Hurricane Kevin Enjoys a Magharita
Daddy in Cancun
Backpacking Glamour, Mine was the Top Bunk
Isla Mujeres Clings to Its Palm Trees After Two Hurricanes
Tulum Ruins and the Carribean
Hahahahahaha
Wednesday, October 31, 2007
Monday, October 22, 2007
Well well well all good tours must come to an end, and as I sit in my cousin's guest room on a beautiful LA morning (are there any other) I can't believe four months has flown by so fast.
In 14 hours or so I fly back to the Land of the Long White Cloud and I can't wait to clap eyes on my tired Mitsubishi Galant, my gorgeous red bedroom and all my fabulous friends. I've loved being away but packing and unpacking 34 times in 120 days can take a toll on a girl's nail polish.
In that time I've visited 17 cities from Saskatoon to Cancun, taken ten flights (must buy some carbon credits), performed my show 36 times and drunk more beer than Homer Simpson at a work function.
I've already waxed hysterical on my performance tour, but as I was far too busy sucking back pina coladas and eating chocolate chicken in Mexico, you my three dear readers have remained in the dark about my travels like a mariachi with a too big sombrero, so let's start at the very principo.
I landed in Mexico City a month ago and then promptly failed to meet my Youth Hostels shuttle as I was standing at the wrong bank. In my defence TWO separate people told me I was in the right place so I choose to believe they were retarded and not me.
Mexico City is very cool, it has 20 million people and 40 million statues of Jesus for sale on the street. (Sidebar, in Mexico Jesus is in a lot more agony than other ones I've seen. His crucifixes are dripping in blood and gashes unlike our nicely sanitised ones which makes death by being nailed to a stake as irksome as a wee thorn in the side.)
It also has fine museums, nice parks, thankfully non-rabid stray dogs and men who rip you off when you go punting on the river. Luckily they also have women who float along in weeny boats next to you selling you Coronas on the river so my annoyance was nicely dulled. All in all I had a lovely time there and was bought beer by a group of International Earthquake Specialists who I managed not to ask; "Did the earth move for you," remarkable restraint I think.
From there I bussed off to Oaxaca, a gorgeous Colonial town where I partied hardy at a great Youth Hostel and where I met my travelling husband John. We were to see each other on again off again for three weeks thereby outlasting many Hollywood Marriages.
My next stop was Zipolite but not before a harrowing five hour bus ride on winding roads and overtaking on blind corners with a general cunt of a driver. I believe he has a bet on how many people he can make throw up on an average ride and I fear I was a statistic.
SIDEBAR - In Mexico you do not put the toilet paper down the toilet, oh no, instead you place it in a small bin next to the toilet. As such I anticipated that many toilets would make Quentin Tarantino's language seem clean. BUT I was generally pleasantly surprised at the state of hygiene in MOST situations. However when I tottered out of this bus looking for the Banos in a small cafe on top of a mountain my luck ran out. It was the bathroom equivalent of a teenagers bedroom, disgusting, smelly and with a thick layer of pubes. There was no way I was going to throw up in that toilet as the splash back would have been such a mixture of dysentery, herpes and cystitis that i would have been quarantined from NZ. So I did what any good Kiwi girl would do and barfed in the bushes. All fucking class me mate.
ANYWAY Zipolite was very relaxed EXCEPT the water was trying to kill me, the current in the water was pulling me so hard I should have sold admission for men to take a dip. What I did instead was some judicious swimming and hallelujah I was finally chilling on a beach. This was helped by the fact that a Chicken sandwich and a beer cost a mere $2.50 US. Choice.
Next stop was San Cristobal de las Casas, another gorgeous Colonial town where I go to know the afore-mentioned Nicaraguan Percussionist, and let's just say "He Banged". I also found some lovely jewellery there, ate a Greek meal in a Thai Restaurant, watched a didgeridoo and climbed two sets of stairs because they were there. Edmund Hilary would be proud, there was no other reason to climb them as the view from the top was shit. I also visited a Mayan Medicine Museum here and must remember to suggest using Black Spider Fangs to help my next boyfriend if he has swollen testicles. MMMMmmm.
After San Cristobal I ventured off to the fabulous Palenque ruins and the happeningist hippy place to stay - El Panchan, which is a groovy little cluster of places to stay just outside of town. I laid my hat in an establishment called The Jungle Palace and I loved it. I had a hut with only thick mesh for walls and a little stream tinkling behind it. It was a truly relaxing place to stay with cheap massages, cheap beers and cheap boys. (OK there weren't any of the latter but I was hoping.) It also had Howler Monkeys outside my window at 5am, THOUGH they should actually be called "Wake you up in a panic with their strangled screaming followed by weird guttural grunts" monkeys, and I'm glad I'd been warned about them first because if I'd just heard that out of the blue I may well have lost my refried beans in my pants. BUT apart from mental wildlife and spiders the size of my face living in the pooey paper basket by the toilet, I had a great time. Oh and yeah the ruins were fab too.
From there it was off to Tulum, the most beautiful Beach in Mexico that I saw ANNNND the most expensive. A diet Coke for $2.50 US??? Like fuck, I lasted here two days then headed to Isla Mujeres.
Isla was a special place for two friends of mine as they met there and are now married. I therefore slapped on my best Husband Luring outfit and camped out in the common room 24/7. Ahhhahahahah as if I'm that desperate to be married..........yes well, I did instead drink COPIOUS amounts of beer and cocktails there, and danced til 3 and 4am etc... for five nights and loved it. I made some lovely friends and then had to tear myself away to go and pick up my Dad.
Yes that's right Dad.
You see my mother was away finding herself in South America so my Dad decided, hey, why don't I go and bother my daughter on her Mexican Shag Fest. Luckily the Shag Fest was having as much success as Britney Spears in the Mother of the Year Competition so it wasn't too much of an imposition.
We then hung out for a week travelling to Merida, (fantastic outdoor weekend partying), Chichen Itza (Huge ruins where it pissed down with rain and Dad knocked a pile of T-Shirts into the Mud in a shop then ran away), Valladolid (another cute colonial town with underground caves where you swim in Bat crap as they twitter overhead), Playa Del Carmen (Nasty touristy place with a nice beach) and Cancun (where he had to continually say that I was NOT his second wife!).
I had a nice time bonding with Pops and needless to say my standard of accommodation improved drastically. "WHAT, bathroom in my room you say....air-conditioning you say...over $25US you say....I can flush my pooey paper you say....No WE ARE NOT married I say...." etc.. etc...
And so it wound to an end with our final night being a haze of Karaoke, margaritas and sunstroke, a very fitting end to a four month legendary tour I say.
So that's that, I'm coming home and may I say, I can't bloody wait!
Good on ya mates.
Final Sidebar - In Mexico you are constantly harrassed to buy stuff. "Buy my prayer bracelet...buy my beaded necklace...buy my snorkelling trip...buy my pooey paper basket..." etc etc. A lot of people, my father included, got immensely pissed off and frustrated with this BUT I just kept saying "No Gracias". You see I figured that these people earn so much less than me and I'm a bloody poet, so I don't mind them trying to make a peso off me, because they wouldn't be here if the foreigners weren't. We create the industry that so many tourists seem to hate simply by being there, so if you want to luxuriate on a beach and have lunch for $2.50, suck it up I say.
In 14 hours or so I fly back to the Land of the Long White Cloud and I can't wait to clap eyes on my tired Mitsubishi Galant, my gorgeous red bedroom and all my fabulous friends. I've loved being away but packing and unpacking 34 times in 120 days can take a toll on a girl's nail polish.
In that time I've visited 17 cities from Saskatoon to Cancun, taken ten flights (must buy some carbon credits), performed my show 36 times and drunk more beer than Homer Simpson at a work function.
I've already waxed hysterical on my performance tour, but as I was far too busy sucking back pina coladas and eating chocolate chicken in Mexico, you my three dear readers have remained in the dark about my travels like a mariachi with a too big sombrero, so let's start at the very principo.
I landed in Mexico City a month ago and then promptly failed to meet my Youth Hostels shuttle as I was standing at the wrong bank. In my defence TWO separate people told me I was in the right place so I choose to believe they were retarded and not me.
Mexico City is very cool, it has 20 million people and 40 million statues of Jesus for sale on the street. (Sidebar, in Mexico Jesus is in a lot more agony than other ones I've seen. His crucifixes are dripping in blood and gashes unlike our nicely sanitised ones which makes death by being nailed to a stake as irksome as a wee thorn in the side.)
It also has fine museums, nice parks, thankfully non-rabid stray dogs and men who rip you off when you go punting on the river. Luckily they also have women who float along in weeny boats next to you selling you Coronas on the river so my annoyance was nicely dulled. All in all I had a lovely time there and was bought beer by a group of International Earthquake Specialists who I managed not to ask; "Did the earth move for you," remarkable restraint I think.
From there I bussed off to Oaxaca, a gorgeous Colonial town where I partied hardy at a great Youth Hostel and where I met my travelling husband John. We were to see each other on again off again for three weeks thereby outlasting many Hollywood Marriages.
My next stop was Zipolite but not before a harrowing five hour bus ride on winding roads and overtaking on blind corners with a general cunt of a driver. I believe he has a bet on how many people he can make throw up on an average ride and I fear I was a statistic.
SIDEBAR - In Mexico you do not put the toilet paper down the toilet, oh no, instead you place it in a small bin next to the toilet. As such I anticipated that many toilets would make Quentin Tarantino's language seem clean. BUT I was generally pleasantly surprised at the state of hygiene in MOST situations. However when I tottered out of this bus looking for the Banos in a small cafe on top of a mountain my luck ran out. It was the bathroom equivalent of a teenagers bedroom, disgusting, smelly and with a thick layer of pubes. There was no way I was going to throw up in that toilet as the splash back would have been such a mixture of dysentery, herpes and cystitis that i would have been quarantined from NZ. So I did what any good Kiwi girl would do and barfed in the bushes. All fucking class me mate.
ANYWAY Zipolite was very relaxed EXCEPT the water was trying to kill me, the current in the water was pulling me so hard I should have sold admission for men to take a dip. What I did instead was some judicious swimming and hallelujah I was finally chilling on a beach. This was helped by the fact that a Chicken sandwich and a beer cost a mere $2.50 US. Choice.
Next stop was San Cristobal de las Casas, another gorgeous Colonial town where I go to know the afore-mentioned Nicaraguan Percussionist, and let's just say "He Banged". I also found some lovely jewellery there, ate a Greek meal in a Thai Restaurant, watched a didgeridoo and climbed two sets of stairs because they were there. Edmund Hilary would be proud, there was no other reason to climb them as the view from the top was shit. I also visited a Mayan Medicine Museum here and must remember to suggest using Black Spider Fangs to help my next boyfriend if he has swollen testicles. MMMMmmm.
After San Cristobal I ventured off to the fabulous Palenque ruins and the happeningist hippy place to stay - El Panchan, which is a groovy little cluster of places to stay just outside of town. I laid my hat in an establishment called The Jungle Palace and I loved it. I had a hut with only thick mesh for walls and a little stream tinkling behind it. It was a truly relaxing place to stay with cheap massages, cheap beers and cheap boys. (OK there weren't any of the latter but I was hoping.) It also had Howler Monkeys outside my window at 5am, THOUGH they should actually be called "Wake you up in a panic with their strangled screaming followed by weird guttural grunts" monkeys, and I'm glad I'd been warned about them first because if I'd just heard that out of the blue I may well have lost my refried beans in my pants. BUT apart from mental wildlife and spiders the size of my face living in the pooey paper basket by the toilet, I had a great time. Oh and yeah the ruins were fab too.
From there it was off to Tulum, the most beautiful Beach in Mexico that I saw ANNNND the most expensive. A diet Coke for $2.50 US??? Like fuck, I lasted here two days then headed to Isla Mujeres.
Isla was a special place for two friends of mine as they met there and are now married. I therefore slapped on my best Husband Luring outfit and camped out in the common room 24/7. Ahhhahahahah as if I'm that desperate to be married..........yes well, I did instead drink COPIOUS amounts of beer and cocktails there, and danced til 3 and 4am etc... for five nights and loved it. I made some lovely friends and then had to tear myself away to go and pick up my Dad.
Yes that's right Dad.
You see my mother was away finding herself in South America so my Dad decided, hey, why don't I go and bother my daughter on her Mexican Shag Fest. Luckily the Shag Fest was having as much success as Britney Spears in the Mother of the Year Competition so it wasn't too much of an imposition.
We then hung out for a week travelling to Merida, (fantastic outdoor weekend partying), Chichen Itza (Huge ruins where it pissed down with rain and Dad knocked a pile of T-Shirts into the Mud in a shop then ran away), Valladolid (another cute colonial town with underground caves where you swim in Bat crap as they twitter overhead), Playa Del Carmen (Nasty touristy place with a nice beach) and Cancun (where he had to continually say that I was NOT his second wife!).
I had a nice time bonding with Pops and needless to say my standard of accommodation improved drastically. "WHAT, bathroom in my room you say....air-conditioning you say...over $25US you say....I can flush my pooey paper you say....No WE ARE NOT married I say...." etc.. etc...
And so it wound to an end with our final night being a haze of Karaoke, margaritas and sunstroke, a very fitting end to a four month legendary tour I say.
So that's that, I'm coming home and may I say, I can't bloody wait!
Good on ya mates.
Final Sidebar - In Mexico you are constantly harrassed to buy stuff. "Buy my prayer bracelet...buy my beaded necklace...buy my snorkelling trip...buy my pooey paper basket..." etc etc. A lot of people, my father included, got immensely pissed off and frustrated with this BUT I just kept saying "No Gracias". You see I figured that these people earn so much less than me and I'm a bloody poet, so I don't mind them trying to make a peso off me, because they wouldn't be here if the foreigners weren't. We create the industry that so many tourists seem to hate simply by being there, so if you want to luxuriate on a beach and have lunch for $2.50, suck it up I say.
Sunday, October 07, 2007
Wednesday, October 03, 2007
Well I´m a moron.
I am killing time currently in a ciber (sic) cafe in San Cristobel de las Casas as I missed my bus because I had left my passport and Traveller´s Cheques in my hostel´s safe.
Yes, moron.
At least I remembered before getting on the five hour bus ride to the jungle of Pelanque, but yeah dickhead.
I´m having a lovely time in Mexico, though since I have drunk cerveza nearly every single day since July, I am looking forward to hitting the gym when I return.
This is probably the first time I have travelled in a country where not many people at all speak english and it has made for entertaining charades. I have realised I know NADA Spanish and so have pulled faces, held up numerous fingers, asked Donde Esta xyz only to stare blankly when the babbling answer comes back to me with directions, haggled using a dictionary to get numbers and laughed rather a lot. All bueno fun.
I have been in VERY hot to very cold weather, eaten spicy and not so spicy food, drunk mojitos, pina coladas and corona, looked at Mayan Medicine museums, fought the waters of Zipolite that are trying to kill you constantly with its rip tides, chatted to travellers from all over the world and pashed a Nicuraguan Percussionist.
Life is good.
My Dad is arriving in a week. He decided he´d like to come to mexico and here he is determined to take over the Karoke Bars of the Yucutan Peninsula. It might scare off some more percussionists of Latino descent BUT I have a sneaking suspicion he won´t want to sleep in a dorm and might just pay the difference!
Fingers crossed!
I am killing time currently in a ciber (sic) cafe in San Cristobel de las Casas as I missed my bus because I had left my passport and Traveller´s Cheques in my hostel´s safe.
Yes, moron.
At least I remembered before getting on the five hour bus ride to the jungle of Pelanque, but yeah dickhead.
I´m having a lovely time in Mexico, though since I have drunk cerveza nearly every single day since July, I am looking forward to hitting the gym when I return.
This is probably the first time I have travelled in a country where not many people at all speak english and it has made for entertaining charades. I have realised I know NADA Spanish and so have pulled faces, held up numerous fingers, asked Donde Esta xyz only to stare blankly when the babbling answer comes back to me with directions, haggled using a dictionary to get numbers and laughed rather a lot. All bueno fun.
I have been in VERY hot to very cold weather, eaten spicy and not so spicy food, drunk mojitos, pina coladas and corona, looked at Mayan Medicine museums, fought the waters of Zipolite that are trying to kill you constantly with its rip tides, chatted to travellers from all over the world and pashed a Nicuraguan Percussionist.
Life is good.
My Dad is arriving in a week. He decided he´d like to come to mexico and here he is determined to take over the Karoke Bars of the Yucutan Peninsula. It might scare off some more percussionists of Latino descent BUT I have a sneaking suspicion he won´t want to sleep in a dorm and might just pay the difference!
Fingers crossed!
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