car will be opening in 2 hours" *static*
"when we call your name, y'all come to the dining car" *static*
"we take your order" *static*
"you remain seated" *static*
"we serve your order" *static*

Got it? *static* *static* *static*

The gypsy-like cafe lady had several goes on the PA selling her wares, found in a nook under the Viewing Car. It was kind of hokey down there and while the food was good, the people who loitered in the cafe section as opposed to say, the Viewing section above, scared me. Why???

Cafe Gypsy even went as far as to announce the end of her shift; she would be getting off. "Thanks y'all for coming past and saying Hello" - like we had any choice - she had the monopoly on beer and cheap train food.

The D car had at attendant called Doris.

I am really not sure what planet Doris came from but she was a total space cadet - why she's hauling ass on Amtrak and not NASA, with her kind of experience, is a total mystery.

If someone was meant to sit in her carriage she would totally spend about 15 minutes trying to find a spare seat, despite having a seating plan. This worked in my favour as I scribbled on the little piece of paper above my seat and changed the 1 to a 2, indicating both seats were taken, and she sat no one next to me for the entire trip. I could spread out.

At one point, for absolutely no reason, Doris recalled all the pillows - there was a near riot. She achieved some success with her pillow recall mainly because she was unrelenting in her unexplained and rather random demands. Some people held out, most caved in. You could feel the blood in the car boiling.

Grammaw went so far as to put her 15th beer down, in easy reach of one of the grandchildren. I assumed she was hoping they'd sip a bit and go to sleep, but without a pillow there was no chance in hell.

An underground formed and I signed up. No names were exchanged, we shared the same ideal of a reclined seat and a railway pillow. A group of us went up past the Viewing Car and down into the store room of the B car and we found a stash of pillows in the storage section. It should be noted that every other passenger car had pillows - only Car D with Doris had been affected by the recall.

We took so many pillows back to D car and made such a fuss about handing them out, it was like we were liberating a city under siege. The whole palaver never registered with Doris. Still to this day I don't know what she thought about the up rise and subsequent conquering of the store room, or whether she really cared.

To be honest I don't think she noticed.

Having experienced the Cafe car and its trinkety gypsy food, I signed up for Dining Car Dinner. Initially I was thankful that the guy taking the names started from the back and worked forward so I was guaranteed to be one of the first up. The dining car opened after much PA fanfare (a speech including refresher training on the dining care business process) and the first names were called out.

I was totally killing myself laughing because the first batch called included people called 'Chastity' and 'Diva'.

These, I thought, were awesome black-chick names.

"DIVA - GET YO FAT ASS DOWN TO THE DINING CART GURL! BIG MAMA CHASTITY WANNA EAT! MMM HMMMM!!"

Not being racist - I just think its really cool when they talk like that.

Chastity must of rocked up, but Diva never came and so Diva got called and re-called several times until the penny dropped.

I was Diva.

The guy taking the names must of totally fucked up or been a total fuck up - or something. I mean an Australian accent is hard to understand at the best of times and sure, my name could sound like Dive - but DIVA? Although my nom-du-train had an element of truth to it, honest to god, in my paranoid state of mind I saw everyone on the train pointing to me in hushed whispers and then throwing their heads back laughing -"THATS HIM - THATS DIVA! HAHAHA".

Maybe thats not how it really happened but that's how I saw it.

I was a crazy person and for like the first time in my life, I'm trying to be invisible.

I kept my head down. Talking to nobody. Giggling at everything.

"Yes, hello - tee hee...just heading for the CAFE.. yes, CAFE.. not DINING. hee hee... Oh lookee here, DINING CAR.. I wonder if there is a spare seat tee hee" etc.

I finally make it to the Dining Car. The moment of truth.

"Name?"

".....Dave.....but i think they stuffed up".

EVERYONE in the dining cart heard what I said and stopped what they were doing. The car went silent. All eyes and ears are on me and i'm like a fucking mess by this point - shaky in the legs and feeling lightheaded and faint. I had to think of something to say but I was totally fucked up and kept on with the nervous giggling and fidgeting.

At one point I reached for my phone as if I could create one of those diversons like "OH TEXT MESSAGE" as if that would prove to everyone that someone out there had respect enough for me to want to actually associate themselves with me.

People were still staring. I'm still giggling and fumbling with my phone.

This made the situation worse and I think I will need repressed memory therapy to remember how I got out of it or it ended.

All i remember is being seated with a father and son who were initially embarrassed by my presence, and I made such a big deal about how my name is "Dave" and its really not that hard, but by that point they thought my name was "Crazy".

I did some of those pregnancy breathing exercises I learnt off a movie and had some hard liquor. Gram-maw must of heard the alcohol being poured cause her-of-the-unruly-grandchildren came in, they were next on the list.

I eventually lost my heart palpitations, stopped sweating and gained a dignified composure.

Turned out the father and son were in Car D as well and when I told the story of the pillows they were truely grateful and i went from being "Crazy" to "hero" - in their eyes anyway.

Over dinner, I'd taken to Doris Bashing as if to draw attention to people on the train who were worse off than me. I still reckon that the gig was up and everyone except the father, son and Gram-maw (who winked at me when i slugged some hard liquor) thought I was a total loser.

I yearned for the day the Polish Chick loudly exclaimed "I come after Dance" to the Department of Homeland Security guy at Chicago O'Hare in the Immigration queue.

We arrived at Los Angeles and my Aunty Lisa and Uncle Kirk came to pick me up in the Prius. How very LA!

They drove me to their house in Redondo Beach as I told stories of the train and how I will never take public transportation ever again.

They must have been nervous about my driving experience as they did not offer me use of their car. I must admit, I wouldn't let me drive my car. They mentioned something about a bus and my initial word association was 'RENTAL CAR'.

I have been driving for about 3 months, tho I have done more driving on the 'wrong' side of the road in foreign conditions than I ever did at home. I think this qualifies me as somewhat of an expert behind the wheel.

So no borrowing of the car in LA for me, but they had a bike.

Day 1 I rode bike up from Palos Verdes to Torrance, Redondo, Manhatten, El Segundo and eventually LAX airport. This is about 32Km and about the furthest I have ever gone under my own steam! It was a fantastic ride along the beach and I stopped in at various beaches, shops and cafes along the way to either cool down or piss, and met some interesting LA characters.

This stretch of LA coastline is not nearly as insane as the northern part which houses Venice and Santa Monica Beaches, but this part was amazing none the least. Locals embrace the idea of having a couch on the front porch and so many residents - why they are home during the day i do not know - would sit and watch the passing traffic.

In turn, we watched them. I see me watching you watching me, or however it goes.

Sitting under the flight path of LAX, some 100m away from the beach, was amazing. I could feel the warmth of the jet engine in my face as the planes took off over the beach, sometimes 2 next to each other on the parralel runways. Of course, I was all of a sudden a terrorist threat and some security guys came over. When they saw I was taking in the view and unarmed without a suicide bomb strapped to my chest - all was okay.

I am pretty sure the next time I enter the USA I am going to be sent to Guantanamo on some kind of unmarked aeroplane and will eventually spend the rest of my life rotting away in an Adelaide prison. If I get a good PR person I am sure the Australian people will come to love and adore me. My face will be on T-Shirts, my family will be on A Current Affair. Life may come good after all.

I rode the bike back to Redondo Beach to hang out with Aunty Lisa, Uncle Kirk, Cousin Katie and Cousin Carly that evening. They live on top of a hill and believe you me, I am not designed for going up-hill. I can cope really well with the down-hill but the up-hill is a total killer.

Many times I thought about sitting in the gutter and just idling away the time until death.

Bike Ride Map - there & back!

Another family dinner, this time Traditional Los Angeles cuisine - Mexican. It was such a nice meal, and I kept going back for more! LA Mexican is not as refried-bean intensive as Mexican Mexican, which is a huge relief for everyone near me.

After dinner the girls and I were excited to sit down and watch Episode 1 of the new series of Project Runway. We critiqued each and every scene, which was a repeat of Season 1's first task of designing a dress made entirely out of items sourced at a supermarket.

Being the connoseur of fine Reality TV such as Project Runway that I am, I was able to name the contestant who won said task the first time round - Austin Scarlett. This both impressed and scared my LA family. Project Runway included Austin as a judge of this round - FINGER ON THE PULSE!!!

Supermodel Heidi Klum was looking radiant as ever and it was good to see a series of Project Runway in which she is not pregnant. "One day you are in, the next you are out" indeed! I reckon she says that in her sultry german accent when she is giving birth.

Day 2, having done enough riding to last me the rest of my life - I hired a car and drove around LA with the assistance of GPS. I had lunch in Santa Monica with Tania, Simone and their host. Then I drove over to Beverly Hills and West Hollywood and vibed out. Basically I did nothing in particular, I paid for that full tank of Gas and i was gunna use it.

I did my favourite thing in LA - driving aimlessly around the Hollywood Hills checking out the rich peoples houses and their views. I also kept doing laps of Sunset despite the signs saying "any more than 2 laps in 1 hour will be fined" - fuck that - its a rental. If its good enough for Britney its good enough for me! I went past Kitson, The Ivy, The Roosevelt Hotel and drove up a street with a wicked view of the HOLLYWOOD sign. I also stopped by Canters Deli (again) and some other cool places on Fairfax.

Unfortunately I got stuck in Rush Hour on the I405 but GPS in the USA is able to forecast traffic conditions and for the most part had me going down La Cienega Blvd, which made for a much more scenic driving tour of LA anyway, despite LA being really unscenic.

Rush Hour seemed to be all the time but no more than when I happened to be on the road, which was kind of cool. Vibing the city in the way of the local. I had to be up early on Day 3 to drive to Northridge to get a lift with Deb, Tania & Simone to Las Vegas. We were driving through the desert on the 4 hour hike from LA to Vegas in Deb's SUV. I plugged my destination into the GPS , Budget Rent-A-Car Northridge, and off I went.

Ryan Seacrest was broadcasting his morning radio show as I sat in gridlock with a Starbucks coffee on I405 heading north.

How LA can you get?

I made it to Northridge, site of the famous earthquake and really needed to make an earthquake of my own. Thankfully, Americans love their fast food and fast food loves a free public toilet and so I popped in.

Alright, so I go to the bathroom. After the bathroom, I decide "I'll try a breakfast". All up, transaction time in McDonalds - 10 minutes. The breakfast sucked, so after the first bite I tossed it in the bin and continued my blind devotion to the GPS system to get me around the corner for the 30 second roll to the Budget Rent-A-Car.

Being 10 minutes late, I apologised saying "I went to McDonalds on the way". This raised the ire of my travel buddies, for they had not eaten breakfast. I protested, 'but the breakfast sucked' - but still, there had been words. It hung in the air. I felt bad.

Why did I feel bad? For the first time in my life i exercised discretion. Driving along, I had been thinking - "do i talk too much shit? Are all my stories about the toilet? Is this shit even funny any more?". I decided to play it down - I euphemised "McDonalds" in lieu of "Banging Crap" - essentially the same thing in my books anyway.

For once, I was actually ashamed to have to admit to a bowel movement. Misunderstanding cleared up. Word got around and defenses were lowered and I actually felt humiliated, which is odd considering how much literal shit I talk. I felt even worse than if i'd farted in front of the Pope - "Oops! Bless me!".

So... driving along, looking within - finding some kind of spiritual zen - self reflection on my life. Hamming it up like I had divine spiritual intervention on the interstate. How fucking LA!

It backfired, if you'll excuse the pun.

The Coast Starlight

Eerie "There Is Help - 1800 SUICIDE" signs are along the railway track, every 1km.

Grammaw (blue dress) has a cigarette at Salinas

Riding along LA coastline

I worship this thing!

USA OK?

On arrival at Chicago O'Hare Airport the first world treated me like a poor cousin. On many levels, I was. I was happy to put my feeble and uneducated attempts at Spanish behind me.

Hola, Adios, Por Favor e Gracias!

Note to self: Learn Spanish Again.

The Immigration queue was easily a mile long if you take into consideration how many times it turned back on itself like that Pipe3D screen saver in Windows.

GRR - I hate that screen saver.

An Air India 747 had come in just before my flight and so there were plenty of terrorist threats for The Department of Homeland Security to interrogate before getting around to rubber gloving me.

I noticed how long the US Citizens queue was, and they quickly (oh, the irony) allocated all but 2 processing desks to the card carrying residents, who breezed through with a twangy accent or perhaps a honk of their home town ("Cincinnati Ohio YEA-AH!") as proof of residence.

The US Citizen queue also had full metal jacket style marine security detail, impressively armed to the hilt. The terror from within??

The Non US line was staffed by 3 unarmed Polish ladies of outsourced Airport Worker nature. When I asked if I was in the right queue, I was told "Yes, of course, this is Hello" and thrust a series of forms with no explanation.

The Polish ladies spoke no English or Indian, the Indians spoke no English or Polish. I knew I was in for a painfully long game of Pictionary/Cluedo/Charades with Immigration. This was going to be worse than that time I was at a dinner party with post dinner entertainment involving a PlayStation, a board game and questions no one could answer.

On the Immigration Form there is a question asking whether you are a Nazi wanted for war crimes - Y/N.

Given the level of frustration I had with the Polish chicks, I was seriously considering ticking Y.

I'm not sure whether we can laugh about WWII yet so I ticked N. I wonder if anyone ever does tick Y?

Its a very strange question none the less. Maybe a "yes" would make them do *some* work? The alternative is standing around yakking in the mother tongue about god knows what - certainly not how to manage a queue or help people make a connecting flight.

Even if you DO have a connecting flight, its all "Yes, Of Course, This is Queue....yackety-yak-yak-yak-yak".

At one point an officer from Department of Homeland Security came over and started trying to chat up one of the Polish ladies. In return, she was flirting in such broken English. The whole situation made me want to die and take the humiliation with me in the same way Jesus did our sins - I wanted to relieve the world of future awkwardness. I really am Saint Dave of the Airport Queue s- I preach tolerance, understanding and death if you dare humiliate yourself in front of others and burden us with the memory.

I finally made it through the queue and got as far as the 20 questions from the border control guy, who was American and spoke English. Hooray! He asked all manner of questions about my background, my employment history and everything in between.

I got really paranoid because he was reading the computer screen at the same time - what did they know - am i in the system?

I broke out into a sweat, which made me even more paranoid.

They were totally on to me.

The questions continued and after a while - maybe it was the nerves - maybe I was tired - Either way, I was so sick of trying to explain my answer to "Why did you leave your last job?" when the answer was found in the short story "I'm a Contractor" which had the line "3 month contract extended by 6 months".

Bored, over it and miserable, I cheered myself up by making friendly Australian conversation (read: i back chat him) about how he liked his job, how long he'd worked there, why did he leave his last job etc.

I got a swift stamp in my passport and a glare which said "get the fuck out of here before your next vacation is Guantanamo".

An airport dash through the terminals of Chicago O'Hare ensued, evoking the memory of the unfortunate Culkin Family in that movie Home Alone. I hit a roadblock with the terminal train I had to use to go from here to there for a domestic connection to San Francisco (SFO).

I only just barely made it.

They had already shut the door to the jetbridge and were minutes away from blowing my bags up for being a No-Show.

I copped a lecture from the American Airlines chick for being gate-late and gave it back ten fold, being very careful not to totally diss the security measures the US has in place.

"Rah rah rah, I UNDERSTAND WHY but rah rah rah, ITS NOT MY FAULT" etc.

I had to be careful - Guantanamo was still a possibility. I will never forget the time that my dad cracked a joke in the Detroit Airport security line about how we were Australian Terrorists.

My mum, sister and I all backed away from him faster than if he had said he had an incredibly contagious case of genital leprosy. I am sure that little episode comes up on the computer screen every time i go through US Immigration. I am positive this is why they ask me so many questions but let Akbar from Air India through with little more than a "yes, of course".

Nice time of year for Guantanamo, I can't say I'd enjoy Abu Ghraib in the summer.

I turned it up on the SFO flight as the sound in my seat did not work and rather than amusing myself with a book or my laptop; I was in a well stinky mood. I had no end of pent up anger and frustration I decided to get up the American Airlines Purser and hopefully score some free food and drink, a total rarity when flying a US Carrier especially American Airlines. The purser was dead nice about "the situation" and I felt really bad about ranting as much as I did.

After a couple of complimentary drinks and complimentary access to the buy-on-board meal cart, plus a change of seat to the Exit Row Window (yehar!) I felt better. The sound did not work on the new seat either, but by now it didn't matter - I was drunk.

Back in SFO, land of milk and honey. I was expecting Cousin Stephanie to pick me up but saw that Aunty Ailsa had come, with Cousin Stephanie in the passenger seat. This was unexpected and I knew something was up and it couldn't be good. It turned out Cousin Stephanie had a real day of it as their cat, Preston, had been involved in a brawl with the cat next door, and lost.

Preston is really old and can't defend the territory like it could "back in the day", and so a trip to the vet was in order.

Cousin Stephanie has absolutely no sense of smell which means she is the designated driver when it comes to taking Preston in the car. Preston, for his part, has absolutely no desire to travel in the car nor be at the vet and he takes these opportunities to clear his stomach and bowel.

He thinks he is human - We can all sympathize with the desire for comfort while traveling!

It is said by some in our family that Cousin Stephanie keeps Preston alive through pure love and affection. Cousin Stephanie empathized with Prestons situation as if the cat next door had directly attacked her, causing an injury such as the loss of sight or the gain of smell.

When we arrived back in Palo Alto I was pretty keen to see how Preston was holding up given the horrific version of events I had heard in the car. The stoic silence of Cousin Stephanie led me to believe that she was dwelling on possible revenge plans for the cat next door. This was situation critical and it dawned on me that we were only hours away from having a war room set up, in front of the television.

As a side note, this concept of giving too much of a shit about a cat when it gets into a fight was foreign to me.

My family had a cat, Bingo, and as much as we loved and adored him and showered him with no end of unnecessary attention, we totally drew the line at putting Bingo in the car for medical attention. We tried it once and it went so pear shaped - Bingo went berserk my mum and sister ended up getting so scratched and traumatized that THEY ended up requiring medical attention.

Bing was just fine, for 20 long, loving years.

It was one of those unspoken arrangements that we would let nature take its course should the need arise for future feline medical attention. Bingo was feral, he came from moggy background and so we lovingly assumed he had a thick skin even when he had the mange, was skinny and half dead. We were praying he would go soon ("he won't last the winter") so we could all sleep in without all that AAAOORRWAAA wailing guilt trip bullshit at 7am when he wanted to be fed.

I must admit, I got him stoned once or twice when he looked a bit beaten up - this made him eat more and sleep more which is, as we all know, the best remedy for what ails ya.

Back to Preston, bless him, he was higher than a kite on kitty pain killers and I must admit I was a little jealous at this point.

No one cared about MY day; trouble with Immigration, American Airlines - it paled in comparison. Nooo...Preston had a bad day AND got a valium.

Oh, to be a feline in my family - we just dope 'em up.

I cat sat Preston during my stay in SFO as he was incredibly grumpy after his fight and stopped eating. Everyone else had lives to lead, where as I was falling out of bed at the crack of noon and doing not much else (it was my holiday after all!). I tried to encourage happiness by enabling Prestons favourite past time. - licking water off leaves of outdoor plants. I would escort him outside, sitting guard against the Terrorist Cat next door. On request, I would re-water the plant.

AAAAOORRWWAA!!!!

I even made him an Art Deco styled box out of excess USPS boxes I had bought - this box was a total work of art and was designed with the discerning cat in mind. It had lots of edges on which he could scratch himself, it had a front door and a patio and a full view of the fridge and feed bowl.

AAAAOORRWWAA!!!!

Cousin Stephanie kept up with her undivided love and affection; Aunty Ailsa put his water bowl on a box so he didn't have to bend over to drink - It was never enough.

AAAAOORRWWAA!!!!

Another trip to the Vet, he was given some more medicine. This included some Thyroid medicine which had been prescribed in the past, that Nurse Stephanie had forgotten to administer. Love and affection indeed! Needless to say, after this he made a complete recovery.

Here is a video of me cat sitting Preston while he licked water off the leaves: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wPmR3ZalLOo



Independence Day rocked around and I was pretty excited to share this most American days with my American family. We had planned a family bun-fight for the evening. Cousin Stephanie and I, always the keen errand-runners (especially where a parental credit card is concerned) decided to go to the store. We stopped first at WalMart, so I could experience this monstrosity in all of its Independence Day Glory.

"Wel-a-come tu Wal-a-Mart-a" was the mangled greeting.

The first of many morbidly obese woman rolled by in one of those carts with the flag designed to make the elderly more mobile. The bargains were great: I got a T-shirt of the American Flag and the words 'Faded Glory' which was so subversive I could not believe Walmart had them for $3.

US dissidents have really sold out, I yearn for the days when people actually made statements and had causes, not just a rack in WalMart.

I found 88c TV dinners consisting of Chicken nuggets, macaroni cheese and corn. I just had to buy and try - later in my stay I actually did. The meal had no flavor and had a texture like an old sock. I was basically eating processed goat feed. I guess all those greeters on minimum wage need to eat some how, and I guess flavor is one of those "value-adds" that WalMart passes on order to "pass on the savings!".

I am not sure whether cat food is cheaper (Prestons Gourmet Vet Only cat food is definitely not cheaper) but my nose tells me that it would at least bring flavor to the table.

After that we did a tour of Trader Joes, quite possibly the most amazing store i have ever seen in my life. I could write a whole blog on their range of "Inspected for Wholesomeness by the US Department of Agriculture" food - whatever that means, but it tasted great.

The day Trader Joes opens in Australia is the day I buy one of those mobile elderly flag cart things for myself.

Family dinner was amazing. Aunty Ailsa prepared refreshing salads as Cousin Stephanie and I cranked up the Breville and grilled a selection of meat. Uncle Steve prepared our families signature dish - Cucumber Salad; California Style.

Basically everyone in my Aussie-Hungarian family makes a vinegary cucumber salad and they all slightly vary in style. California Style is controversial in that it uses the herb Dill as opposed to the more traditional basic vinegar/water solution. Across the board, we all agree it tastes better the longer it stays in the fridge. The only problem is it never really stays more than 2 days in the fridge before someone has finished it.

Its our "thing".

San Francisco was spent in the kind of malaise I'd be in at my parents house; oh how I love family.

We set the DVR/Tivo to record quality television as Living Lohan, Denise Richards - "Its Complicated", The View, and other TV shows which looked too bad to be good.

Living Lohan was by far the worst as, despite the Tabloid Clusterfuck name, it had zero celebrity, lots of hangers on and was unashamedly BAD.

Person: Talent, do you know Ali Lohan?
Talent: I am not familiar with that one. I met her sister once...

Denise Richards is anything but complicated, she is a big pot of crazy slightly steaming away and then BOOM - the lid hits the roof, credit to Kathy Griffin for that call. Denise has no fucking idea, but its trainwreck TV that i love to hate and so I watched it. Finger on the pulse.

I saw a great show highlighting the various Southern Barbecue cooking methods and I knew at some point I had to get me some Barbeque. This is not like Australian Barbeque (that is "grill") the southerners cook the shit out of the meat and then lay on this amazing BBQ sauce. Barbecue is quite possibly the only reason I would fly across America and land somewhere that is not NYC or LAX/SFO.

Its hard discussing the rest of what I did in San Francisco as for the most part I was hanging out with Cousin Stephanie who had wizened up to my blogging and so whenever something happened it was "OFF THE RECORD".

GRR, i hate Off the Record.

So, without being specific about how we amused ourselves, we seemed to run a marathon of errands which were for the most part fruitless or based on my desire to drive somewhere. If the errand were fruitful it usually meant that we scored stuff that was entirely unnecessary to the greater cause or doing something relating to Cousin Stephanies company.

Company errands generally ran to time and budget and more often than not involved going to Home Depot, which was kind of cool.

One of our errands resulted in unplanned Southern Barbecue which was not a part of the greater cause but was incredibly fulfilling given the TV show I had previously seen.

Another time we ended up cruising Apple stores to scope out the news-making queues for the iPhone launch the next day. FINGER ON THE PULSE - I was so close to Apple HQ at 1 Infinite Loop, Cupertino, CA. Cute.

We stalked a lot of iPhone stores over a number of days and when we went in for the kill they were sold out - doh!

I'd go as far as to say we made a sport out of it: Extreme Errand Marathon.

An example, is in 1 hour going to Home Depot, Starbucks, Apple Store #1, Seed Store, Wells Fargo, Bank of America, Pet store, somewhere else and Home. BOOM! We definitely streamlined our days, which almost always included a tour of local fast food establishments, errands, work and a DVD marathon. Check it out on YouTube: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TyYDFHFwC-8



I really did enjoy driving around the USA, the interstate system is so much fun. Given that the majority of my driving ended up with an In & Out burger it was double fun.

From time to time I assisted Cousin Stephanie with her work. This was mutually beneficial -I had to fund my arse around the world; she needed an extra set of hands.

Cousin Stephanie runs a small business which involves hard labor, some of which she performs herself. She follows that time honored US tradition of employing 'Day Laborers' and 'Their Mates' - who were really nice, pleasant guys and hard workers to boot. Hard to understand at times but we had fun. My various questions like"what does Mamacita mean and how is it used?"were met with a game of charades in which the lewd actions completely explained the colloquial Mexican saying and then some.

Its a mystery to me why these guys aren't working Chicago O'Hare Immigration... wait up!

I worked as efficiently as a disabled man changing a flat tire on the interstate in 40*c heat and so my first and last foray into hard labor was entirely forgettable. I volunteered to get los amigo's Subway for dinner each night and I did that almost perfectly and without any procrastination, despite forgetting who wanted Queso on their Jamon sub.

I found access to the roof of the building and thought it was the right thing to do to invite my boss up to take a little time and enjoy the view.

Despite all this, when there were goals set and an end in sight I worked really fucking hard and kind of enjoyed it - definitely fun running around an empty construction site occasionally being productive and not just a nuisance.

The weekend rocked around and Cousin Jeff arrived back from a stint in Florida finishing up on the project he literally launched in the days before Cousin Gregs wedding. I mean LAUNCHED. Into Space, not into the ether like on any of my projects.

Saturday night We had secured 3 tickets to see KATHY GRIFFIN LIVE at Concord, CA - a town about an hour or so's drive from Palo Alto. How fucking exciting, I totally rate Kathy Griffin. To see her live - AMAZING.

I "drove like the wind" along various interstates taking into consideration Detours and a tour of the nearest Fatburger fast-food establishment, the only one of its kind near San Francisco.

We managed to get to Kathy just in time, and we had pretty decent seats, and a fantastic parking spot. The gay parking lot attendant mafia was looking out for its Australian brethren!

Kathy Griffin is just an amazing entertainer, she is so real and just outrageously funny. Her show "My Life on the D List" is the absolute pinnacle of Reality TV as nothing in her life is scripted (unlike say, a Lohan production) and Kathy rolls with the punches. Her father died, she was recently divorced as her husband was defrauding her - Kathy deals, and she's bloody good.

When it comes to hanging shit on E List celebrities (like say, Ali Lohan and Denise Richards), she 'goes' there. She also tells stories of personal experience that celebrities would rather you didn't hear. Like how she got re-banned from 'The View' for broadcasting a conversation she had with Barbara Walters had about Lube. She says what other people dare not allegedly say.

For a pop culture junkie like me she is my one and only god - suck it jesus!

(Kathy Griffin got in trouble for saying "suck it Jesus" after receiving an Emmy award and saying it was her new God)

Given how the USA sells out at absolutely every opportunity (think AT&T Stadium, American Airlines Arena etc), Kathy Griffin was playing at the Concord - Sleepy Time Pavilion. How funny is that, the signs on the way in say "Sleepytime, your ticket to a good nights sleep".

Hardly what you want from a show, but Kathy managed to keep us all awake while she cracked it for a good 2 hours.

Seeing Kathy was definitely one of the seven wonders of my trip. Check it out on YouTube: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zqyVX_VisSk



Over all, I had the most fun in San Francisco hanging out with my family and getting to know them in a way that can't happen over one family dinner every few years. My clan are spread far and wide and to actually be able to experience family life on the other side of the world was cool. To realize that the SFO faction is almost the same as mine - the sibling rivalries; the obsession with trashy TV; the parents who wished we would watch less tv and eat healthier.

Blood runs thicker than the water that separates us.

Cousin Preston

WalMart on Independence Day

Extreme Errand Marathon

In and Out Drive Thru

Hard Labor

Videos

GRRR!!

The Real Cancun

We arrived in Cancun on another first class bus, this one had extreme air conditioning but also had free tea, coffee AND a mens and ladies bathroom up the back. Such luxury! It reminded me of the time my friend Liz and I decided to bus it around the north island of New Zealand only to find the bus was actually a Tarago. While it turned out to be an alright experience, the humiliation we both felt at being shuttled around in a Tarago was our unspoken reality. Liz was once proudly Tarago people so I guess she was kind of used to it.

The NZ Tarago Experience was pretty funny, I guess that is what I miss when taking "first class" style transportation, its the ability to laugh at the hokey ways the operators save a quick buck, kind of like the camping chair experience on the people mover in Merida.

So, Cancun.

There is one thing I have noticed about places that claim to be relaxing and no hussle and bustle. Personalities cause the conflict, not the language barriers, nor the differing cultures. When there are huge language barriers and cultural differences that seem to make absolutely no sense at all (like Romanian road rules) there is a kind of camaraderie that takes place among the weary traveller.

When there is nothing to worry about and everything is taken care of, for a premium price of course, that is when the real issues begin. I was aware that on entering Cancun, it was not as calm and serene as it seemed.

We got off the bus in the swelteringly hot Cancun bus station and the immediate clusterfuck of local official and unofficial taxi drivers began, which of course raised Tania's ire to the point of almost suggesting we walk or catch a local bus ("its the principle of it...") when we were miles and miles away from the touristy part. We were all in on this currency induced indignation until we collectively realized that the exchange rate was like 10 to 1; yet again, we were getting upset about nickles and dimes.

Its funny how the exchange rates are almost perfectly calculated when we are in a shop ("CAN YOU BELIEVE HOW CHEAP CALVIN KLEIN IS??? $5 BACK HOME - HAHAHA - LETS SPEND SPEND quick.. BUY BUY BUY" etc) but when it comes down to the necessities in life like 'get me the fuck out of here... NOW', the exchange rate all of a sudden becomes a problem.

We arrived at the Fiesta Americana Condessa, a really flash and over the top western style resort where we had a total bargain booking due to Tania's friend Antonio's connections - his dad helped build the cone pergola thing out the front, which was MASSIVE - so he got discounted room rates and 3 pieces of laundry for free.

While 3 pieces of free Laundry sounds like not a big deal to anyone else in the world, in Tourist Cancun where money open doors, it talks English, it washes clothes...money does absolutely everything you could ever need to do. Its really funny how people who "no comprende englais" all of a sudden speak fluent English when a greenback is up for grabs, and while the Peso is still the Mexican currency, the rules are different in Cancun where it is US$ Dinero the whole way, baby!

Tania recommended we go to a place called Senor Frogs for dinner and some dancing, which sounded truely hideous but given we were on the arse end of busses, hokey hostels and Mexican "charm" (dirt and filth) it sounded like a good idea to go out Americana style and eat a burger and listen to some music.

It turned out to be how I imagined hell to be. The entire experience was so American it farted Britney Spears first album. Having spent a fair amount of time in America and believing them to be, generally speaking, a misunderstood people - the experience at Senor Frogs made me see Americans in the eyes of the Muslim Jihad.

Spring break, every night.

The black MC who rapped badly over the R&B music, the girls who bumped and grinded ANYTHING that moved (including waiters) and who took part in the various games run by the MC which included, top swapping, sculling beer and bursting the balloon in the waiters lap, by straddling him.

Whenever people had an opportunity to talk on the microphone they excitedly honked the name of their city/state like they were on Oprah -

"CINCINATTI, OHIO... YEA-AH!!!"
"WOOOO clapclapclapclap" etc

There is something Americans just *love* about screaming out the name of their home town, like there is any pride associated with yelling "FRESNO, CALIFORNIA! WOO!" or "BUFFALO, NEW YORK! YEA-AH!".

I know a chick from Wangaratta in Victoria and if she EVER went on say, Kerry Anne Kennerlys show, screaming out "Wangaratta, Victoria -YEEEAAAH! FOR THE WIN" I would completely abort the friendship. Its not that Wangaratta is as bad as say, Fresno or Buffalo (believe me, i know) or any other American city that is not San Francisco or New York, its just really appalling that people carry on like their hokey home town is some kind of badge of honor when they are public.

Everyone whooped it up as the girls got on stage, the cliches AND the tits came out.

Some really bored and uninspired waiter chick came around blowing a whistle so obscenely that I just had to see what it was she was carrying on about, and I found out she was selling shots. Why the hell not? This place could not get any worse. Basically, she would pour the most syrupy shots down my throat while rubbing my hair and slapping me all over and blowing that god-damn whistle.

It was almost the final straw before i stormed out of there, hoping to bump into the first Akbar, Mohammed or Jaleel with a crop dusting license and a butter knife.

I've gotten more drunk off mouthwash than those shots, that's for sure.

The final straw came when they started playing some cool disco music, while the Americans were doing a choo choo train around the venue, so we hit the newly cleared dance floor. As the choo choo train made it back, the vile slutty writhing of the young, drunk girls was just too humiliating to watch. Also, the bad dancing of the B-White-Boy wannabe's was so delusional that like Jesus, I wanted to die for having to witness their sins.

I was super righteous by this point, I'll tell ya that in English for nothing, a rarity in Cancun.

We left and walked along the lake commenting on how vile, nasty, horrible etc the whole place turned out to be, despite making a mean hamburger and fries. We had to walk back past Senor Frogs to catch the bus back to our resort to find one of the sluttiest girls passed out in a pool of her own vomit on the fake grass out the front. There was justification in this scene, and more self righteousness than a royale with cheese.

I wondered really a-loudly how many people would be pregnant by the morning.

Simone and I shared a room and Tania and Antonio shared another, a really flawed arrangement as both Antonio and I smoked and as such the two non smokers got stuck with 2 smokers. I did my best to smoke on the balcony, which was less than 1ft wide, but had the most amazing view of the ocean, the aqua sea, the white sand, the resort next door and copped the amazing sea breeze. It wasn't so bad, I have smoked in worse places like the smoking room at Madrid Airport which smells like burning hair.

Smoking "outside" gave me a good excuse to enjoy the view and linger a while longer; while the view was amazing, there is only so much ocean, sand and resort I can handle before it all gets a bit same-samey.

The girls and I motivated ourselves into a taxi one morning (read: early afternoon) to go across to Isla Mujeres, a small island about 30 minutes by ferry from Cancun. Once we had negotiated the local OXO (7/11 Mexico Style) and sourced more Peso (to avoid the outrageously bloated USD currency exchange) we were on the boat. It was a really pleasant ride and well worth whatever it cost, which was not much.

Once we arrived I spotted a place saying "GOLF CARTS FOR HIRE" and I knew I had arrived in heaven. I have always wanted to drive a golf cart around a Caribbean Island and as my future travel plans had changed some what, to not include a trip to Belize and Honduras, this was my only opportunity. More on that later.

I was kicking myself that I forgot my license AND my passport, negating the possibility of being the designated driver, but Simone who enjoys organization like I enjoy sleep, she was prepared and so for 450 pesos ($45AUD) we had ourselves a cart until 5pm.

We all took turns at driving the golf cart, which was speed restricted to the pace of a small child, unlike basically everywhere else in Mexico where the general rule of thumb when it comes to speed is is "just don't hit anything". The speed allowed us to take in the view and did not cripple us so bad that we did not get to see the entire island in one afternoon. We hit the furthermost most point and saw some Iguana's and a really shitful outside art gallery thing which offered basically nothing, except a view, which we already had.

We drove on past a flying fox which looked amazing, but given our propensity to save a quick buck here and there, we decided the only thing that the flying fox had going for it was the view, which we already had. It was my turn to drive and I wanted to take that bastard golf cart off road, so we did, going down the side of a mountain on what Lindsay Lohans PR rep would call a "paved road" where we found a nice, quiet beach and an opportunity to jump in and laze around in the water for a while.

I'm not sure why we left that beach, which appeared to have a restaurant, but we collectively decided to move on to a more popular area for lunch, hoping that the food would be of better quality or something. So we found that place, parked the golf cart under the shade (like it was gunna get so hot inside with all the windows up? der) and found ourselves a table.

This restaurant looked like it had it all - outside eating on the beach, heaps of people, lots of amazing dishes on the menu. The service was totally hopeless and the food tasted like something a shark ate and shat out, if it arrived at all. The girls grilled fish came, no problem. The prawns we ordered defied eating, even with lemon, tabasco, hell even being coated in sand and deep fried would have made those prawns taste better. They left the shit shaft in as well, which I think is gross, and so I sort of passed on the prawn dish.

The girls tried to politely not eat while they waited for my dish to come, which never came despite my repeated attempts at getting the waitresses attention, actually speaking to the waitress, and speaking to what appeared to be the "big island mama" in charge.

It is a total mystery to me what happened to my lunch because they had about an hour of me complaining while they responded with "just a minute, it will be minutes" before we got up and tried to do a runner. We left some money, but not the entire bill and tried to sneak off to the golf cart.

Unfortunately, due to the aforementioned speed restriction its not like we could discretely bail on to the door less and windowless golf cart and fang it the hell out of there, leaving an impressive sand storm in our wake.

When Big Island Mama came rolling over to the golf cart, I knew we were in trouble. Given the speed Big Island Mama had, it dawned on me that possibly the worst thing to do at that point would be to drive (roll) off because she could catch us quite easily at her pace.

She started complaining about the bill and how we were short and I started swearing in a variety of languages hoping she would understand one of them, Tania started up with her "its the principle of it" rant and Simone knew the only way out was to give this woman the money so we could drive (roll) out of there. I can't remember, but when we had enough distance between Big Island Mama and the golf cart I started yelling at the top of my lungs various words which despite language barriers, tone can still convey sufficient indignity and offense.

I did not want ANYONE in that restaurant to enjoy themselves as I did not have a full belly and paid however many pesos's (fuckin PRINCIPLE of it) so i could look at a dodgy plate of prawns sipping a warm coke.

Hows the calm and serentity now, ya f***** f** s****** c*** b**** s*** w****!

More off roading , this time onto what I now know to be a construction site, but which at the time looked like it would be a bit more fun. There were a couple of guys on another golf cart, but given the speed restrictions they were having real difficulty managing a burn out, so we turned around and went back to the beaten path.

Towards the absolute end of our day on the island, we found the most magical beach. Murphys Law. Of course, to be able to enjoy the beach cost a number of Peso's and given my self induced indignity due to an empty stomach, I was not going to spend another 0.0001 Australian cent on anything. "Fuck 'em", I'd say.

Magical.

We started taking photos on the underwater digital cameras when we realised that on the boat in the background, a couple were straddling each other. They appeared in the background of almost all of our photos as the boat looked calm, serene and gave the photos a sense of perspective.

I wonder if they saw us taking photos and thought "dirty pervs!" while we looked on thinking "get a room!". Funny - and then it was time to get the cart back to the ferry terminal and catch the boat back to Cancun.

All I remember about the boat is that it took forever for it to come and the heat on the jetty was almost unbearable, and we were about 5 metres away from the most beautiful blue water you could see. We were right up front on the queue, which ensured we would get a great seat for when we get off the boat and could bolt for a taxi and avoid any more queues. The boat left, then came back because a few more people wanted to get on. By this time, everyone was beyond over it having waited in the sweltering jetty.

The late comers took their fucking sweet time to walk down to the boat, laughing, stopping to take photos. The boat errupted - people were so collectivley pissed off by the time the stragglers arrived on board, absolutely everyone let them know what they thought. Tania dropped a C-bomb which paled in insignificance compared to what some of the other people came out with, even though it was in Spanish, the tone conveyed it all.

We didn't do much else in Cancun, what else is there to do when the beach and pool are free, and everything else costs the world? We did go clubbing one night to a place called Coco Bongo's which Antonio had recommended - $40USD for "all you could drink". This was both good, and bad.

The club itself was something I have never seen before - Vegas style shows every 15 minutes and a variety of top 40 and urban music inbetween. We were inebriated to say the least.

Michael Jackson, Superman, Elvis, Beetlejuice, Madonna - all had their shows. It was spectacular.

We were pretty drunk and I'm not going to go into it too much here, except to say "there were words". It was kind of awful and I could have been a bit more of a man and tried to avoid what happened sooner or all together, but I was pissed.

The Real Cancun.

We were all in some way involved in what transpired and it was unfortunate that it had to happen, but it did. At the very least it put everything on the table, there were no assumptions, there were no unreasonable expectations or misunderstandings for us to deal with in the future. And that is that.

A day or so later it was time for me to depart Cancun for the USA, instead of Belize (Puh-lease!) and Honduras.

A friend of mine, Chris2, who had been to the area before, conveyed his sense of shock that someone like me would be going somewhere like that, and sure enough, as I discovered - it really isn't my scene.

Maybe another day. But not today.

I was booked on American Airlines (Aerolineas Gringa's) to San Francisco via Chicago to meet up with Cousin Stephanie given that she was mourning the loss of family-en-masse as everyone had gone back to Australia after the wedding. It worked out perfectly because I was mourning the loss of cable tv and flushing toilet paper, so we could both offer some comfort to each other.

Cousin Stephanie and I had unresolved business to attend to, mainly relating to being idiots and cracking each other up with the various characters we create, but also the most pressing issue: the end of days.

We had 2 entire seasons of Jericho in which to watch and take notes, for future reference. We had seeds to buy, endless discussions on the merits of a "panic room" and solar panels.

There was In & Out Burger, Starbucks and Satellite TV.

I needed to be me again.

Cancun

Senor Frogs

Golf Carting!

Coco Bongo's Nightclub

Chitchen Itza

VIDEO SECTION: Coco Bongo Nightclub

Here today, Cenoté tomorrow.

On the bus to Campeche, on the way - despite riding in business class luxury (you hear that, Lynn?) we were stopped by some scary looking military men who ordered everyone off the bus while they randomly selected suitcases for inspection. When I saw mine on the table, I started panicking, why i am not sure, because i had absolutely no reason to be concerned. It was just really full on and scary having someone point a machine gun at my suitcase and demand for it to be opened. Once I opened it, they did nothing more than a passing glance and we were given the all clear - Phew!! They didn't find that secret stash of pseudo ephedrine Sudafeds I'd lied to the authorities (a pharmacist for fucks sake) about back home, "just in case".

We arrived in Campeche refreshed and ready to hit the beach as Campeche appeared to be on the coast of the Gulf of Mexico and so, naive as I am, I thought it would have a beach of some description.

At Campeche bus station, which was really clean and well organized we jumped in a cab, which for an incredibly cheap price offered to take us to the Hostel Monkey. I can't remember whether Tania got uppity about spending the money on this cab but we made it to our hostel with out much to-do.

Later, if she arked up about money at an inopportune moment, say, when I am just getting off a bus or trying to speak Romanian and I was just not in the mood for being frugal, i would glare one of those glares that would mean €200 is spent without ANY to-do.

This was the first of at least 2 accommodations we stayed at on this trip which involved hauling luggage up insane stairs either plentiful or steep or both.

Campeche itself was a welcome respite. The buildings had all been restored and colorfully painted making them look somewhat un-Mexican, but gorgeous none the less. It was hard to find the local stores as the facades were clearly the tourist attraction and were not befouled with the advertising or branding of the globalized world in which we live. Noted, I was still reading that book about Consumerism so I was prepared for a lengthy discussion on how its rare not to see Coca Cola or a telecommunications company logo for one entire block. Not that anyone really cared - These facades were really cool.

It never ceases to amaze me how corner stores the world over have coca cola branding, varying from the flashy to the imitation - the imitation branding, as hokey as it is, its kind of weird in that they're trying to convey coke cred to sell bread.

We wandered around, tried to find the beach only to find that there was no beach! Campeche was some kind of port, or bay, and the only thing they had by the side of the water was a walkway, a wall and some nasty looking rocks below. I do not understand why no one on city council did not think to haul sand in from, I dunno, anywhere - and place it here. At that moment, I needed a beach, even if it was a "bay beach". (pfft).

The skies looked ominous as we continued our walk along the bay - it actually started looking quite scary. I mused about how this is hurricane season and we were in hurricane territory and then had half a thought that we should have checked out the weather, or done something to ensure the safety and comfort of our holiday.

Next time I travel I almost definitely will look into the weather, and whether the place I am staying has stairs.

Tania met some locals and broke into her stories, in Spanish, which from what I can gather was saying the place names with the right accent and saying how nice and pretty it all was. Simone and I, not stupid - realized the heavens were about to open and ditched Tania with her 4 gentlemen friends & we found some hokey awning styled shelter just after the heavens opened.

The storm looked like a hurricane altho it wasn't that bad, I guess the palm tree's are used to swaying like that.

Tania caught up to us, with her local friends, who appeared more disinterested in her pronunciation of Latin American cities and more interested with the prospects of a drunken gringo later that night. I don't recall them featuring in any later stories so she some how must of ditched them somewhere around that awning - no easy feat.

So.. feeling like sewer rats after a hurricane, we resorted to the only other thing we seemed to do in Mexico - shop. Tania was hell bent on getting through all the shops in record time, lest they not open at a desirable hour the next day, while Simone and I went about finding some food - which we found, and was delightful. Its amazing how fulfilling a bread roll and salad with salad dressing can be after 2 weeks of refried beans.

We weren't sure what to do that night, given we had 2 potential touristy things to do - one was to see a "spectacular sound and light show" at one of the local pyramid ruins, the other was the Campeche Musical Fountain. The lady at the hostel who spoke little to no English almost had us on a very expensive taxi to catch the "spectacular sound and light show" but the kindly Swede working the night shift managed to catch Tania's attention as she was running for the taxi, advising her that the "spectacular sound and light show was not on that night".

This random American from Kansas told us in his incredibly slow drawl that the sound and light show was better at Uxmal anyway, and if we can get there, its definitely our best bet. So the fountain it was!

The rain had almost stopped, but later turned into a relentless drizzle which made the short stroll to the Musical Fountain not such a bad idea after all, as the hostel people had told us they can hear it from the hostel, meaning it must be close. We picked up this Canadian chick from the hostel who was also keen on seeing the fountain, and she ended up having about as much personality as a drowned beaver and we huddled under umbrellas and made awkward conversation as we walked through the picturesque main square of Campeche.

"You been to Canada?" ...
"uh..."
*Weird Awkward*

As the story goes, Simone fell down a hole. It was a pretty nasty, un-announced hole in the ground and she fell right in and managed to get a really nasty graze down her leg, not to mention the shock of falling a few feet into an abyss. While she was going through the worst of the pain, the pithy little fountain near where she was recovering ("Nah, that can't be it") roared into life and the most un-original big-orchestra oom-paa music started blaring.

Sad little streams of water rose and fell with the music and some of the lights changed colour at the same time. The streams crescendo-ed with the music - almost in time - and this said to me that we must be at the wretched Campeche Musical Fountain.

I could definitely put on a better performance by inviting everyone into my bathroom while i play Ravels Bolero while flicking the lights and flushing the toilet - almost in time.

Why any town would be proud to have this as a 'local attraction' with prime billing in all the tourist brochures is beyond me - its kind of like how people tell you to visit Federation Square when you go to Melbourne and when you finally do (after the excitement of catching a tram or marveling at the pretty lane ways which are really just convenient storage for expired food from local restaurants), you wonder if that's really it and then it dawns on you that the whole Fed Square experience is profoundly underwhelming in the grand scheme of things.

We wandered around a bit more, taking in the local cathedral, which had a statue of Jesus covered in many Lanyards - that was pretty funny - and then ended up at a local restaurant which a few locals told us was the local outlet for Ice, as Simone needed some for her leg. Double bonus - the restaurant had free Wi Fi and the WEP key was something really easy like "1234" which can be conveyed without a marathon game of charades, so I was happy too.

I went back to the room to read a book and chill out and the girls walked around to see what else was to be seen (which was nothing) and lo and behold, they bumped into "The English". In hind site I really wished I had stayed out as The English would have been really fun to get pissed with! Ah well..

The next day, we got up and caught the "tourist tram" (it was really a bus) around the small town with a bunch of school kids who were about as bored as we were, except we could make smart arse comments without copping a lecture from the teacher. Even the tour guide chick seemed a little bored in her explanations of it all - "here is some architecture - here is some more - and some more... pretty hey?"

After that we walked around a little - the girls hit the shops (again - more range by day) and i tried vainly to shop but was pretty bored of the offerings, except they had a cool BB gun in one of the shops and I really struggled to think up a good justification for any of the border crossings I had ahead of me, as to why I was armed.

That whole "end of days arm yourself and stockpile" justification does not necessarily translate well (I know in French it is "finisterre") and i had a few more countries in between, such as the US, which are pretty uppity about people being armed at the borders. Isn't it ironic?

So I ended up in a hammock. That was nice, I had a great view of the cathedral, and a great book - and really, that's about all Campeche had to offer.

We caught the bus to Merida which was again, uneventful and first class the whole way and I don't remember much about this trip except that I was sat next to this incredibly fat Mexican woman who would shift in her seat every once in a while, and the most abdominal smell would occur. This was funny until it wasn't, and that she kept diving into her bag for more food said that it was "ALL SYSTEMS GO" on that front (or back) and I was well impressed when we arrived.

Everything looked like even in the 70's, it would have been considered in poor taste. We got into our hostel, which was kind of charming from the outside. However, we discovered inside the room, the bathroom had this particular acoustic that meant everything was double amplified.

Poor Tania unintentionally reinforced how much discretion we should employ while using this facility in the future.

Thankfully, after a dispute with the room booking relating to our penchant for private bathrooms, Tania ended up calling the hostel worker a "fuck wit" ensuring that we had to find somewhere else to stay the night, if only to keep our dignity in tact - I was pretty sure that had we stayed we would have had a rough night of it.

Plan B (which i'd like to point out was my original Plan A) was a hotel which offered 5 stars and a pool for mere dollars extra per night. We found the hotel after midnight, after some aimless walking, got offered a good rate and we were in!

The joys of air conditioning, a pool and an insulated bathroom are never quite understood until its too late!

Merida was another clusterfuck of disorganization and despair at what to do, but following the sage advice from the Kansas Redneck we quickly hired a cab and got our Spectacular Sound and Light show at the Pyramid experience started. At one point, I had suggested we hire a car as Uxmal seemed to be quite a distance, but the Taxi quoted about 1000 peso's and as we were told this would be worth it, we decided to go along in the taxi.

The Taxi driver was quite funny and Tania sat up front and entertained him by saying the Latino Americana city names using the proper accents while Simone and I made small talk, occasionally trying really hard to understand each other over the loud Mexican folk music that was playing on the radio. We stopped at a servo on the way for some food (HOORAY!) and made our way out into the Mexican country side.

Let me just say this - the Spectacular Sound and Light show - it was worth it for the laugh at the very least. This "spectacular" show made the fountain in Campeche look positivley magical! Basically - at the beginning they lit up the various ruins sites, which was pretty amazing, but then we had to sit through nearly an hour of a story in Spanish of why everything was so important and how the people lived. Lights came on, they went off - they were sometimes red, sometimes green.

I kept commenting to Tania "this is soooo spectacular" and we giggled alot and when that got boring I burped, which raised the ire of the school kids around us who were equally as bored (and they spoke the language). It became double funny when one of them took the rap for my burp.

Then, being so so so bored, when they turned some of the lights off at a poignant moment of the long-winded story (think: Abe Simpson in Spanish) I started clapping, which made more people laugh. The taxi driver, who forked out however much it was for entry (30 pesos - what the hey? he just made 1000) was killing himself laughing at me, which as anyone who knows me knows - this makes me be even more outrageous. I'm not sure whether i was just too tired or exhausted but this time I decided to cool it , I felt bad for the school kids who were getting in trouble for my shenanigans (think: Bart Simpson).

When we left, I think Tania and I were the first people out. When I was pretty sure the "sound and light" part had ended, even before the "ambient exit light" part began, I was out of there. We found a gift store and decided that might be worth a chuckle and it was as we found a version of the Karma Sutra entitled "Mayan Sutra" and had various pictures, including a drunken fat man trying to hit on a latino princess, and that was just the icing on the cake for an otherwise shitful, excruciatingly boring and expensive afternoon.

The next day we went back to the erstwhile Hostel where we had booked a day trip to the Cenoté's (said 'Snotty'). Now, if ever there was something worth doing, it was this - and it was really cheap at like 300 pesos. We were picked up by a mini van which had more passengers than it could fit - no worry, a fold-up chair is all that is required. This was pretty funny. In Mexico where there is a will of making money, there is a way to make it happen.

It turns out we were travelling with 2 guides, one of the guides family (brother, parents, grandma), and a random Mexico City guy. We mainly spoke with the English speaking guide altho I am sure given half a chance in the commentary Tania would have wow'ed them with her correct pronunciations of ciudad's de latino americana but we were really wow'ed by the whole day so the small talk mainly focused on that.

Firstly, a trip to an "authentic" Mexican market place which smelled like shit and had so many flies and food that they really could have been selling shit - and then onto Cenoté number 1.

Amazing.

A hole in the ground, and in that hole, gloriously beautiful natural spring water. I climbed down the ladder, navigated the slippery rocks and jumped in first. Simone followed and Tania had a bit of a spac about the height of the jump, but eventually came in. We tooled around on our underwater digital cameras, snorkels, goggles etc.

We went to the next Cenoté which was just as spectacular and had this amazingly rickety ladder to climb down to gain access. I of course, went down first and the girls followed. Later in that swim we took turns at climbing the rickety ladder and jumping into the Cenoté from various heights.

Simone said she saw a dead bird in the Cenoté which momentarily concerned me that I would come down with a rare strain of Mexican Flu, however I started being a shit to Tania by telling here there was actually a dead horse in the Cenoté (it was really an under water rock formation) and various local small and furry animals such as Pisoté.

Dead Pisoté in the Cenoté!

After our time in Cenoté number 2, we climbed out and dried off as best we could. The tour guides (most ancient Mayan) grandma started laughing at me and the only words I could understand were "haha...Baños...hahaha". HOW DID SHE KNOW??? Maybe the girls chiding me for my earlier indiscretions had some how transcended language barriers, and the old girl was certainly not stupid.

At least she found it funny!

After Cenoté 2 with its dead horses, birds, pisotes and baños humour we made our way to a traditional Mayan Restaurant / Souvenir Shop and had a pretty nice traditional lunch, then back to Merida.

Later in Merida we bumped into "The English" another time, and I was dying to go out and get pissed with Jayne and Steve-o but due to a big night in Campeche and what Jayne claimed was food poisoning (for the second time) from fast food - they had to pike. I was SPEWING (well, not as bad as Jayne) but glad we got to catch up albeit briefly :)

The girls and I ended up in a variety of Meridan night clubs including a Karaoke bar which had the most awful sound system which actually hurt my ears, but as promised at 10pm they started playing House music even tho it was ear bleed by default. We then went to the hot spot club which really was warm and steamy inside, but it all kind of sucked big time and no matter how many shots I had it didn't get any better.

Not much else happened that I can remember, tho I am sure we had many experiences which will be told and re-told and embellished over a few drinks, like that time i saw a dead horse in the Cenoté... Spectacular!

Campeche

Campeche Storm

Campeche Cathedral

In the Cenote

Jumping into the Cenote (I am in this photo!)

VIDEOS!!
Awful Sound & Light Show at Uxmal Ruins


How to use the Mayan Toilet (From Palenque)


Cool Nightclub (from Mexico City)

Ruined at the Ruins

I haven't blogged for a while cause i've been busy.

Traveling is so fucking painful some times - I am never ever this busy at home!

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Having unsuccessfully auditioned for a two part episode of "Air Crash Investigation", when we arrived at Villahermosa Airport we were experiencing the kind of adrenalin rush usually associated with extreme sports or Montezuma's Revenge. While we waited for the bags we traded various stories about survival - how I managed to find God on the second landing attempt, the lady next to Simone offered her a lollipop and Tania was confident of a successful landing, but quietly shitting herself.

As Tania was the primary Spanish speaker in our group and I was the designated smoker, she went about finding us a transport into Villahermosa while I went about finding a nice quiet place to smoke and gather my thoughts. Despite being honestly terrified during the landing attempts, I had secretly enjoyed the rough ride on the ancient and almost extinct Boeing 737-200 jet.

Background: I had been a bit of a curmudgeon in Mexico City:

"GRR why do they make so much noise..."
"GRR re fried beans for every meal..."
"GRR people here are too poor" and
"GRR i feel sick" etc

When we landed in Villahermosa I was presented with what I thought to be a more leisurely pace - Villahermosa is a small town that reminded me too much of Newcastle, Australia for my liking, but it was a welcome change from the fast, loud pace of Mexico City.

The lady working the Taxi stall was incredibly helpful given that Tania was speaking in the native tongue. Despite my parents warnings that Mexico will be the death of me ("don't take taxi's , they will rip you off") - the Mexican airports have a pretty good system of pre-paying taxi's with prices clearly advertised and not subject to change.

From the Airport to Villahermosa was about 200 pesos ($20 AUD) and as we checked out the price board our eyes collectively focused on the price for Palenque, our final destination that night, at 1000 pesos ($100 AUD).

The girls had wanted to check out Villahermosa, walk around, vibe it out, while we waited for an ADO 1st class bus to take us to Palenque.

I had made my feelings known in Mexico City that I was not bus people and that the indignities associated with bus travel would make me more upset than if I died due to some freak plane accident and that I would only catch the bus if it was absolutely necessary.

The girls decided that the best option was to split a cab to Palenque, and to see if we can offer the driver a few more peso's for a quick tour around Villahermosa city. I, of course, needed no consultation on this decision and was extremely pleased with the outcome, especially the part about not having to lug our bags around Villahermosa and then onto some chicken bus.

Villahermosa turned out to be a bit of a shit hole (EXACTLY like Newcastle, Australia) and while it had all the attractions - a cathedral, a statue or 20, a river; there really wasn't much going on. The only thing which I found appealing in the town was that its in the province (or whatever) of Tabasco and almost every restaurant had a sign advertising Tabasco. This of course, was of great interest to me, but traveling with 2 people who avoid spicy food like I avoid fruit AND who had given up an afternoon of site seeing to avoid me having to catch the bus, I thought it wise to shut the fuck up and not suggest we stop for a meal.

As the story goes, We were all glad that we only spent 45 or so minutes in Villahermosa hopping in and out of the taxi for photo opportunities. The joy that we would be heading to Palenque in the comfort of a taxi, meaning we would arrive at about 8:30pm at night and not midnight like on the bus, was shared by all.

More to the point, the hotel I booked in Palenque had a pool. Hooray!

My first impressions of Palenque was how much it was like Goulburn, Australia - except with ancient Mayan ruins instead of a massive concrete sheep "tourist attraction / servo".

The town itself had a certain Mexican charm (it was dirty) but at the same time it was safe and did not feel totally overrun by tourists. Tania and I went on a walk that first night and discovered not much, but we were able to purchase a large jerrycan of Bonafont (my favorite purificado agua) and some other assorted necessities like a kit kat.

The early arrival gave us (more to the point, the girls) the opportunity to suss out day tours while we (more to the point, I) made good use of the pool and the wireless internet connection. Getting wireless internet connected in a foreign hotel really is pot luck - the people at the front desk spoke no English and no matter how much of a mexican accent i used with my English - they had no idea what I was on about.

Two games of charades + Tania + a crude drawing of a network = I was connected!!!

WEP keys are permanently on my list of things to bitch about until I die.

We spent a day checking out the Ruin's at Palenque which were spectacular like something out of a computer game - I can definitely see why the Mayan ruins are so iconic and replicated far and wide and I really felt like I was inside a Nintendo or Sierra computer game, trying to find the hidden key to get to the next level. At one point later in the day I found a random question mark next to a tree, EXACTLY like the ones in Super Mario Bros and I was positive that I was playing some kind of lost level game.

On arrival at the Ruins, Tania cracked the big time shits after her copious amounts of bi-lingual and artistic tactical organization did not entirely pay off and we ended up having to pay an extra 100 peso's for a guide, who in hind site walked us around the ruins telling us tit bits of information like

"this is a ruin",
"those are steps"
"they looked different back then",
"this is the ancient mayan Baños and this is how they used it" and
"you use Baños over there"

I didn't mind paying the extra 100 pesos ($10 AUD - ciggies cost more) and it turned out that our guide, "Professor Baños" was worth it for the laugh.

Tania is ever the one to crack the shits over nickles and dimes and i secretly thought the self induced indignation was quite funny, especially as the other guides were looking at our digital cameras and other flashy assorted western gear knowing full well we could afford the $10 AUD.

I get her point ("its the PRINCIPLE of it now") that at every step of the way in Mexico and Latin America they seem to lie to get more dinero out of the turista and it is incredibly frustrating until it becomes clear that its basically nickles and dimes they're extracting. Sometimes the rip offs are amazingly big and humiliating in hind site but thankfully , that did not happen to us.

Professor Baños was wearing a safari suit which made it all the more funny and reaffirmed my belief that I can NEVER trust a man in a safari suit.

About a hundred photo opportunities later it started pissing down in that tropical way where it seems never ending and an umbrella seems like a futile solution. We found a proper shelter and waited it out with some locals who appeared to be "working" in the jungle (I was secretly praying they were 'harvesting' something in the jungle and would produce some 'crop' for a rather stressed turista) but eventually the rain stopped and we continued on our jungle journey to some more ruins on the road less traveled.

It was gorgeous except for all the rotting fruit smells and flies, but we stopped for another photo opportunity, this time asking some random people to take the photos for us. It turned out, the people we asked were English and spoke English!

I affectionately referred to these people as "The English" (right up until today) but to their face it was Jayne and Steve-o. We bumped into them later on at a waterfall and then again at ANOTHER waterfall and ended up spending some time walking around and chewing the fat. Jayne and I found commonality in the TV shows we watched ("this is EXACTLY like i'm a celebrity get me out of here") and Steve-o worked at a big telecommunications company so we had some good laughs about that.

The English and I thought this part of Mexico was a bit peasant and backward and at times, shitful for the most part, but the last waterfall we were at was amazing. Unfortunately the locals were totally crazy and clearly accustomed to extracting dinero from turista, but this was rather funny so it was OK.

On the drive down to the last waterfall (on such dodgy mountain roads we were all about to hurl) our bus driver kept stopping as the ever resourceful locals would close the road by holding up some rope, waiting for the driver to pay however much it was, then dropping the rope and allowing us to pass.

This happened 3 or 4 times, and at all times there were entire families sitting by the road trying to sell local fruit, random items of folk clothing and tea towels.

On arrival we stopped at a restaurant, which in these parts was basically a roof over some ground and heaps of random stray dogs wandering around and we ordered things like bread, vegetable soup and fries as there was no way our stomachs could handle anything more flavorful on the ride back.

Interestingly, this roof/restaurant had Cable TV and a gaggle of random locals were sitting around watching a football match on ESPN. It was strangely comforting to know that even in places where kidnapping is not entirely out of the question, that if I was to be kidnapped, I could watch MTV.

After eating we strolled around the local area where the local elders had rather cunningly set up stalls at every single opportunity selling trinkety tourist stuff or access to a "clean" Baños. The local children who, perhaps, are not old enough to work a shop, simply ran around chasing after tourists begging for either money or chocolate or trying to sell some kind of berry they found in the jungle.

The waterfalls were amazing and the absolute best part was when I jumped in and swam around in water so pure and fresh it washed away all the negativity i'd been experiencing in the past few days. I felt SO great when I was in that water. Steve-o and his mate followed, then the girls came in, and it was totally relaxing to be away from the hustle and bustle that is Mexico for a few brief minutes. Water makes EVERYTHING better!

We ended up leaving on our bus back to Palenque and we said goodbye to The English. The trip down was equally as queasy as the trip up but we made it back safely.

That night the girls ended up walking around Palenque a bit and doing some shopping (or whatever it is that they do) and I stayed back and read a book.

That night, we ate dinner at a restaurant which appeared to be nice, but they managed to fuck up Spaghetti Bolognese so bad and my Kebab was alright except for the re-fried-fucking beans.

The next morning, I had fully come to terms with the realization that we were not about to take a taxi from Palenque to Campeche, our next stop. Not that I really pressed the point too much (if at all) but it was in the back of my mind like how I thought I would be kidnapped and watching MTV at the Waterfall.

Tania reassured me that the bus really was first class and that everything would be OK. I remember vaguely something my friend Lynn had said about how horrible her bus was around Mexico but that she went for the cheaper bus and that there were more expensive buses which could possibly be nicer.

To my absolute surprise and delight the bus that Tania had insisted on was like flying business class! It had TV, reclining chairs; it was heaven. I made a mental note to never ever catch a bus with Lynn who clearly has a problem spending $23AUD on luxury and quality for 5 hours.

Really easy to sleep as well - I was reading a book called Consumed which is about how we've all been turned into infantile consumers by marketers. While I completely agree with the sentiment, it was boring as hell as the author made his point on every single page (~400 pages). I felt like writing to him saying "i am an adult, you only needed to tell me twice" but having been infantile enough to spend $24USD on a book berating me for doing so, I deserved it.

Good sleep, anyway.

Palenque Ruins

Palenque Ruins

Professor Baños and me, doing the proper Aussie tourist photo pose.

SEE!! I told you it was like a computer game!

Simone, Tania and I swimming at the waterfalls