The Show Kicked Ass

thursday nights at the orpheum have never been better

shaun and i left from my house around 645 while listening to a robert plant compilation mr. alford had just so happened to create for this distinct purpose; as he floored the gas pedal down highway 91

parked on seymour street just behind the venue and walked right on in

first things first, had to buy my concert t-shirt
when i have teenage kids years down the road, they'll thank me for keeping all of the "vintage" rock concert t-shirts i have

then we entered the forum and the opening act was already performing
it was THE TREWS
straight from nova scotia, and to tell you the truth, i kinda liked it
they were alot like the black crowes, but more of a rock edge to them, quite well done

then the people really started to flow into the building and before you knew it you could feel the heat of the sellout crowd, and the marijuana smoke in the air as moroccan music played on the speakers while the roadies arranged the set

all different kinds of people were there to see the golden god
and considering most of them paid at least 100 bucks to see him, a majority had to be devoted fans.

there were the old-timers who rocked to led zeppelin in their heydays, there were people like shaun and i, who were born after the group broke up, and then there were the odd hoochies brought in buy their wealthy boyfriends to appear to be the trendy cutting-edge people who know where it's at, and of course the hippies. at least one guy in a tye-died t-shirt with a peace sign and a couple of cougars "with flowers in their hair" who passed out letters to people in the third row that when all held up in unison read "mighty rearranger" (the title of plant's latest album)

and then at 8:45 pm, pacific standard time, september 22, 2005, my life changed.

the band walked on stage and the auditorium erupted in praise. the five members who make The Strange Sensation all grabbed hand held drums and tapped in unison, the crowd joined in, the tension was rising as all waited for the grand entrance

the incense burning on stage and the soft lighting made it look somewhat like a dream, then in the background behind one of the drummers you could see hands clapping and slowly approaching, the band parted and in walked the 57 year old genius, clapping was no longer in unison, but before i knew what i was doing i was going crazy like my best friend beside me.

started off with a darker (if possible) rendition of "no quarter" and the night took off from there

mixed with new songs from his band, and a couple of covers (of bob dylan and jimi hendrix) i was surprised by how many led zeppelin songs he actually sang. only expecting a couple he belted out no quarter, four sticks, going to california, gallows pole, black dog, and he saved his best for last

when they came back onstage for the encore, one guitarist grabbed a small stringed instrument that looked and sounded middle-eastern, the other guitarist joined in with the electric guitar and the golden god himself broke out into whole lotta love.

10:15 and mr plant thanked us for coming with his parting words "thank you vancouver, goodnight. see you again when........ we have something more to say."

that's one more checkmark on the list of things to do in my life

on our way back to the car, another concert goer walked up to shaun and myself and said "considering i paid $100 for the tickets the show sucked, it wasn't even two hours!"

that made me mad, i considered kicking his ass right then and there, shaun piped up "IT'S ROBERT FUCKING PLANT MAN!!!!!!" and off the jackass went

oh well, every party has it's pooper

as for me, i will forever remember that night, as well as the fact that shaun pointed out that we too have graced the stage that robert plant performed on, the Johnston Heights Secondary graduating class of '98 held their ceremonies in the orpheum!

ROBERT PLANT @ THE ORPHEUM

Tomorrow night, Shaun Alford and Amn Johal will stand in the midst of those in row 22; and kneel before the Golden God.

the horseback ride

FROM HELL

let's begin

after getting up early (around 7am) we hitched a ride in a taxi to where the bus for our expedition was to pick us up

the place was called "asta de la banderas"
what it looked like to me was a big flagpole with no flag

needless, the bus arrived to take us to "rancho palmas real" and the horseback guides introduced themselves and kept referring to me as "senyore Yohal" (because they pronounce "j"s as "y"s)

for the rest of this entry i will type out the conversations based on how they sounded to me

anyways the lead guide was a dude named Antonio (one of the many i would encounter) and he was quite humourous during the hour long drive to the ranch. we had breakfast when we arrived and then went to see the horses and see what we would be doing that day

allow me to digress. when we signed up for this horseback riding and upon looking at the brochure for it, i was thinking of a nice peaceful little walk in the jungle to a secluded waterfall, followed by riding through clear little streams and checking out the wildlife.

NUH-UH!

there had been thundershowers the night before (which were cool cause they lasted for hours and we didn't mind) and antonio stated that "da wiver senyores and senyoras diss mohning would be too diwicult to cwoss. dherpore to get to da checkpoint vere we gid off da horses and 'ike (excuse me? "hike"?) to da wadafall, we going to have to go over da mountain senyores" and he points to a massive mound of earth behind him

"but don't wowwy senyores, the horses... dey know what dey are doooooing, just keep yo balance senyores and senyoras."

this is where it all began

before i knew it i was on top of a big horse named "bandido" who you could easily tell was not pleased by my size, he preferred to walk slow, which was fine by me since i hadn't been on the back of a horse since i was six and that was just walking in circles inside a barn during a field trip

antonio however was not pleased by bandido's slow pace and kept yelling "OLA BANDIDO ANDALAY!" which made my 4 legged beast of hellfire take off on a fast trot, making me bounce up and down right on the saddle feeling like i was getting kicked in the ass.

bastard

then when we reached the top of the mountain i it was nearing 1130am and the sun was starting to burn and i was sweating profusely

then of course, antonio rode up and stopped beside me

"what's the madder senyore? arrr yoooo nerbous?"

perplexed, i reply "nope"

"then whyyyy are yoooooooo sweeeeeeeeeting?"

by then i had quite about had it "because it's FUCKING HOT!"

heather tried to quell it by saying "we're from canada, we're not used to this humidity"

"oh" said antonio "hahahahahaha OLA BANDIDO ANDALAY!"

and off went my horse through the path, running under trees so the branches would hit me in the face

the other side of the mountain was a whole different story, zig-zagging paths that led about 200 meters down a steep embankment, this wasn't the time to do this

suffering with a sore ass, the humidity and bruised face, i now had my fear of heights to add to this mayhem. bandido appeared to be afraid of heights as well.

this is where a good samaritan (and ranch hand) sebastien came to the rescue. this dude had to be in his late fifties and was riding what looked to be a mule more than a horse, with about 100 pounds of ice and pop and water bottles evenly distributed. apparently he knew that bandido was afraid of heights too (can't blame him, it was a freaky sight) so he grabbed a rope from his bag and tied it to bandido's reigns and started down the hill on his donkey with me and bandido following suit. what amazed me was that this old donkey riding mexican was doing this while singing to himself and not even holding his own mule's reigns. serious pro!

finally we reached the checkpoint and i graciously thanked him.

next was the hike
ever heard of the grouse grind? well this was like a quater of the length, except it was now crazy humid and there was a suspension bridge to cross as well. a rickety suspension bridge, with some planks missing, and chicken wire on the sides of it so i couldn't really hold onto anything. i felt like donkey did in shrek.

we managed to make it to the waterfall and i truly amazed myself because there was no way i thought i would be able to accomplish such a feat.

the waterfall was about 20meters high and the water was muddy

dissappointing
*sigh*

then we had to hike all the way back (by now i couldn't feel my knees)
approaching bandido, i could swear i saw the horse roll his eyes.

then antonio piped up again "senyores and senyoras the wiva' has dieeeeeeeed down 'gain, we will go along da wiva. pwease fowwow da woutes we tell yooooooooo. ip yo horse stops in da wata, please gib him a hard kick, othawise he will dwown and you will die, hahahahaha, OLA BANDIDO ANDALAY!"

what we had to cross was the same muddy river about 10 times, at one point it was a raging torrent where the river came up to my waist and all you could see of the horse was his head just barely above the water

first my fear of heights, now this, i saw my life begin to flash before my eyes. i was at the age of 15 when we finally reached the other shore.

then another 45 minutes of trotting through the farmlands when antonio approached me with a stick. handing it to me he said "senyore Yohal, here is a steeeeek, when yoooo want bandido to wun, you hit him wit it"

RUN? are you kidding me?

then antonio slapped bandido's ass, and off went my horse. by now i really didn't care because i couldn't feel my own ass anymore.

finally we reached the ranch again and there was lunch waiting for us

the waitress took a look at me and brought me two big bottles of beer rather than pouring it in little cups for me. that's good service.

heather was sore as well, and quite amusing, since she had decided to wear white pants that day and now they were all muddy in the most embarrassing places, i still laugh when i think about it.

we finally got back on the bus and received photographs of us on our horses just before the experience had begun. you could already tell that bandido and i were not pleased

thankfully, we arrived back at the hotel in the evening. and after a long hot shower i just passed out. boy was i sore the next morning.

looking back on it now, i'm glad i went through with the horseback riding. would i do it again? probably not.

"OLA BANDIDO ANDALAY!"

sincerely,
Senyore Yohal

during siesta

between 1 and 3pm it would get too hot outside in puerto vallarta so we would retreat to the room and watch an american cable channel that would shows reruns of "3rd watch" and "er" or play decent movies that i had just happened to miss while they were in theatres

one movie was "the war" starring elijah wood and kevin costner
in one specific scene, kevin costner's character is having a flashback of the vietnam war and watching a vietcong soldier kill his best friend

witty as i am i turned to heather,

and i asked, "did xuan-thy kill him?"

and she replied "yeah....... wait a minute. did you say xuan-thy?"

i still can't stop laughing

ARRIBA!

went to mexico with my girlfriend for a week in august (13th to the 20th to be exact). stayed at a resort named "canto del sol" in the HOT AND HUMID city of puerto vallarta.

everyone was so friendly, but it was so hot. i actually ended up getting sunburn. ME! a brown dude getting sunburn. quite embarrassing. i guess it was the endless hours in the swimming pool drinking pina coladas and vampiros.

yeah, i tried not to focus solely on beer and go straight for the hard drinks, may as well make the most of the all-inclusiveness.

many things to do in the crazy city, lots of tours and shopping and drinking and happiness

but so hot and humid, in the 40s with humidity

but for my list of things to do, i checked off most of the items

-i purchased myself an oversized sombrero by the flea market salesperson who kept calling me "brother" and saying all the goods in the store were "almost free"
-i went horseback riding (from hell) in the sierra madres
-i ate things i've never heard of
-took shots of tequila
-lounged in a pool until my skin became all wrinkly and i looked retired

however, one thing on the list that i assumed would be done quite easily, was not checked off. and that was to befriend someone named "julio"

in my whole week in mexico, i did not meet one person named "julio"
there was a carlos (who was the signature vacations dude that helped us arrange our touring expeditions), a cesar (which doesn't really cut it, cause i have a friend named caesar at home [and my friend spells his name properly]), a few antonios (one of whom led the horseback ride from hell), a sebastien (who aided me during the hellride) a rafael who was our regular waiter at the hotel restaurant, a cervando (who was the city tour guide and wouldn't shut up about the famous 1963 film "NIGHT OF THE IGUANA" starring richard burton which put puerto vallarta on the map), and even a felipe (he served me fish during my last dinner there)

but no julio, not even one.
*sigh*

there were even people hired there to entertain at the pool
they were known as activities personell, must be a great job to have
they were also part of the evening dance shows the hotel would present

the costumes were..... interesting to say the least

i remember heather turning to me and saying "do you see their outfits and tights?"
and i replied "do you see their gay?"

needless to say, the hotel was great
and i was drunk

yes i know

it's sept. 14th? where have i been for more than a month?

simple, i'm busy

so there

lots to write about though, so whether i write one looooooooong blog or do a series of little ones is still up in the air as i type this

but boy has it been a crazy time, went to mexico, went to edmonton, healed my gimp toe, drank lots, and feel as good as ever!