Starting Over

Maya Riviera Day 6: The Ruins of Chichan Itza

kennysjournal6@journalscape.com — Tue, 6 May 08 19:39:00 UT

This was the capital city of the Mayan civilization and it is an incredible place! El Castillo (The Castle) which is the central pyramid is an artful piece of engineering.

If you are standing in front of one of the faces of the pyramid you can clap from hundreds of feet away and the acoustics of the pyramid will accept the sound, bounce it around, amplify it and send it back to you sounding exactly like the call of the Quetzal bird.

The Mayan months leave 5 extra days at the end of each year and they used those as a celebration of the new cycle. The celebration includes sacrifices of any prisoners captured during the year, parties and a ball game played in this court:

On top of the wall to the right was the place where the highest ranking warriors would sit to watch the game.

The game consisted of two teams, each with a Captain. The players on the team would fight over control of a rubber ball which they would attempt to knock over to their Captain who would use his hips to knock it up and through this ring:

The Captain of the winning team, yes winning team, would be sacrificed. The carvings below depict his headless body with snakes shooting out of his neck. The blood/snakes will nourish the land, the people, etc. It's an honor to win and be chosen to give your life for the people.

This is the Sacred Well, it was a cenote that used to be filled with beautifully clean fresh water, but the white man decided if he blocked it up that the water would dry up and he could scavange all of the jade, gold, pottery, etc that had be placed down in the well. Pinchi gringo.

At the end of the day we visited the nearest proper cenote, utterly incredible to swim in. Keaver and I jumped from about 20 feet up into the cenote (it's about 250 feet deep).

Maya Riviera Day 5: Ruins of Tulum

kennysjournal6@journalscape.com — Mon, 5 May 08 13:53:00 UT

Sarah's parents organized a trip to the Mayan ruins of Tulum and to the Hidden Worlds cenote (seh-no-tay) on Monday. I didn't know what a cenote was, all I knew was that we were going to be doing some snorkeling there so I assumed it was like a lagoon or something. It turns out that a cenote is a fresh water pool that is accessible because a sinkhole opened up and exposed it. (A cool side note here, I just did a Google search for "cenote" to double check my informal definition and most of the image results that popped up were for two cenotes that I visited last week!)

Our visit to the Hidden Worlds cenote was very strange. We stopped off at a roadside location where they fitted us all up in wet suits and piled us into .... "truck" is too glamorous a name. Imagine an old truck. Now strip away all of the metal on the outside of it. Really, strip EVERYTHING away that isn't necessary for operation. You are left with 4 wheels, an axel, an exposed engine, a steering column and a single chair for the driver to sit in. No dashboard or anything, he had a single gauge duct taped onto the steering column. Now imagine the flat bed on the back of the truck. Add to it a simple frame about 4 feet high with 2 extra cross bars along the top. Everyone piles into the back and stands up, holding onto the metal frame for dear life. heh.

We climbed down into this tiny hole, so small that I had to contort myself a little bit to make it in. It opened into a medium sized cave which was mostly filled with water. We got in, snorkled around in a little circuit and hopped out. It was neat and I enjoyed myself despite it's simplicity.

Then we were on to the Mayan ruins of Tulum!

The plaques that describe the area mentioned that the architecture at Tulum was known for being simple and unsophisticated.

...

These guys need better PR.

The beach behind the cliffs of Tulum was very pretty:

We found Clay sunning himself on the edge of the cliff. I was _just_ about to go to something horrible to him while Debbie took a picture of it, but his instincts woke him up just in the nick of time.

This is the aforementioned Debbie:

Paul laments the loss of these Mayans. They owed him $5.

On that note, I've been told through my life that the Mayans disappeared or were all killed off, but this isn't true. There are still plenty of Mayan people alive in Mexico, but it's the Mayan culture that is mostly gone. Some of the people still even speak Mayan in places, although our tour guide mentioned that most who do speak Mayan mix it with Spanish. The above ruins were still inhabited in the early 1900s until the Mexican army came and whupped on them.

Maya Riviera Day 4: The Wedding!

kennysjournal6@journalscape.com — Sun, 4 May 08 13:26:00 UT

The wedding was fantastic! We hopped in some vans which took us down to Xpu Ha where the ceremony was held on the beach in front of a small 4-room hotel there. The reception was held at the beach and Hotel's restaurant. Sarah was incredibly beautiful and Clay was very handsome. The ceremony incorporated many Jewish customs (from Sarah's side) and I enjoyed it quite a bit.

Let me go on record here as saying that if you want to see a party in action at your wedding... invite the Jews and Greeks. These people know how to PARTY. :D Dancing the Horah, lifting the bride and groom up on chairs, just tons of good times. A REAL celebration! I helped lift up Clay on the chair, which was cool to be a part of fun tradition.

In fact, these guys ramped up SO quickly from end of ceremony to full on party... that I didn't even get a chance to take any pictures during the reception. :) I was far too busy shakin' that ass to take pics.

I'm going to post some choice pics, but here's the link to the big album for Clay and Sarah's Wedding.

Clay, The Groom!

Sarah, The Bride!

The beautiful Xpu-Ha Beach where the wedding was held.

The Kiss

The adorable couple

Me and the Man

Maya Riviera Day 3: Rehearsal Dinner

kennysjournal6@journalscape.com — Sat, 3 May 08 23:05:00 UT

Today was the most eventful so far, despite having a good long nap. The nap and lots more water helped shake off the remainder of the Summer Heat from the day before. I got another massage (woo!), this time with aromatherapy. I spent more time at the pool and ran into some party people which finally made me feel like I was in Cancun. I guess I kind of expected revelers getting way too drunk and doing stupid stuff, but until this moment, I hadn't see anything. I stumbled upon people in a beer chugging contest. I hung out and watched because it gave me something to do while chillin in the pool (I usually get bored in like 5 minutes and just go back to my room). While watching I ran into a couple of women from the wedding group who I had danced with at the club the night before and we hung out a bit. We took a lesson and learned to dance the Merenge. It's remarkably simple, but I need some work with a few moves. There is a part where you slowly turn around by snapping your hips back and forth and I can do it when turning left, but not right.

Later than night was the "Rehearsal" Dinner. None of the tables had markings, it was just free for all on who was sitting where... and the funny part was that Clay and Sarah didn't have seats. There was a whole table empty, but sitting there meant they would be totally alone. The peeps that I know had covered two tables, so we did some juggling and we got to have Clay and Sarah at our table, which was cool.

From the Dinner to the bar.... hung out with Keaver and Sage's family (Sage and Maria and their two adorable children, Te and Miles). 4 Mai Tai's later and I still wasn't even tipsy. What the hell? :) I watched him make the drinks and they weren't light on the alcohol... *shrug*

The Wedding is tomorrow! I hope to do some major dancing!

Maya Riviera Day 2: Welcome Cocktails

kennysjournal6@journalscape.com — Fri, 2 May 08 23:06:00 UT

Met up with some peeps for breakfast and a bit of swimming and such at the pool. I also spent a little time down at the beach and climbed into the Gulf of Mexico up to my chest. I found the spa and scored myself a Swedish massage. I used to get massages regularly when I worked at Google and it's something I definitely miss. It was very nice! When I got back to my hotel room I crashed HARD. Partly due to the massage and partly due to too much sun and not enough water. I got my H2O on and sought out a very arcane herb to help recover from the sun.... it's called Xi Gua... or in English, Watermelon.

That evening brought Welcome Cocktails with peeps and eventually lead to the Dance Club within the resort. I really love dancing. I wish I could get people to go out dancing with me. You! You reading this right now! Let's go dancing!

Funniest moment of the day.. sitting in the sports bar at the resort, waiting for Keaver to show up, this random guy walks up to me. He is DRUNK OFF HIS ASS... I mean, DAMN, this dude was drunk. He says, "Dude............ I don't mean to be an asshole... but do you know where my wife is?" I ask what she looks like and he says, "She's got an asshole and an attitude." Laughing, I tell him that I can't help him.. but right at this moment, the front door of the sports bar opens up and this woman who is CLEARLY PISSED is standing there and barks "DAVID!" in a full on dog voice. The drunk guy says, "Oh! There she is!" and wanders off toward her. Priceless.

I met some friends and family of Sarah and we had a nice talk while lounging in a little .... um, lounging place.. surrounded by water. I think we talked until 2am or so. Much fun!

Maya Riviera Day 1: The Hotel

kennysjournal6@journalscape.com — Thu, 1 May 08 23:10:00 UT

We stayed at the Grand Riviera Princess Hotel for the week. It was a beautiful place, but I'd probably not recommend it to others. There were some issues with promised features that were not delivered and such... which in certain circumstances I can understand, but it appeared that the staff had the policy of full denial. You'd say, "My *insert amenity here* isn't working" and they would say, "Oh, you don't get that with your type of room," and I would say, "Yes, I do, it's specifically listed," and they would say, "Oh, ok" and get it fixed in a couple of hours.

Regardless of that, I had a great time... here's a little look at the place.

You can click any of these images to go to the full album.

View from my Hotel Room

My Hotel Room

This is what Cancun REALLY looks like. Inside the resort is manicured and controlled, outside the resort is all nasty marshland.

The Hotel Plaza

Maya Riviera Day 1: Arrival

kennysjournal6@journalscape.com — Thu, 1 May 08 23:06:00 UT

(These entries are back-dated to their original date. I was a little uncomfortable posting that I was out of town in my journal in real-time. I'm going to post about the trip each day with pictures and such, so keep an eye out. Also, beware because my tense will get a little wonky since some of it was written mostly in real time, some days later and some after I've gotten back.)

I hit the airport at 6:30am and made it through all the lines pretty quickly. LAX has a new security feature, which I dig a great deal. They have 3 security lines setup, Casual Traveler, Expert Traveler and Family. The Expert Traveler line is for people who all know they need to take off their shoes and empty their pockets and take laptops out of their bags, etc, etc. Subsequently that line moves much faster than the others because it requires much less direction.

The flight from LAX to Cancun is remarkably short, I expected it to be much longer. Not really sure why though, it's shorter than a flight from West to East Coast USA.

For those who don't tangibly know where Cancun is.... (I was in Maya Riviera which is just south of Cancun).

View Larger Map

Two memorable moments of the flight... the first I enjoyed due to a swift kharma response. I walked onto the plane, put my book onto my aisle seat and headed for the lavatory. When I got back, my book was missing. The guy in the middle seat next to mine had decided I needed to sit somewhere else and moved my book. Um... JERK. Don't fuck with other people's stuff. I grabbed my book and took my proper seat. His kharma was returned when the breakfast cart made it to our aisle.. and I got the last sandwich available. He had to go hungry. muahahahhaha

The other memorable moment was this beautiful green-eyed woman who walked up the aisle for the lav. She was stunning. I'm not often taken aback like this when I see attractive women. I will see beautiful women and think "Wow, she's really good looking," but my brain actually stopped working for second. In addition to being stunning, she was wearing a Chinese coin necklace and a Transformers t-shirt. Gotta love it. *smirk* My mouth was already open to begin speaking to her.... when her boyfriend (or maybe husband) walked up. While none of the other attractive, beautiful women I saw during the rest of the vacation were as stunning (even though maybe will still very beautiful)... the boyfriend who was just a moment behind the women would set the theme for the rest of the week.

Immigration and Customs took about 30 minutes and in the line I ran into Keaver (who I worked with at Applied Semantics and Google). We grabbed a taxi to the Hotel and did some catching up.

The resort is beautiful. It's the kind of thing where inside the resort is utterly different than outside. Outside of the resort is nasty marshland... then there is a stone wall and inside the resort are rows of hotel rooms and countless pools. Eventually the resort meets up with the beach, which is beautiful, very fine, white sand.

We ran into Clay and Sarah (the couple getting married) and hung out with them. We grabbed some dinner and Sarah mentioned there were some problems with the place-cards and such for the wedding, so I plopped down in Clay and Sarah's room and helped fix them by writing out 90ish place-cards by hand. I know how crazy weddings can get, so I was happy to help out and take away some of the stress.

Fluid Pattern Intelligence Test

kennysjournal6@journalscape.com — Tue, 29 Apr 08 09:57:00 UT

I just found this this test via Derek's Journal and he's right! Holy crap it's hard! :D

The guy running this test is collecting the data for a study, so don't discuss the actual questions in the comments to avoid tainting the results for anyone else who wants to take it. :)

Video Games are Serious Business

kennysjournal6@journalscape.com — Sat, 26 Apr 08 09:05:00 UT

A lot of the time I spend playing World of Warcraft is spent raiding (playing with a group of 24 other people and doing really difficult/complex dungeons). It requires skilled players who can work together well and thankfully the people I play with are! They are a lot of fun as well, good people.

Getting people to work together requires a leader. Since 25 people are involved though, it's a little much for 1 person to handle. Our raid leader has a couple people to help coordinate everyone... and as of this weekend I am one of those people.

I've been asked to be in charge of coordinating/leading all of the magical damage dealers in the group! I'm excited about the idea of it, but I am going to be careful with it. I have seen this kind of psuedo leadership stuff causes drama problems in groups. However, that very reason is why the raid leader asked me to help out because even though I can be a jerk to people, I actually do have lots of people skillz can also be very political when placed in situations that require it (usually in supervisory types, when I'm the follower I still tend to be brutally honest).

So, I'm going to give this a try. If it begins to detract from my enjoyment of the game, then I'll back out and just go back to being player-at-large. I wasn't sure that I ever really wanted to get into this type of position, despite being told on numerous occasions that I'd make a good raid leader, but right now I'm sort of missing the passion for other things in life. I'm not excited about school, I'm not excited about working (I've been doing small freelance work), but I'm actually excited about World of Warcraft and the accomplishments that I'm a part of within. So, I figure if I'm passionate about this I might as well nuture it and see if I can spark up the fire in other areas of my life. Let's see what happens.

Where in the World is Osama bin Laden?

kennysjournal6@journalscape.com — Sun, 20 Apr 08 23:07:00 UT

Last night I walked down to the local movie theatre, unsure what I wanted to see and found Where in the World is Osama bin Laden? It is the latest documentary from Morgan Spurlock the creator of Super Size Me.

It was a fantastic documentary, as I have come to expect from Morgan. I've enjoyed both of his documentaries I've seen and his TV show.

The basic premise is that he's about to have his first child and is worried about all the dangers in the world and decides to do what he can to find the Most Wanted Man in the World.... Osama bin Laden. He travels throughout the Middle East interviewing people and seeing the situation first hand. He gets into a couple of scary situations, he talks with a lot of people who support bin Laden and a lot who hate him. I have to say that the government and authority imposed oppression in Saudi Arabia was the scariest part. I've heard many times that Saudi Arabia is bad and they are one of our best friends... but damn. I didn't understand just how bad it is.

One of the funniest people he interacted with was this old man in Afghanistan... this is pretty close to the interaction:

Morgan: Do you know where Osama bin Laden is?

Old Man: I don't know who that is.

Morgan: He's the man who flew several planes into buildings in America on 9/11.

Old man: Oh, him. Fuck him.... and fuck America.

It's funny. It's scary. It's insightful.

I highly recommend it.

Ten Word Contest

kennysjournal6@journalscape.com — Fri, 18 Apr 08 16:06:00 UT

A while back, Penny Arcade announced its Ten Word Contest: You must write a short story, set in World of Warcraft, and this story must be precisely ten words long.

They provided examples:

His father's sword, shattered to the hilt, fell like stars.

or

"Help," he cried. "My dick is stuck in this Treant!"

They announced the winners today and included lots of runners up. These are my favorites:

Patrons of all taverns knew well the hero's name: LleggolazXxX.

I kill. But not for vengeance. For really neat pants.

"You're a disgrace to Tauren culture," said the shaman Lolhamburger.

WTB ninety days, eighteen hours of my life back PST

Can you come up with a good one too? :)

Return of the Turd Person

kennysjournal6@journalscape.com — Thu, 17 Apr 08 19:49:00 UT

The aforementioned Turd Person strikes again!

One of my homies come into class early and chooses a seat at one of the tables. The tables are all wide and designed for 2 people to sit at. She chooses the side of the table on the aisle instead of up against the wall. Then she leaves to go get a drink.

The turd person walks in, moves my friend's stuff and sits in the aisle seat.

Too Damn Scary

kennysjournal6@journalscape.com — Wed, 16 Apr 08 02:01:00 UT

Sitting and watching scary TV shows like Carnivale at 2am is clearly a bad idea. I finished up watching a particularly scary episode... who am I kidding, they are all scary.

I'm too jittery now to go to sleep, so I flipped on the TiVo and started to watch tonight's episode of The Daily Show.

2 minutes into the show... THE ENTIRE HOUSE LOSES POWER AND I'M IN THE PITCH FUCKING BLACK.

Not cool.

Weekly Maintenance

kennysjournal6@journalscape.com — Tue, 15 Apr 08 10:15:00 UT

When Blizzard is doing weekly maintenance on the WoW servers, I'm doing weekly maintenance on my house. Laundry, dishes, dusting, cleaning, etc.

phew.

I'm not done yet, but I had to sit and take a breather.

Unexpected Information

kennysjournal6@journalscape.com — Mon, 14 Apr 08 14:40:00 UT

I check out Geek 2 Geek (dating website) every once in awhile.

The thing you want to see least and the end of a woman's profile who has been witty and funny and has made many geeky references and has claimed many of the same geeky interests is....

"... I'm a transsexual."