trinidad....

day 1

arrived in the airport on time (earlier in fact). i was already psyched about being in TT from all the reading that i did during the weeks leading up to this trip. my quick glance through our exit row window made me feel like i was in india - the sporadic glimmers of light that dotted the city. another aspect reminiscent of india is the airplane culture of unfastening seatbelts a good 10 minutes before the plane comes to a complete stop.

my bro and i were planning on speed walking to the customs counter, but the camera bug got into us and we decided to take a pic of the 'welcome' sign. we then got in line and soon found out that our flight attendant misinformed us. she told us we had to fill out one form per family, but apparently each person had to have one. i guess it did seem suspect from the beginning. anywayz, tru to our style, we did a last-minute scramble for an extra form and filled it out just in time.

feeling extra chatty, my bro began discussin our travel plans with the customs agent and askin him what he recommended. as i heard their exchanges, i realized that our traveling styles are pretty compatible (with the exception of a couple major issues - to be shared on day 2.)
in any case we went through customs unscathed, grabbed our one check-in awaiting us at some undisclosed carousel, and stood in line to exit the airport.

during our $30 US cab ride to the courtyard mariott (where we were able to use a inconsequential AAA discount), i chatted with our driver about the weather, sites to see, and so on. he was of indian descent and maybe a mix....hard to say here because the colors do seem to run into each other down here, mon. we tipped him a little bit too much, mostly out of the sheer excitement of being in a new country, but whaddya gonna do, right?

after we got our room, i (in remembrance of the memphis extravaganza) promptly jumped up and down both beds for a good twenty minutes or so. my bro had no idea what had gotten into me, but soon realized that i was jumping on his bed too, and took action by trying to take me down. it's all good though - i was the victor! (also in the scrabble match we played that night :)

day 2

yes, i must confess. i did hit up the hotel gym first thing in the morning. call me nerdy, call me a freak - i've become attached to the routine of sweatin in up on the treadmill. also, the discovery we made the night before of zee tv and other channels featuring indian music triggered my tv addiction gene and i could be found watching these channels in my room or in the hotel lobby at different points in the day!

after a while i got bored and started trying to wake my brother - to which he responded, "we should have discussed what a vacation meant to each of us before we came here." in my defense, by the time we got up and got out of the hotel it was close to 12:30pm - a bit late, woudn't you say?

it was at this point that i made a bit of a conversion blunder. in speaking with the hotel staff, i asked about how long it would take to get to town and the rates. when the said $10, i was psyched that at last the advantage of conversion was kicking in. the reality check came as we were asking the driver how much it was and he said $10 US. another thing i was floored by (to a greater degree) was his statement that we should only ask questions about our whereabouts to people with similar skin color and hair texture.

we dined at Mangoes Restaurant & Cocktail Lounge (64 Independence Square - Port of Spain) and head north on frederick street through Woodford Square to Queens Savannah Park and walked past the Magnificent Seven. we ended up on the other side of town by hotel kapok - a place we looked into when making hotel reservations.

somewhere along this loooooooooooooong walk, it began to rain pretty hard. and since i'm such a good planner :) it all worked out b/c i brought along an umbrella and a poncho in our sack-ish bag. also somewhere along this walk, we heard someone calling out from a place of residence along the street. i wasn't sure who they were calling out to so i gave a curious look to my brother. he looked back at me and turned to where the sounds were coming from. the voice promptly responded, "not you boy!" in a strong caribbean accent.

it was a long and hot, but interesting walk along the queens park savannah and the magnificent seven. the fact that it was sunday and most everything was closed was a bit of a damper, but that's life i guess. at the hotel kapok we asked about rates because we didn't have accommodation for the third night of our stay in port of spain (POS) yet. since we were trying to budget the third night of our stay in trindad we decided stay at a guest house closer to the airport.

day 3 (in short)

through a hookup, we hired a driver to take us around the island a bit. we visited a couple temples that were pretty amazing given the length of time and circumstances under which indians were brought to TT (as indentured laborers.)

day 4

finally! - on the island for a few days already and we hadn't hit up any of the beaches. we headed to the infamous maracas bay....one of the few beaches that trinidadians are proud of esp. since the beaches there pale in comparison to those in tobago. after a few hours on the beach we went straight to the airport for our 20-minute flight to tobago.

memphis, part deux

friday

after re-entering the working world my internal clock doesn't really let me sleep in unless i'm out and about until some obscene hour of the night. so i was the first person up and feeling a bit antsy.

about an hour later, my buds stirred in our super sized hotel bed and soon we were all munching away on all the snacks we brought with us. veggies and hummus from the north, healthy bars from the southwest, apples, oranges, and so on. and yes, two of us even ventured to the hotel gym. and after returning we promptly started eating once again.

all showered and pretty, we left our hotel to explore memphis, tennessee leaving the hotel to drive around downtown. after surveying the heart of the city, we successfully found street parking (and i did a stellar parallel parking job, if i don't say so myself). the only glitch was that we had to come back and feed the meter every 15-30 minutes. after realizing that this caused unnecessary tension, we settled on parking in a lot and wandered back into the happenin area of memphis.

after roaming around a bit, we settled on a spot called the flying fish. after a decent and oil-heavy meal we headed to the national civil rights museum - a historic site that sent chills up my spine. it was very informative and helped fill in some of the missing pieces of that era for me. the scary part was seeing the actual site where MLK, Jr. was shot and where his assassin stood - quite disturbing actually. the way it was set up was that the museum was across the street from another museum of sorts that chronicles the effort to apprehend the assassin.

the only drawback of the museum was that it was very text-heavy. if i were to do it again i would probably rent the audio equipment to help move me along the exhibits. the element of humor in all of this was that at the tail end of the museum exhibitions, there was a small window for the Indian community of greater memphis to build their ties to the civil rights movement in the U.S. through Gandhi. (mostly funny because i had been wondering if there was an indian community in memphis...)

to decompress we walked along the mississippi river to chillax a bit. our walk was followed by a quick trip to a mall-type complex where we had a bathroom break, tried on clothes, and ate some fly chocolate. on our way back to the car we passed by a creperie where we oooh-ed and aaah-ed over the menus and displays. we ended up taking them back to our hotel room for us to study closely. after resting a bit, we somehow mobilized ourselves to have a night on the town at bb kings.

saturday

(doing short bits to expedite the process.....)

graceland - was SO fly - also a very eerie experience to go into elvis' real house, but well worth the time and $$$.

crepes - quite tasty - would definitely go back again if i were to somehow find myself back in memphis.

the drive back - pretty uneventful as far as i can remember. we didn't stop a whole lot b/c we were trying to get back at a decent hour. i think we were all quite tired by the end. three stops in the chicagoland area - chicago, burr ridge, and naperville : )

bosom buddies and memphis

a long overdue account of a road trip to somewhere within driving distance of chicago….

my buds and i were originally set on heading to toronto, but questionable weather conditions predicted for t-town led us to settle for a much more happenin city (another one of those things we get used to doing at this age – settling – settling for a job, settling for a partner in life, settling down, and so on).

after we agreed that we wanted to be in a bearable climate, we looked at a map of the u.s. of a. and thought to ourselves, ‘hmmm, which cities are driving distance from chicago?’ cities like st. louis, gary, and others were quickly vetoed --> that is _literally_ how we ended up choosing to head down south to memphis, tennessee (i generally say this in a twangy southern accent J )

for moi, the journey began in new york city (take your shirt off - c'mon you know the song, right? right?!?)

wednesday

i arrived at o’hare at a fairly decent hour of the evening to be greeted by my cousin and one of my bosom buddies. my parents were in the car awaiting our arrival. they made a stopover at devon avenue on the way to the airport (this idea was definitely one of my mom’s ambitious, let’s-get-everything-done-that-we-can-on-the-north-side-of-the-city plans), and that meant that there were tons of groceries in the back of our sleek seven-passenger van and some snacks in the front. after the three of us piled in, we made our way into the burbs.

thursday

we got off to a fairly early start given that we were catching up into the wee hours of thursday morning. after running a few errands we made our way over to another burb to pick another bosom buddy - and we were off to memphis, tennessee.

(unfortunately, since i forgot to remind my bosom buddies to bring road trip music for our listening pleasure, we ended up listening to the music that i stuffed into my overnight bag before i left nyc: trance, some hip hop, alanis, and a lot of other random music)

the drive down was fairly uneventful. lots of stopping to pee at rest stops, perusing the aisles of rest area shops, and munching on apples, pears, and other very health snacks. (read: a couple of us had started working out and trying to eat healthier much to the dismay of the third bosom buddy.) when we had finally arrived, it was dark, a bit chilly, and we were famished!!! we were so hungry that we sat in the car in front of the hotel for close to 30 minutes trying to figure out where to eat. part of that was trying to figure out a place that was vegetarian friendly in the south – a bit of a task. we settled on an italian spot that was fairly easy to find given that every single street in memphis was on the triple A map that my pops had ordered for us (even a street that was ½ a block long in memphis ‘downtown’ called ‘november 6^th street.’) i must add here that we did pull into a gas station for directions and the buffest and sexiest of the three of us was hit on by the direction giver.

the food itself was good stuff - filling after spending the entire day eating fresh vegetables and hummus (which i did enjoy but it's nice to eat cooked food for at least one meal of the day :) an event worth mentioning was me trying to order a drink during sans identification (i left mine in the car.) the waiter, attempting to give me the benefit of the doubt, asks me how old i am ('27') and when i was born (03-DD-1980.) seeing as the road trip went down before my birthday, the waiter did not quite understand why i claimed i was 27 when i was technically 26. (doesn't any one else round up????)

post-eats, the three of us were downright chipper. especially one bosom buddy who took to jumping on the hotel bed for at least fifteen minutes before chillaxing a bit. she managed to convince us to join in madness as well. now, i will always feel less inhibited to jump on hotel beds, and i have a bosom buddy to thank for that.

(more to come on the rest of the trip - i am accepting revisions to this blog provided that they are well-supported by physical evidence : )

port of arrival

new delhi - mid june 2006

i arrived in new delhi via (insert random european city here) at some godforsaken hour of the morning – one of the gazillion ‘red eye’ flights that non-resident indians (nris) have grown accustomed to over the years. surprisingly enough, i sped through the customs line and had gathered my baggage in minutes (something i wasn’t used to – let’s just say that more often than not, if you’re flying air, you may never see the contents of your checked baggage again).

and i know that as a person of indian origin, i prolly shouldn’t dis air india, but geez - i really think that i could have done a thesis on how air india as a business could be construed as the epitome of why old-school india-born businesses can never really prosper – no prospects for employees to ‘move up’ in the organization, zero tolerance for for customers (it’s true – no concept of customer service!), ill treatment of the grandma/grandpa types (although they can be pretty feisty themselves sometimes : ), and i’ll spare you the rest.

i really should own up to the fact that most of this angst is coming from the ‘now,’ especially since I was feeling really frickin relieved (that my luggage was intact) and exhausted (as is expected after hours upon hours of sitting on a plan doing stan-the-man exercises).

back to the story though - as i quickly gathered my belongings and steered myself over to the pre-paid taxi counter, the pungent odors of the india that i loved and hated dearly left me wondering if i could do this all over again - put on a front of 'knowing' when that was the furthest from the truth - 'knowing' the bigger things--like language and making realistic, thoughtful travel plans--as well as the smaller things--like how much to tip, how to get from place to place, and if i'll get diarrhea merely from thinking about whether or not i'll get it.

so, i took a deep breath as i rolled by baggage cart out of the airport, and stole furtive glances in the direction of the alleged pre-paid taxi stand. when i didn't find them, i asked a security officer in my ivy league hindi, 'taxi stand kahaa par hai?' he gestured the direction that i should head.

after much strife (mostly due to the approach of direction giving in india generally, i.e. ‘the place that you’re looking for is past the petrol bunk, three roads later you’ll see a temple – don’t turn there, the next road over – there’ll be another temple, turn there….’ – and you’ll get this if you’re lucky), we landed up at the guest house i was staying at with my close friend and travel buddy for the next month.

we stayed in delhi long enough to check out the Bahá'í lotus temple which was an oasis of peace and quietude in the gadbud that defines almost every nook and cranny of delhi. and let me assure you that by ‘quietude,’ i mean quietude.

i emphasize this because my friend and i were chastised more than once for whispering to each other in the prayer area. i don’t think we were being disruptive, but of course i do happen to be one of the two rebels disobeying the numerous ‘silence please’ signs. in our defense, we were merely trying to process our understanding of the baha’ii faith.

i can’t really remember what else we did in delhi – the mélange of intense heat, humidity, and pollution has most likely has obliterated any memory of what else may or may not have taken place in the motherland’s capital.

more on the next destination to follow. . .