It´s flat as a lake right now. Literally, because I´m in Puno which sits on Lake Titicaca (done laughing at the name, cool) and it is freaking cold. It´s really pretty too, in a rugged, there are no trees kinda way. Too be honest though, I probably wouldn´t even be here if it wasn´t for the fact that Danny and his girlfriend are showing up tomorrow. I haven´t seen him in a few months and it´s on my way back down to Chile so I thought I´d stop by.
The funniest part of this whole thing, is that I´m carrying around my surfboards and all these Aymara people looking at me like a complete idiot, followed by them coming up to me and telling me about their female world surfing champ. I´ve never seem so many people care so much about a sport so arcane and irrelevant to their lives. I mean, prior to Sofia Mulanovich, I would be surprised to see that anybody here know anything about surfing.
Well, I´m trying to write while listening to the BS report from ESPN.com, this is not very helpful. I need help with Fantasy Football, because it´s my first season in Football.
Monday, July 30, 2007
Monday, July 23, 2007
Look Out for the Black Foot
LAN finally decided to give my boards and I made the quick decision to get the hell out of Lima. It only took me a 10 hour bus ride to get there. Unfortunately, I had the man with the unstraightenable arms and so he was giving me the forearm shiver for the whole ride. Plus you have the driver who couldn´t stop honking the whole night. I think that honking is placed on the Peruvian drivers test.
Sample question:
You are driving along the highway and you need to make a lane change, but there is a car right next to you. What do you do?
A) Put your turn signal on and wait paciently until the driver is out of the way.
B) Speed up and cut the asshole off
C) Honk loudly and spin the wheel
I know the Californian answer would be (B) but here it´s (C). I´ve never seen so many lane changes with another person occupying the space in the lane. Needless to say, with this style of driving I did not get much sleep.
And once I was in Pacasmayo the fun didn´t stop. I saw that the surf was pumping so I tore into my wettie and ran out the gate. I got a taxi out to the point (I´m being very lenient with the word taxi, more like a three wheeled moped with a parasol on top) because it´s quite a hike to get out to the point and it´s all over rocks.
I had almost made it and I was watching the surf when all of a sudden the ´taxi´ hit a soft spot in the sand and capsized. Luckily for the ´taxi´ my foot broke the fall. Unfortunately for me it left me with a pretty good sized bruise along the top of my foot. It was also sore.
I did still surf though and found Pacasmayo to be a really fun wave and extraordinarily long.
But that´s not why I´m here.
About an hour south of Pacasmayo lays the little port city of Puerto Malabrigo and on the southern end of the bay is the longest wave in the world (not counting tidal bores). On top of being thigh-burningly long (okay I know it´s not a word but Dr. Seuss made up weirder words) it is as close to perfect as any wave I have ever seen. I happened to arrive on the eve of the swell and today was one of the most fun days I´ve ever had. Just long uncrowded lefts that were peeling all the way through the bay. It was one of the coolest things I´ve ever seen. I think I might try to wait it out and surf it one more time before I leave. It´s definitely worth it.
Sample question:
You are driving along the highway and you need to make a lane change, but there is a car right next to you. What do you do?
A) Put your turn signal on and wait paciently until the driver is out of the way.
B) Speed up and cut the asshole off
C) Honk loudly and spin the wheel
I know the Californian answer would be (B) but here it´s (C). I´ve never seen so many lane changes with another person occupying the space in the lane. Needless to say, with this style of driving I did not get much sleep.
And once I was in Pacasmayo the fun didn´t stop. I saw that the surf was pumping so I tore into my wettie and ran out the gate. I got a taxi out to the point (I´m being very lenient with the word taxi, more like a three wheeled moped with a parasol on top) because it´s quite a hike to get out to the point and it´s all over rocks.
I had almost made it and I was watching the surf when all of a sudden the ´taxi´ hit a soft spot in the sand and capsized. Luckily for the ´taxi´ my foot broke the fall. Unfortunately for me it left me with a pretty good sized bruise along the top of my foot. It was also sore.
I did still surf though and found Pacasmayo to be a really fun wave and extraordinarily long.
But that´s not why I´m here.
About an hour south of Pacasmayo lays the little port city of Puerto Malabrigo and on the southern end of the bay is the longest wave in the world (not counting tidal bores). On top of being thigh-burningly long (okay I know it´s not a word but Dr. Seuss made up weirder words) it is as close to perfect as any wave I have ever seen. I happened to arrive on the eve of the swell and today was one of the most fun days I´ve ever had. Just long uncrowded lefts that were peeling all the way through the bay. It was one of the coolest things I´ve ever seen. I think I might try to wait it out and surf it one more time before I leave. It´s definitely worth it.
Saturday, July 21, 2007
Nerdiness is Infectious
Some of you may have read my little blurb on how I dislike exclamation points. That I feel that they are the worst form of punctuation out there. Well I was talking about this with some of the people that I was hanging out with in Santiago and we got to discussing: if exclamations are the worst, what are the best?
Well I´ll tell you, elipsis and parenthesis are the coolest. Elipses are cool because they can make anything (especially text messages) sexy. What is more sexually loaded: ¨Do you want to come over?¨ or ¨Do you want to come over...¨ Its easy to see that the first one could be sent to your mother while the second one would probably be sent to someone completely different and probably in the later hours of the night.
Then there is the parenthesis, which are cool because they allow you to interject random comments (like the fact that I have a strange interest in punctuation) whenever you feel like. It´s for when the comma just doesn´t cut it and you really need to say, ¨hey, look this is really random.¨ And since I do that a lot, I like the parenthesis
Well I´ll tell you, elipsis and parenthesis are the coolest. Elipses are cool because they can make anything (especially text messages) sexy. What is more sexually loaded: ¨Do you want to come over?¨ or ¨Do you want to come over...¨ Its easy to see that the first one could be sent to your mother while the second one would probably be sent to someone completely different and probably in the later hours of the night.
Then there is the parenthesis, which are cool because they allow you to interject random comments (like the fact that I have a strange interest in punctuation) whenever you feel like. It´s for when the comma just doesn´t cut it and you really need to say, ¨hey, look this is really random.¨ And since I do that a lot, I like the parenthesis
In One Piece
I´m completely relieved because I actually have all of my stuff with me. I had a rough couple of days and I´m glad everything is back in my possesion. I thought I had lost my passport but it turned out (surprise, surprise) that I´m just dumb. I spent the whole morning looking for my passport and my other documents (which included the number to call to get my boards) and I had given up. I even called my mom to say that I lost my passport. I ate a bit of lunch, and decided there is no way I could have lost my passport. So I went back to the hostel and tore apart my backpack, just like I did the first time. No luck. Then I turned it upside down and shook it like a bad parent would shake a baby. At first only coins and trash fell out and then in a small heap was my passport. God was I glad to see that.
But I still didn´t have my boards and I had an early flight the next day so I had to tell LANchile that I was going to Peru and that they had to deliver my boards there. Well, I initially got some disconcerting news, they had no idea where my boards were. Which did not give me the best feeling. But at least they then had my address. When I got to Lima I checked in with the Baggage Claim people and they said that my board had appeared and was on the flight to Santiago and that they only needed to fly them up to Peru for me to get them. Then I called last night and they had no idea what I was talking about, back to being nervous. But all that was wiped out when I woke up this morning and the concierge (that sounds too nice for a person at a hostel, but I don´t know what else to call him) told me that LAN had called and the surfboards would be in. Complete relief, and now, they are here.
So now what? I got to go try to find a bus ticket up to Pacasmayo. I think I might just go tonight so I can at least get the back end of the swell that is filling in right now as we speak. I might have to pay the guys to let me leave, but oh well, everything is back with me.
But I still didn´t have my boards and I had an early flight the next day so I had to tell LANchile that I was going to Peru and that they had to deliver my boards there. Well, I initially got some disconcerting news, they had no idea where my boards were. Which did not give me the best feeling. But at least they then had my address. When I got to Lima I checked in with the Baggage Claim people and they said that my board had appeared and was on the flight to Santiago and that they only needed to fly them up to Peru for me to get them. Then I called last night and they had no idea what I was talking about, back to being nervous. But all that was wiped out when I woke up this morning and the concierge (that sounds too nice for a person at a hostel, but I don´t know what else to call him) told me that LAN had called and the surfboards would be in. Complete relief, and now, they are here.
So now what? I got to go try to find a bus ticket up to Pacasmayo. I think I might just go tonight so I can at least get the back end of the swell that is filling in right now as we speak. I might have to pay the guys to let me leave, but oh well, everything is back with me.
Wednesday, July 18, 2007
No Boards, Dragon Breath and the Terrible Horrible No Good Very Bad Flight
Back in South America, my boards however, decided they rather liked Australia and they are going to stay atleast one more day. This could be disastrous as I fly to Lima very early on the 20th. So basically, if they don´t come tomorrow I´m not sure what I´m going to do. I´ll probably try to talk them into sending it up to Peru, but if they can´t do it, I will have no idea what to do. I might have to reschedule my flight if they don´t get the boards to me. Hopefully that will mean that they will reschedule for free because they are the ones that lost my boards.
This has led to some below average hygiene maintainence (not that it was good before). I figured that I dídn´t need a shower before I left, actually I wasn´t given any time. The shuttle bus came to pick me up when I was still in my boxers. I figured that I could at least brush my teeth at the airport. I was wrong. The line was such a clusterfuck that I had to stand for two hours so I wouldn´t lose my place and by the time I had checked in I had to put my ¨liquids, gels and aerosols¨in my board bag. No worries, just brush my teeth as soon as I get off the plane. I was actually thinking that I could just get some time in the layover to buy a toothbrush. Nope, my airplane takes off an hour late, giving me only 15 minutes to rush onto the plane, at which point I´ve started to break into a sweat.
So now, here I am, Mr. Sweaty Greasy Dragon Breath, getting onto the plane and what happens? For the only time in my life I get the seat next to The Hot Girl. Let me explain this for those who don´t understand. Everytime I fly I spend my last twenty minutes in the Airport Lounge scouring the area for my particular flight´s most attractive girls. On most flights there are between 3 and 6 decent to good looking girls with one standout. I pick which ones I´d most like to sit next to and when I go onto the plane it´s like a small lottery. I see all the girls and check which ones have empty seats next to them. Most of the time, about half the girls have boyfriends so I´m usually looking at 1 or 2 single good looking girls on my flight. If I´m on first I´ll watch them come in, examining the aisles looking for the seat. It´s always a bitter disappointment when they pass by. I really have not had much luck with this, in fact, until today/yesterday, I´ve never sat by a hottie let alone The Hot Girl.
So of course, I sit next to Her today, not a hot girl, but The Hot Girl. She was a sexy little colombian named Maria and here I am, greaseball hair, sweat/BO, and the worst breath ever. Every time I opened my mouth I thought someone farted. So obviously I´m a little self conscious and shy. To top this all off, I´ve got a seat that doesn´t stay still and absolutely the least legroom of any flight I´ve ever been on. So I´m now fidgeting and squirming, releasing gaseous explosions from my mouth, sweating even more from the fidgeting and here this beautiful little columbiana is not even moving. She slept the whole flight in the fetal position (imagine how small you have to be to sleep in the fetal position on a plane). I there existed the possibility that I frightened the girl.
But other than that debacle, the flight was great...oh, yeah, wait my inflight entertainment was scratched to death and I couldn´t play inflight movies or music. I kept getting these screetching noises, feeling like I´m in a Vonnegut novel. And then, on top of all this, they lose my bags. So now I don´t have my bathroom kit, or my boards, I´m still clearing out rooms when I open my mouth, my hair has never looked greasier, and if my breath isn´t killing people then my BO sure is.
I love traveling.
This has led to some below average hygiene maintainence (not that it was good before). I figured that I dídn´t need a shower before I left, actually I wasn´t given any time. The shuttle bus came to pick me up when I was still in my boxers. I figured that I could at least brush my teeth at the airport. I was wrong. The line was such a clusterfuck that I had to stand for two hours so I wouldn´t lose my place and by the time I had checked in I had to put my ¨liquids, gels and aerosols¨in my board bag. No worries, just brush my teeth as soon as I get off the plane. I was actually thinking that I could just get some time in the layover to buy a toothbrush. Nope, my airplane takes off an hour late, giving me only 15 minutes to rush onto the plane, at which point I´ve started to break into a sweat.
So now, here I am, Mr. Sweaty Greasy Dragon Breath, getting onto the plane and what happens? For the only time in my life I get the seat next to The Hot Girl. Let me explain this for those who don´t understand. Everytime I fly I spend my last twenty minutes in the Airport Lounge scouring the area for my particular flight´s most attractive girls. On most flights there are between 3 and 6 decent to good looking girls with one standout. I pick which ones I´d most like to sit next to and when I go onto the plane it´s like a small lottery. I see all the girls and check which ones have empty seats next to them. Most of the time, about half the girls have boyfriends so I´m usually looking at 1 or 2 single good looking girls on my flight. If I´m on first I´ll watch them come in, examining the aisles looking for the seat. It´s always a bitter disappointment when they pass by. I really have not had much luck with this, in fact, until today/yesterday, I´ve never sat by a hottie let alone The Hot Girl.
So of course, I sit next to Her today, not a hot girl, but The Hot Girl. She was a sexy little colombian named Maria and here I am, greaseball hair, sweat/BO, and the worst breath ever. Every time I opened my mouth I thought someone farted. So obviously I´m a little self conscious and shy. To top this all off, I´ve got a seat that doesn´t stay still and absolutely the least legroom of any flight I´ve ever been on. So I´m now fidgeting and squirming, releasing gaseous explosions from my mouth, sweating even more from the fidgeting and here this beautiful little columbiana is not even moving. She slept the whole flight in the fetal position (imagine how small you have to be to sleep in the fetal position on a plane). I there existed the possibility that I frightened the girl.
But other than that debacle, the flight was great...oh, yeah, wait my inflight entertainment was scratched to death and I couldn´t play inflight movies or music. I kept getting these screetching noises, feeling like I´m in a Vonnegut novel. And then, on top of all this, they lose my bags. So now I don´t have my bathroom kit, or my boards, I´m still clearing out rooms when I open my mouth, my hair has never looked greasier, and if my breath isn´t killing people then my BO sure is.
I love traveling.
Sunday, July 15, 2007
In a Lame Duck Period
Last week, I got to see my parents, Reynnie and Scottie for the first time in almost five months. It's basically been the longest strecth of time I've ever gone through without my family. Strangely enough, I only got a pang of homesickness when I was with the family. Even more strangely, it was the first time I've missed two places. I was missing Pichilemu and Laguna too. Not on equal terms, for sure, but it was strange to have created a separate life for myself down in Chile. The intensity by which I missed Pichilemu was nowhere near as strong as for Laguna, but still it was unexpected.
I will say I had a great time last week in Fiji with my folks, Reynnie and Scottie. We got one great day of surf, a couple decent days and a few crap days. I guess that's about how surf trips go. You can rarely get every day good, I don't even expect it, I'm always just happy when I get one or two good days in total. I was definitely most worried about Scottie coming all the way over to Fiji and getting skunked, but luckily we got an all time day on Monday that was easily good enough to show Scottie the potential of the whole reef set up there. His first wave at glassy Pools was just a screamer and when he was paddling back out I've never seen him so excited. Now this is Scottie we are talking about, and he is perpetually excited, but his face seemed to say it all. I guess his words did to, he was pretty hyperbolic but in combination with his facial expressions it had a definite sincerity.
The rest of the week wasn't as good, it got smaller after monday, but we did get a bit of a farewell swell on friday and some decent waves at Pools again. It was definitely the most I have ever surfed Pools on a trip. But even though the surf wasn't as good the rest of the week, we all still had a great time, and the tension of getting good surf was lifted with Monday, so everyone was pretty relaxed the whole trip.
Except of course the Cohens, who seemed to forget that there were only fifteen people on the island and were hassling everyone for waves. This isn't to say that they are bad people, they are actually really nice. Dennis, especially is a laugh, but being on the island they forgot to leave their SoCal aggression behind. Dennis would paddle up to the top of the point after every wave and would definitely take a wave in every set. He consistently pressured people for waves and would paddle around them to catch a few waves. He even flat out burned me on a wave that was clearly mine. The worst part of all of this is that it gets Reynnie, Scottie, Me and some of the others into picking up some of our old habits of sitting way inside and consistently jockeying for position. We didn't go full bore though, we usually would try to take the in between set waves so the older crew would get plenty of waves and we never said anything to Dennis because we were getting plenty of waves, even if they weren't sets, but I did feel badly for the others who weren't expecting to have a hard time getting waves. I guess it was just frustrating to have people on the trip who just have no idea about surf etiquette.
Oh well.
But now I'm back in Australia, prepping for my lengthy journey ahead of me. I have a plane flight to Santiago on wednesday that will take me about 18 hours, that will get me in on the 18th. Then I fly to Lima on the 20th at 6 in the morning, meaning I probably won't go to sleep at all, only to be followed by a 9-11 hour bus ride to Pacasmayo. Once there I'll be camped out for the next 7 weeks or so. I had initially talked to my friends about going to Costa Rica with them but I haven't been able to find anything cheaper than 1000 dollars, so it looks like that's a no go. Not a big deal, maybe I'll just go back to Chile a bit earlier to hang out with Reynnie. That should be fun. I guess things are still up in the air but I'm not too optimistic about going to Costa Rica.
But to be back in South America is going to be great. I'm getting to the point with my spanish that I'm really comfortable, even if I don't speak quite as well as I want to, so I'm basically looking to clean up all my mistakes before I get home. The break in Australia was really nice but I'm ready to go back to the tierra baja.
I will say I had a great time last week in Fiji with my folks, Reynnie and Scottie. We got one great day of surf, a couple decent days and a few crap days. I guess that's about how surf trips go. You can rarely get every day good, I don't even expect it, I'm always just happy when I get one or two good days in total. I was definitely most worried about Scottie coming all the way over to Fiji and getting skunked, but luckily we got an all time day on Monday that was easily good enough to show Scottie the potential of the whole reef set up there. His first wave at glassy Pools was just a screamer and when he was paddling back out I've never seen him so excited. Now this is Scottie we are talking about, and he is perpetually excited, but his face seemed to say it all. I guess his words did to, he was pretty hyperbolic but in combination with his facial expressions it had a definite sincerity.
The rest of the week wasn't as good, it got smaller after monday, but we did get a bit of a farewell swell on friday and some decent waves at Pools again. It was definitely the most I have ever surfed Pools on a trip. But even though the surf wasn't as good the rest of the week, we all still had a great time, and the tension of getting good surf was lifted with Monday, so everyone was pretty relaxed the whole trip.
Except of course the Cohens, who seemed to forget that there were only fifteen people on the island and were hassling everyone for waves. This isn't to say that they are bad people, they are actually really nice. Dennis, especially is a laugh, but being on the island they forgot to leave their SoCal aggression behind. Dennis would paddle up to the top of the point after every wave and would definitely take a wave in every set. He consistently pressured people for waves and would paddle around them to catch a few waves. He even flat out burned me on a wave that was clearly mine. The worst part of all of this is that it gets Reynnie, Scottie, Me and some of the others into picking up some of our old habits of sitting way inside and consistently jockeying for position. We didn't go full bore though, we usually would try to take the in between set waves so the older crew would get plenty of waves and we never said anything to Dennis because we were getting plenty of waves, even if they weren't sets, but I did feel badly for the others who weren't expecting to have a hard time getting waves. I guess it was just frustrating to have people on the trip who just have no idea about surf etiquette.
Oh well.
But now I'm back in Australia, prepping for my lengthy journey ahead of me. I have a plane flight to Santiago on wednesday that will take me about 18 hours, that will get me in on the 18th. Then I fly to Lima on the 20th at 6 in the morning, meaning I probably won't go to sleep at all, only to be followed by a 9-11 hour bus ride to Pacasmayo. Once there I'll be camped out for the next 7 weeks or so. I had initially talked to my friends about going to Costa Rica with them but I haven't been able to find anything cheaper than 1000 dollars, so it looks like that's a no go. Not a big deal, maybe I'll just go back to Chile a bit earlier to hang out with Reynnie. That should be fun. I guess things are still up in the air but I'm not too optimistic about going to Costa Rica.
But to be back in South America is going to be great. I'm getting to the point with my spanish that I'm really comfortable, even if I don't speak quite as well as I want to, so I'm basically looking to clean up all my mistakes before I get home. The break in Australia was really nice but I'm ready to go back to the tierra baja.
Wednesday, July 4, 2007
County Bondi
I'm in County Bondi, as Jimmy likes to call it. I'm in Australia, but I don't think I've hung out with anybody but people from the UK. Jimmy is Irish, his two best friends Sean and Danny are English (although their accents are completely different: Danny sounds like a surfer version of Ali G and Seanie sounds like if Prince William was a surfer, quite a contrast for people that grew up only a few miles apart.) The larger crew that they hang out with is also largely from the UK. I went to a birthday party with them last weekend and it was for a scottish guy. The people around the table were also exclusively from the UK, there might have been one aussie amidst them. I'm basically in a warm climate version of the UK, but I guess it could be worse. At least those guys know beer.
As for what I've been up to, well surfing and not speaking spanish (with exception of the other night when a german friend of Jimmy's came over and we spoke in spanish for about forty minutes). The surf has gone absolutely flat, I haven't seen a rideable wave in the last few days. That said, I got some great waves this weekend up in the National Park and at Maroubra (home of the famous Bra Boys). Just basic fun beachies. Since there hasn't been much surf here and there really isn't much to do, I just go watch the miniature waves break on the shore and stare at girls running by here. I'm actually quite enjoying myself. The girls here are ridiculously good looking and justing sitting watching them run by/tan/whatever they do has been a welcome distraction to help me get through the surfless days.
Tomorrow I'm off to see the folks, for the first time in almost five months, so that should be cool. It looks like we'll get a bit of surf in Fiji, nothing big, but atleast we'll have good weather to go with it. I think it will be cool because I've got a few gifts for the crew and it should be fun to 'get on the piss' (as they say down here) with Reynnie and Scottie.
As for what I've been up to, well surfing and not speaking spanish (with exception of the other night when a german friend of Jimmy's came over and we spoke in spanish for about forty minutes). The surf has gone absolutely flat, I haven't seen a rideable wave in the last few days. That said, I got some great waves this weekend up in the National Park and at Maroubra (home of the famous Bra Boys). Just basic fun beachies. Since there hasn't been much surf here and there really isn't much to do, I just go watch the miniature waves break on the shore and stare at girls running by here. I'm actually quite enjoying myself. The girls here are ridiculously good looking and justing sitting watching them run by/tan/whatever they do has been a welcome distraction to help me get through the surfless days.
Tomorrow I'm off to see the folks, for the first time in almost five months, so that should be cool. It looks like we'll get a bit of surf in Fiji, nothing big, but atleast we'll have good weather to go with it. I think it will be cool because I've got a few gifts for the crew and it should be fun to 'get on the piss' (as they say down here) with Reynnie and Scottie.
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