We took Valentines weekend in Las Vegas with a lot of friends. This was originally planned as just a friends trip, but it ended up turning into a bachelor/bachelorette party.
The flight there was delayed by 4.5 hours. This was due to the fasten seatbelt sign not working, which they didn’t fix. Instead they just said, “we’re going flying anyway, and you just can’t get up during the flight.” We made it there just barely in time to go to the spa. Steph was a little late to her massage, but not too bad. We didn’t have time beforehand to check in, so we did that after and went to dinner after a short nap.
Dinner was at Bar Masa and the food was pretty good, but no dish really stood out as fantastic. It was a pretty massive group of close to 30 people, and we all had a good bit of sake. The night progressed up to the suite, where four guys dressed as teenage mutant ninja turtles came up, and we played a lot of codenames. Steph was sleepy since we had to get up early so she left around 1am, and I stayed until about 3am since I had slept on the flight.
The next day we went to brunch at Bardot, where Steph got the largest French toast I’ve ever seen.
We then went up to George’s room and played some more Codenames with Tom and Irene. I really enjoyed spending time with them, and will have to have them over some time. We then went to a nice dinner at Milo, followed by some gambling at Ellis Island. They were giving out $10 in free slots play, which was interesting. It took a while for everyone to figure it out, but they did. Debby was the one who enjoyed it the most by far, as you can see in the poorly shot video below (Sorry for portrait).
After a 4.5 hour delay on the way in it was annoying to have a 4.5 hour delay on the way out, which included a long wait on the runway because one of the AC units was broken, but they decided “we’re going to fly anyway.” Not sure how I’m feeling about Jet Blue after this trip.
Stephanie and I went to Whistler in Canada for a weekend of Snowboarding (me) and Skiing (her). We met up with a group of people including Rong, Riley, Emily, and Emily’s family. It was a pretty good time, and we stayed at a rather nice vacation rental.
We took a gondola there that stretches between the two mountains, Whistler and Blackcomb. It was an amazing view, and once we got the glass bottom gondola. Looking down was pretty interesting, and we couldn’t actually stand on the glass.
Stephanie wasn’t terribly comfortable until near the end, and I was pretty rusty myself. There were a lot of points I would have liked to go a bit steeper, but the paths that Steph chose were challenging enough for me. The others were pretty good at the skiing part. The only thing I would really liked to have done is go up to the glacier and snowboard down that. It sounded like the kind of thing I’d really enjoy: huge area that is decently steep. There are a lot more videos that we took with the go pro on my youtube.
Pretty much the entire way there and the entire way back I was using my phone for the Gear VR. It was a really nice way to pass the time while travelling. The only strange part is when the vehicle turns the screen registers it as turning. It might actually be good for motion sick people since the screen responds exactly to the motion.
We got to Kochi pretty late and just went straight to the hotel. It was New Years Eve, so we had planned on staying up late and partying. We got there and Lindsay was able to get us into the roof party, despite one woman insisting that it was sold out. Lindsay even got us a discount because the package deal of a room and the party wasn’t on the website.
We had a pretty good night. Lindsay won a dance contest.
The only stop we made was to get some bootlegged alcohol, made from coconut juice. It wasn’t that great and wasn’t from the cleanest of places
I didn’t feel too unsafe because the fermentation process was proceeding cleanly.
We saw a fantastic sunset, and got some much needed sleep in the well sealed cabins. I only got a half dozen bites from the mosquitos, but that is why I was taking anti-malaria pills.
The next morning we went back to Kochi and got a hotel for the time before the flight. We walked along the beach some and got to see them take in the Chinese fishing nets.
Lindsay left at 4pm, so Steph and I grabbed some dinner and a nap before heading off to our flight at 1am.
The flights were really long, and not too bad. Steph and I switched seats halfway through the long flight, and she really didn’t like the middle seat with the broken recliner. I can’t blame her since it was really uncomfortable. I wasn’t able to sleep in it very much, but the window seat she gave me got me a decent amount of sleep. Her parents were there to pick us up when we got back and it was nice of them to make us some soup for dinner. Steph was completely gone the whole ride back, but she managed to stay up until a decently late time.
It took four flights to get me from Atlanta to Bangalore. I went through Chicago, over the North Pole, through Delhi, through Chennai, and then to Bangalore. I had to go through security at every airport and customs in Chennai. Lindsay met me at the airport and we headed back to the hotel for a nap. A few hours later we went back to pick up Steph as she got in. We had a short night’s sleep, and slept in quite a bit. We eventually checked out an hour late, and grabbed a quick bit of food at the close by McDonalds. We got the Indian versions, made of Aloo and Paneer.
We made it to the next hotel, which was about an hour and change away. We checked in then went to see the town, and get some much needed coffee. We walked a bit around one of the nicer areas and found a Cafe Coffee Day that Lindsay liked. We got our much needed caffeine and then talked through what our plan for the trip was going to be. While walking along the streets we noticed cows just wandering around and standing in the middle of the road. Everyone just went around them. With as crazy as the traffic was, cows weren’t even close to the biggest hazard.
We then went for some really oily massages called ‘Ayurveda’ massage. It was a very interesting and unique experience that I would not want to repeat. The massage wasn’t that unpleasant, but the constant oily feeling afterwards wasn’t great. They do let you shower, but it isn’t western standards. We had a nice Indian meal after that and called it a pretty early night.
The next day we went on a tour of the city, with a really amazing guide. In the morning we went to a snake temple that was built to appease all the snakes that were displaced from the filling in of lakes in Bangalore. They served the most delicious meal we had while we were in India.
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Near the snake temple were sari looms, and they were incredibly loud
Just down the street from there was a well known coffee/tea house, so we stopped by to get a drink
After that we went to the central marketplace. It was very loud with people going everywhere. There were large piles of trash around because someone had not been bribed to take it away. There were so many flowers in the lower area, and Steph got some Saffron, which I was dubious about.
We then went to a Sikh temple and learned a little bit about the Sikh traditions of taking care of the community, which I strongly approve of. Their meals, housing, and education social policies are very good, and are done on a scale that is mostly sustainable. Their religious practices aren’t for me, but the social policies are nice.
We had lunch hosted by a local family that was distantly related to the royal family that once ruled the Bangalore area. They were very nice, and cooked a dish ‘Kofta’ that was delicious. We liked it so much we decided that in the cooking class we were going to be taking later we would have to have that included.
We then headed to the temple to Kali, which was pretty disturbing. They had animal sacrifices, locks to cast curses, and a black cat owned by a transvestite. The whole place wasn’t that scary, just really creepy.
The nexts stop was Pottery Town. This was an area that was known for making pottery, and consisted entirely of a labor caste that converted to Christianity to get out of the caste system. They had a lot of pots everywhere, as well as all sorts of clay figures. We found one room full of nativity characters.
A short drive away was one of the slum areas, which the guide referred to as the nicest slums. The area was mostly buildings with a few tarps here and there. We stopped by an area for women who take trash and weave it into usable products. Lindsay got a day bag there, with Steph and I just donating for a tour of the facility. It was a very interesting area.
Lastly we stopped by Washerman’s Valley an area in almost all Indian cities that has the old style of cleaning clothes. They wring water out of the clothes and beat them against rocks to force out the dirt and oil. This is a very cheap way of getting laundry done, but destroys the clothes pretty quickly.
We called it a night and went to an interesting Mexican restaurant, which was decently good tex-mex.
The next day we headed to the park, followed by a nice cooking class.
Liana and Ryan joined us for a paint nite event, and it was a really good time. The venue was a little cramped, but I was able to get over to them and chat for a bit. The painting was also the best one we’ve done so far, and I got a lot of comments on mine looking good. I really enjoy the simple paintings with really colorful backgrounds.
Steph and I did a paint nite in Mountain View with Jeff and Patty. The location was Agave and the painting was a fall scene with orange leaves and a blue sky. I went a little off script with a sunset painting that turned out marginally. The nice touches I liked in mine were the two mallards I painted in the corner.
Stephanie’s was really nice, and I really liked the leaves in her painting. She also had an adorable kitty sitting in the swing.
I went skydiving again. The first time was freshman year in college, so a while ago.
We met up with some of Steph’s work buddies and headed out to near Moss Landing. The wait was a little long, and the ride a little short, but still worth it. I got a video of it, and hopefully Steph can pick that up from her coworker tomorrow. Hai, Mark, Kaijen, Erik, and Damien were there as well. It was the first time I had met Damien, and he was a really cool guy. We went to a Thai restaurant after the skydiving and had a good meal before heading home. Steph was super tired so we didn’t do anything more that day.
Stephanie and I joined her parents on a day trip to Half Moon Bay. We walked along the sea cliffs for a while, and stopped by the Ritz. We had lunch at one of the best restaurants in downtown and then walked around for a bit. There was a great olive oil bar across the street that we stopped into, and I got some garlic olive oil, and an herb vinegar. They both were very tasty.
The company did an offsite in Tahoe for a few days and it was a great time. We left Wednesday afternoon and go to Tahoe just before sunset. The first thing a few of us did was to go down to the hottub. We were then split into teams for the weekend, and I was on the Silver team (grey is boring). That night we went to the casino there, the Montbleu. I did very well, with +$25 on slots, +$50 on roulette, and +$100 on Blackjack. I was by far the biggest winner that night. There was a large group playing craps, and having some fun doing that. I didn’t join them since I’m not familiar with the way craps works. We had dinner at a nice steakhouse there, and pretty much everyone got the filet mignon. The food was delicious, the wine was tasty, and the conversation was excellent.
We got back to the house a little later, and played HOTS until very late. We managed to get a 5v5, as well as a few 4v4’s, and 3v3’s. The 3v3’s were interesting and fun, since we all went middle lane.
The next day we had a big breakfast and went to the lake. I brought my dive gear, so I was the only one able to swim for any period of time. That also made it a lot easier to do the tubing, since when I fell off I wasn’t freezing cold. We had lunch in Emerald Cove, and I swam over to the island there. I hiked to the small house on top, then swam around the base of the island looking for crayfish. I found a few, but only managed to catch one. I ended up letting the one go since he wasn’t enough for a meal.
We got back and had a big cookout, some board games, and a serious discussion. For the board games I was part of the group that played Puerto Rico. I got in a tough spot and lost pretty badly. I don’t really care for Puerto Rico anymore. It was fun at first but once we figured out that whoever sits to the left of the person who produces wins, it became a waiting game.
The next day we went up the gondolas and got a great view from the top of the mountain. I got some alone time at the peak while most everyone else was zip-lining.
Darren and I had a great couple conversations on the way home, and I look forward to future such discussions.
