Native Americans

So originally the indigenous peoples of the Americas were called indians. This was changed because it wasnt PC (and it was really confusing, so I am glad it changed.)

Now they are native Americans. What the heck? That is just as confusing. Native American? I am a native American and my ancestors didn't walk here. My friend Doug is a native American too. What is native? It means you were born here.

Why don't we call them indigenous people like everyone else. South and Central American societies call the original inhabitants indigenous, so does Australia, and you know what? It makes sense.

Anyway, thats my rant for today. Goodbye people.

11:24 AM - 0 Comments - 0 Kudos - Add Comment

Fly like the Rocketeer

Oh my dear lord. Today on the way home from school I had the worst crash I can remember ever having. Bascially, the parking lane and the driving lane had a two inch difference between them, I got stuck along the edge and crashed. I put about 15 feet of distance between the point where I totally lost control and where I stopped and my bike managed to do a complete flip sometime during the process.

The most shocking part to me is not only was my bike in riding condition (after some onsite repairs) but I was also in good enough condition to ride it all the way back home. I only have 3 injurys of note, a scraped shoulder, a badly scraped ankle and my leg that has a massive welt on it (what?) and feels like it got hit by a sledgehammer. As for my bike, it got scraped to hell, including my helmet and seat.

Seriously though, I fell on my left side, and my bike chain managed to come off the gears.

3:05 PM - 0 Comments - 0 Kudos - Add Comment

Readjustment

Its been about 2 months that I have been back in the states and I am still in the process of readjusting. I miss the food, mountains, and the people. They were friendlier there. Everyone in Chicago walks around with a permanent frown on their face, even when they are supposed to be having fun and if you try to talk with a stranger they rarely react positively. In VZ you could chat up anybody.

Well, at least there are libraries in Chicago.

6:59 PM - 2 Comments - 4 Kudos - Add Comment

Last Week Adventures

What happened the last few days. Well, I got my 300 dollar money transfer really really late (as in, the last week) and outside of Venezuela, Bolivars are only good for wiping your butt, so I went adventuring.

On Thursday Jeff and I went biking to the agua thermales above Tabay. Holy crap that was exhausting. The second most physically difficult thing I can doing in my life (the first being the mountain I climbed the first week I was here.) Okay, Tabay is not super close to Merida, and you have to go down a river valley and back up. By the time we were in Tabay we were dead tired...then we had to bike up another thousand meters up a road that went back and fourth. The less steep areas you could try to bike, but it was like riding a unbalanced unicycle because the front wheel was off the ground half the time (it was that steep.) The other parts it was just impossible and we had to push our bikes up. The Agua Thermales was cool, we went to a secret natural one above the tourist one. We coated ourselves with mud and chilled in the really hot water. Then we went back down, which was murder on the thumbs because you had to grip your breaks as hard as you physically can to stop yourself from careening off the corners of the road and off a hill/almost cliff. After that it got a bit nicer, going down hill...and then we had to go up a path much like the road we were at before, only since it was a path it was instantly impossible to actually ride the bike, just push. Then, on the last 10 lengths (there were at least 30 total) it turned to steps, so we had to carry our bikes. I felt like Jesus bearing the cross. Venezuelans really love when I use that simile. Oh, and I broke my chain on the last path so I had to pay 5 mil to get it fixed (no problem, that is $2.50.)

Yesterday I went Parapenting (or paragliding.) That involves driving up a huge mountain, god knows how high, but it was really high, straping a parachute to you (and the pilot, who was behind me, running as hard as you can off a cliff while the parachute tries to pull you backward and then lifting off. Then we flew back and fourth some over the mountains. There were cows there and they would all look up at us, which was cute. We would dive down close to the ground and then back up until finally we headed out towards the valley (we were headed to the bottom of a river valley in the bottom of the mountain valley.) After a bit I got I felt a little ill, since the thing was bouncing up and down and left and right, so I took a quick vomit (lookout below!) and before you know it you are back on the ground. It was quite exciting.

Today is Friday, my last day in Merida. Its been fun. I speak decent Spanish too. Awesome.

12:26 PM - 1 Comments - 2 Kudos - Add Comment

News

A news reporter tried to interview me today. Something about medico (medical) and Chavez. Thats all I understood so I told her I dont speak awesome spanish and I didnt know the issue.

I did make it into Venezuelan documentary about this robin hood type guy from the 1970s who is burried in the local graveyard.

Something bad happened though, because earlier in the morning the hospitals in Merida were on the news (and its only interational news, so its not like the local news that only has Merida.)

Also, in the internet cafe I am in now, they are playing the Faclo song Amedaus, but its in spanish. Its so hilarious.

11:57 AM - 0 Comments - 0 Kudos - Add Comment

Meet American Men

Hahaha, I log into myspace, and where there are normally "Meet Hot Girls" adverts, there are adverts for "Meet American Men"

"Men from the US, Britain and Mexico (??) want wives. Meet Mr. Right Join Free Now."

Lololol

11:29 AM - 1 Comments - 2 Kudos - Add Comment

Chavistas and their views

All the Chavistas I have met in Venezuela have all been tourists. There is the irish woman, and now some woman from California, its so funny listening to them talk. Chavez blames the US for everything, from the collapsing economy to outbreaks of dengue (mosquito disease.) Seriously, he said that the US caused the dengue outbreaks.

We must be shooting over containers full of infected mosquitos or something.

It is really hard to find a lot of stuff over here too, milk, eggs, chicken, cooking oil and toilet paper (and napkins, since you can use them as toilet paper.) Oh, and medicine, and greenbeans, peas and beef is starting to get expensive too. Anyway, they mostly focus on the lack of milk, since milk is really important, especially for babies and little niños.

Well, acording to the Chavistas, they are not lacking milk because of their colapsing economy (most of it is because Chavez is trying to limit the amount of dollars in Venezuela, which is the only thing you can use to buy goods from the US...like milk, computers and medicine) but because according to the Chavista girl at our school, its because the opposition party is buying all the milk in the country and destroying it (by throwing it in the ocean or something) so that they can blame it on Chavez. I am not exagurating.

I think pretty soon they may tell me that the opposition is working with aliens to beam all the money out of peoples pockets in a plan to buy guns to overthrow Chavez and his utopian society he has set up.

By the way, a second contributing factor to the milk shortage is that a lot of farmers are going over to Columbia to sell their milk for more than they can get in Venezuela. Dollar smuggling is big buisness here too. They go to Columbia, get a bunch of US dollars, then go back to Venezuela and sell the dollars for twice as much as they bought them for. Dollars are also popular to keep your savings, since bolivars are worth less and less every day.

The official exchange rate is 1:2100 dollar to bolivars. The capitalist rate is 1:4000 in Merida to up to 6000 in Caracas. During rainy season when there are less tourists, you can get up to 7000 or 8000 per dollar.

Its crazy here.

7:25 AM - 2 Comments - 2 Kudos - Add Comment

Hiking in the Andes

So my first adventure in Venezuela was when I went up hiking in the Andes. I went with Jeff, my irish friend and a guide named Fernando that he knew. The mountain was huge, over 4,500 meters (15,000 feet.) It was a miserable day, but a crazy story. To get to the mountain was a 1.5 hour trip by bus through roads that were crazy. They went back and fourth with turns of 90 to 170 degrees the entire 1.5 hours. We arrived at 10.30 and headed out.

We started going up by going through a river valley. We had to keep crossing the river and small sections of swamp. After that it started to get to the steep part which went the rest of the way up. As we got higher, me and Jeff would take a few steps and gasp for air. Since we had a late start we were climbing really fast. I didn't realize how fast we were climbing, but it was fast. About 3 I suggested we head back to catch the bus, the last one which leaves at 7.00. I have hiked before, so I know how long it takes to go down a mountain. Well, Jeff wanted to make it to the peak. I wanted to rest so I just sat down and rested and let them finish the journey. It wasn't very far away to the peak. I could clearly see it. I was to sick though. I was hyperventilating and I was very dizzy. I was worried I would lose my balance and fall to my death (it was very steep and rocky.) Well, little did I know that as soon as Jeff and Ferdando left, Jeff got really sick too, and started slowing down immensely. In the meantime, I started to get worried. I was sitting alone on a  ountain. It was cold, very windy and the sun was going down. I had to keep moving to new rocks to stay in the sun as the shade started to follow me. I could see the clouds far below with one occasionally shooting up part of the upper valley. Clouds = thick fog so I was glad that none of them were headed up as far as me. Oh, and there was so little oxygen that I was still dizzy, even after doing nothing but sitting. To think that we had been hiking up steep mountainside for 6 hours prior was crazy.

One group of hikers passed us. They were dressed with padded pants and gloves. Real hikers. One of them spoke English and thought we were crazy. They had started climbing at 6.00 in the morning and we for the most part caught up to them. They also didn't know how I was going to make it down before nightfall, since they knew where my friends were at. Finally Jeff and Fernando came back at about 5.10, really late, but I was glad to see them again. We started to head down in the dark, once we hit the cloud level, we were going in the dark in thick fog down a super steep mountain. There was a ¾ moon out, so we could still see but we still ended up slipping down a few 10-15 foot stretches of loose rock. It was really eery looking, walking through swamps and rocks on a foggy moonlight night. It kind of reminded me of Frodo, Sam and Golem from Lord of the Rings. Fernando was still energetic, so he was always quite a few spaces ahead of me and Jeff.

By the time we got back down to the bottom, we were cold, dizzy and very tired. Jeff and I felt like walking zombies, and Jeff was starting to hallucinate and my feet were sloshing wet (its harder to keep them dry in a swampy area when its dark out.) We ended up trying to hitchhike to the nearest town, or at least a main road. For about an hour Fernando had no luck, while Jeff and I were just laying in a parking lot. Jeff got up and hailed one car. It stopped. It was a station wagon and the guy was going to take us. Not only that, he was going all the way to Merida. Talk about the luck of the Irish. The driver even offered to take us all out to dinner. We were too tired to do anything, but we offered to buy him dinner at a later time.

The ride home we still felt like we were going to die. We had no seatbelts and the guy was tearing through the absurdly sharp turns like crazy with only one hand on the steering wheel of his 1980s station wagon. Also, in Venezuela solid lines mean pass, but do it faster than passing on broken lines. Oh, and the middle of the road is both a good place to drive and to walk here.

When I got home I went straight to bed. My shoes were black, my socks were black, and my hands and feet were black. I looked at them, and went straight to bed. I was too tired to shower. Oh, and there were fireworks going off all night, to help lull me into slumber.

We dont plan to use that guide again by the way.

5:27 AM - 0 Comments - 0 Kudos - Add Comment

Venezuela

I live in Venezuela now. It is exciting. The bus is only 600 bolivars, and most things cost under 10,000 (except for gum, I paid over 24,000 for that.)

Also, the city has very small sidewalks, and there is grapiti all over, especially for a guy named Nixon, who is apparently a politician running against Chavez or something. Oh, and everything is covered in fences or bars, and a lot of houses dont even have windows, its a little under 80 every day and a little under 60 every night. There are also mountains no matter where you look. Its very pretty.

I am off to catch the bus home now, maybe we will eat arepas again tonight.

12:29 PM - 3 Comments - 4 Kudos - Add Comment

Chicago Air Show

So I went to the air show today. Around noon I heard a jet engine so I ran to my roof and there was a B-1 making flybys. I hoped on my bike and went to the lakeshore. It was terrific. They had stunt planes, AC-130s, KC-10s, a squad of A-10s, a few F-15s and F-16s and my favorite; the F-22.

There were two really amazing events that stuck out more than the rest.

The first F-15 that came out was doing flybys real close to the shore. You could even see the pilot in the seat. At one point it did a giant loop over our heads. It started so low to the ground that when it pointed its exhaust at me I could feel the heat. During one flyby it turned sideways and you could see vapor cones forming on its wings.

The F-22 was just as incredible as something could ever be. It really is the most amazing aircraft every built. It was flying around turning on a dime and doing absolutely insane aerial maneuvers. It was so crazy that I can't describe it with words so I present to you this video.

F-22 Raptor

The U.S. Air Force Thunderbirds made a brief appearance early on, but I left before they did their performance. I had to leave early because it was so freaking cold. It was 65 degrees (in the middle of August) but luckily I brought a jacket with me. It then started to rain and after being pelted with little freezing balls of pain and I was forced to retire for the day. It was an outstanding show though, and I can't wait to do it again next year.

Update: I went up on my roof and watched the Thunderbirds. It was incredible. They would hold formations so tight that it looked like a shape was flying through the air, and not a bunch of jets. They also would routinely break off into pairs and fly through the city (and right over my roof…and me.) I remember having toys of these guys when I was a kid. It's a dream come true.

1:20 PM - 1 Comments - 0 Kudos - Add Comment

Slip and slide (on a bike, which is bad.)

God damn. I was going to go on a nice bike ride down by the lake today. As soon as I start to turn onto the bike path I wiped out. I slid on the walking path rocks and it got me good.

Its really only scrapes but it looks real bad (one arm is totally covered in blood.) I managed to scrape pretty much my entire right arm from my wrists to my elbows, took a chunk out of my right palm and my left knuckles and scraped both legs below the knee (and on one leg, both sides are scraped, how the hell did that happen!?)

Anyway, some people stopped and asked me if I was okay, then another gave me her water bottle to wash myself with. Then I had to make my way home with my right arm dripping blood. Now I need to go wash my bike off, as my handlebar is covered in blood. Its a gruesome sight.

4:01 PM - 1 Comments - 0 Kudos - Add Comment

Fancy Movie Premier (with moviestars!)

So yesterday there was a fancy pants movie screening. The movie company was there hosting it and there was a big crowd of fancy pants standing around in the lobby for about an hour talking and being loud. How fancy was this? Well, Haley Joel Osment was there for sure. I talked to him briefly, he seems like pretty nice guy; he was also pretty short, about 5'4 and being flanked by two friends of 6'0 and 6'1 (which made him look shorter.) Oh, Mayor Daley was supposed to be there, though he had to change his plans at the last minute.

After the movie let out, there was a guy with a TV camera doing one of those "ask people about the movie" things. This caused everyone there started standing around the theater trying to get on camera (which is rare in the city, it must be a high society camera obsession) and eventually started having a party. A few people started to leave but then realized "hey, no one is leaving; I need to go back and make sure people see my face." Customers then started coming down and complaining that the crowd was being so noisy that it was making it hard to hear their movies (which is believable, these guys were loud) so I got the managers to come chase them away. Where do they go? Down half a floor. Perfect, now we need to go chase them away a second time.

Anyway, that's my story.

7:39 AM - 2 Comments - 2 Kudos - Add Comment

U-boat dream and more.

So I had a dream today in which I was the captain of an oversized Uboat in some type of watery post apocalyptic future. No one else had Uboats, so I was able to pretty much go everywhere undetected. A few people had military ships, but that was it. After a little bit, I had to start navigating these man-made cave labyrinths. The walls were all made of stone with pillars everywhere. Very big and half filled with water. I was able to stay submerged although I was always very nervous about not running into anything or scraping the bottom which both would have sunk my boat.

Eventually I got to the end where there was a large battlecruiser and a few destroyers just sitting around. I was going to sink them all when a smaller cruiser crossed my path. At this exact time the water started becoming even more shallow and I was forced to try to stop my boat and surface it at the same time. The cruiser was too close to fire at me, but one of the destroyers wasn't, and it ended up nailing my deck gun and punching a hole through my deck. My crew and I managed to use our anti-air (which was a flak) to destroy the ships guns so they couldn't return fire. We then used our torpedoes to destroy what we could and ran like hell.

Then I awoke to another dream. I was in an amusement park with an ex-friend I used to have (we were friends in the dream; yes Doug, it's who you think it is…again.) Well, she wanted me to go on the Mr. Freeze ride and I refused. She pressured me into finally agreeing and the dream ride was nothing like RL. In the dream, it was a giant super fast slide, with giant obstacles that you had to avoid by holding out your arms and creating a lot of drag. Since I didn't know what the heck was going on, she just grabbed on to the back of me and guided me. About halfway down we hit a bump and we jumped which sent us airborne. The track was dropping much faster than us and we ended up very high in the air. Luckily there were trampolines at the bottom, with numbers on them (the farther out you go, the more points you get.) Sadly, we missed all the trampolines and fell on the concrete. Ouch.

That pretty much ended that dream. It was still pretty amazing.

6:18 AM - 0 Comments - 0 Kudos - Add Comment

Giant Dream

So I had a dream last night. My friends and I were trying to cross this pass with a giant in it. The giant thought it was fun to seriously injure everyone. Breaking their legs or knocking them unconscious. Me and one of my last friends tried to hide so it wouldn't find us, but the giant was very good at spotting things and found my friend. The fact that we were hiding made him mad, so he crushed my friend to death. Then he came after me. Luckily I had the symbiote Spiderman costume (basically, I had all of Spiderman's powers) so I jumped up on a wall where the giant coulnt get me. He then started to climb the wall. Uh oh. I then proceded to lead the giant on a mad chase throughout a dream city of 3-4 story buildings. I couldn't hide inside anywhere because he could just reach through the walls and the giant was very fast as he would run, not stomp around. I would end up jumping forward into the air as far as I could (which was pretty good) and then when I ran out of forward momentum I would shoot out my web and catapult myself to the farthest building I could reach. After a lot of running for my life, I finally ended up trapping it in something. I taunted it for a little bit before leaving.

The next part of my dream, I was in charge of researching and assassinating US scientist who defected to Iran. I think I killed two people before I woke up. Fun times.

7:03 AM - 0 Comments - 0 Kudos - Add Comment

School Shootings

Holy crap. Some gunman went crazy in Virginia Tech and so far has killed 33 people (including himself.) Its not only the deadliest school shooting ever in the US (even more than Charles Whitman's) its also the deadliest mass shooting period. My step-brother goes to Virginia Tech. Rumor has it that he is still alive but it's still scary.

 Earlier in the year my friend David had an anthrax bomb scare in his campus. It seems my inner city school is turning out to be one of the safer ones.

11:47 PM - 1 Comments - 0 Kudos - Add Comment