unfinished business: cuba

6 months and a new year later and i'm back in miami international getting ready to board a flight to the island. there's unfinished business for the amigo skate crew and for the next two weeks we're going to try and unravel what the impact of the lifting of the us cuba embargo has done to the local skate scene and in a greater scheme the people. i'm excited to sweat & break bread with my good cuban kin. 

what would become of him

the world he knew changed. he wasnt quite sure how but it was gone.

back then impulse and desperation had a strong hold of the boy and as the jubilee of his decision finally settled he felt the sting of a very obvious conclusion.
the morning after he walked inside a post office and handed a pair of 2x2 portraits along with a form. he stood and he waited as the agent lazily inspected and shuffled the forms.
"ok, everything's here." the boy's jaw relaxed and breath returned to him.
he was a few steps towards the exit when the agent hollered "expect your passport in about a month" his spirit was crushed, you could see it on his shoulder; the weight of everything he was fleeing from, all of it on him pressing down. 
the next two weeks a popcorn ceiling and a rusted mailbox syndicated themselves in the life of the boy. he somehow managed to come up with the extra cash to get things expedited but deep down he knew there'd be no guarantee. again and once again he was left at the mercy of his Creator.  

he woke up late one cold january morning 2 days before the big day. the popcorn ceiling looked the same and he was afraid the mailbox would give him a similar greeting. he was at the front door when his mother stopped him; she handed him the envelope not knowing if her son would ever return    

a wrap on the vx launch of maui

just finished checking-in the last few maui guests bound for san francisco and i'm throughly BEAT.
earlier today, 5 minutes into opening the ticket counter, our entire system came crawling to a halt.

an hour goes by and still nothing. at this point we're about to start checking-in guests the old school way, which is hand writing manual boarding passes and bag tags. luckily our IT team found a fix moments before we pulled the trigger and we quickly checked everyone in. 

our entire VX team at OGG stepped up big time and we were able to knock out the whole flight way before we even began boarding.

this whole day has been nuts. our inaugural flight from sfo to ogg landed at 1340 and you could sense the jitters; not just from our own vx team, but from the rest of the ogg vendors around. our bird landed and was greeted by two water cannons provided by the ogg fire dept.

it was a beautiful sight to see, especially with the backdrop of the mountain accompanied by blue covered skies and fluffy clouds lingering behind.

im here for another 3 days and now that the biggest hump is behind us, i think ill start exploring a bit more and start working on my tan.

mahalo!

the jet-lag and off to maui

the jet-lag never was this bad. i guess three weeks is alot of time to be hanging on the other side of this planet but it also might be the fact that im just getting old. the jet-lag would usually last two days tops but its been six days now im still having trouble sleeping.

but yesterday i hopped on a flight from los angeles to maui and maybe working from maui might help. its an exciting time for virgin america and im thrilled to help open the new station. i also heard the poke and loco moco have therapeutic/sleeping agents  known to knock grown men out.

yes please.

bangalore to los angeles via hong kong

today is tuesday

november 24th, 2015

im currently debriefing inside a starbucks a few blocks from home after a long long day of traveling from bangalore, india back to los angeles, california. 

the day began yesterday but technically yesterday is still today from the point from where i started.

ok,
moving forward...or backwards? 

bangalore time: monday nov 23th

we hopped on a cab at 9pm monday night. 2 hours later, after a bloc of akon and eastern european dance music along with close calls dissecting through the horrific evening bangalore traffic we made it to the airport. it was 11pm and the flight to hong kong was scheduled at 1:15am the next day.  

hong kong time: tuesday nov 24th

our flight landed at around 10am and the connecting leg was scheduled at 1:35pm. we walked around the airport for a bit and grabbed some some iced tea/coffee along with some pastries and waited for the flight. we found a good spot with chairs down at arrivals and relaxed a bit. the exhaustion was beginning to show in brianne's hair and eyes and in me through my speech; i tend to slur and not make cohesive thoughts when i dont get enough sleep.
we got our seats late so we had to move fast. when we reached the gate i noticed that boarding had just begun. we took a breather and i looked at my boarding pass, seat 72E, the middle seat at the last row on a boeing 777-300ER. i dreaded the flight at this point, which was estimated to take a little over 12 hours. before take-off, as i sat on my seat, i said a quick prayer to my Maker and off we were.

los angeles time: tuesday nov 24th

we landed at around 9:35am that same day, 4 hours before our flight took off. i got around 4 hours of sleep on the flight, not nearly enough. my shoulders were soar, i felt a bit groggy but we were back. i got home at 1pm and what was to be an hour nap became five. my shoulders didnt hurt as bad and the warm white chocolate mocha that sits comfortably in my right hand is taking a little of the edge off. the journey back home was long but when youre traveling with good friends while make new ones, there is nothing else id rather be doing. 

now back to the grind. i think

thekkady rub-down

i just want to preface this by saying that i havent had that many massages in the past. the way this one went down mightve been due to my lack of knowledge. you decide

i was brought into a room measuring 6"x10" and was asked by a young 18-22 year old thekkadian male to remove my shirt, pants and while i stood there wearing only my briefs, the thekkadian brought me this thin strip of cloth that kind of resembled a seatcover, which he then wrapped around my waist.

the next thing i see are my panties dropping to the floor and finding a hand reaching in-between my legs for the other loose strip of cloth, which was lazily laying on top of my crotch. 

a few reach arounds and he found it and with a tight and quick snug he brought it back up my crack and we were set.

to summarize the rest of the experience, i was dripped in this warm curry sauce from head to toe. 
was it really curry sauce? brianne says no but i guess ill never know. 
the next hour i was slapped, rubbed, gyrated, and tickled. while ass up, another young thekkadian came into the room and this is when the tag-team began. one heated hot stones and the other rubbed and placed them on my joints. this part i actually did enjoy. 

i was helped from the massage bed to this wooden box that had hot coals inside. i sat on this chair and then they closed the wooden box around me with my head the only thing peaking out. i roasted for about 10-15 minutes and while my body dripped and sweated the curry sauce, one of the young thekkadians began to show off his bruce lee stances and then proceeded to moon walk and show me some of his best michael jackson moves. i wanted to clap but i was in a box 

when they opened the box i was bit dizzy so they helped me up. at this point i thought the massage was over but no, it wasnt. 
it only kept getting better. the pair of thekkadians meticulously began to dry me off, limb by limb. the next few minutes were filled with awkward small talk. many thoughts began to race through my head: i thought the about current language barrier i had with these thekkadians along with the cultural differences and all of the life choices ive made that led me to this moment in time standing practically naked completely drenched in sweat and curry. 

when the drying was done, both walked out of the room and closed the door. the next few moments as i put my clothes back on i took everything that had just happened and i laughed.

brianne came out of her room maybe 10 minutes later looking all greasy. we parted ways with the staff shortly after and walked outside. our driver sumesh was there waiting for us

on the car ride back to the hotel i told brianne my experience and she laughed. 

last days in kerala, india

originally i began writing this post a few days ago back when i was still in kerala but ive been in bangalore for three days now and alot has happened since.

but back in kerela, before hopping on our houseboat in kochi, our days began with 4-hour road trips across southern kerala. we drove from munnar to thekkady in the morning and if it weren't enough, munnar sent us off with even more breathtaking views of its tea covered hills and countryside. the fluffy clouds hovering right above munnar's peaks placed a huge accent everything. it was sad to leave

but off we were and finally arrived in thekkady. we stayed at the spice grove hotel where the lobby staff greeted us with some fresh lemonade and then proceeded to place something like clay on our foreheads. the hotel staff upgraded us to a family room, which we didnt need but didnt mind at all. an hour later and we were on the road again headed to the thekaddy tiger reserve where hopped on a river boat hoping to spot a tiger, preferably chowing down on some nice tender deer or monkey or human, or whatever; the entrance to the park was riddled with monkeys so yeah, why not monkeys. 

after some drama trying to get our tickets, we finally got on the boat and went around the refuge. a little under 2 hours later and my report includes a flock of weird looking deer, a pair of horny miniature komodo dragon looking lizards, some colorful birds but sadly no tigers. 

we grabbed early dinner then walked around the uneven streets of thekkady. it was a busy night, the shops were mostly full of locals going about their normal business. we walked for about an hour, got lectured on the difference between pashmina and cashmere and then we heard thunder; the rain began shortly after. luckily we were close to our our next stop, the rangerwood hotel where we had scheduled massages earlier in the day. 

the experience? memorable

i began to write the experience on this entry but it got a bit long so i made it into its own. 

the next day we drove to kochi and caught an overnight houseboat that i still cant believe was just for us. we spent the night cruising down the narrow alappuzha straits and backwaters of southern kochi. we saw young children diving into the murky waters, ladies washing and beating their clothes on the stone walls and the countless other houseboats that trailed behind. we passed the time lounging and re-telling stories of earlier travels. the experience was heightened by the sheer beauty of the landscape around us; it was simply surreal. the morning after we took to the sights and explored fort kochi and saw the medieval looking chinese nets that hung next to the river, the jewish quarter and synagogue, walked around hill palace, got close to deer and a huge t-rex, then headed back to the hotel.

we said our goodbyes to our cab driver, sumesh, who had been with us for the past 5 days. we flew the next morning to the big city of bangalore and just like that kerala slowly became just another beautiful memory.