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Kerry's Big Adventure
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Location Date South America 
1295827200 Oceania 1289433600 North America 1285110000 Asia 1281740400 - Mexico
- Ciudad De Mexico
Favourite Quotes:
"What is the CS group like here?" "the usual: a bunch of random people who are unusually friendly"
"He´s not gay, he´s just Brazilian"
"I can´t believe my boss thinks i´m soliciting sex from a girl called roxy racing during working hours"
"No matter how much money they offer you, it´s not worth it" "Australian hip hop - it´s called skip hop" "You´re a... what´s the opposite of a misogynist? a... femogynist?" "See even English people need affection, even if they can´t express emotions" "That´s what we call it - Kerryoke" "Just because you´re part of the Commonwealth doesn´t mean we have to hang out with you" "Thank you New Zealand for teaching English to the Germans" "You´re a gay Brazilian man trapped in an Australian woman´s body" "There are only three things I won´t put in my body: heroin, a penis, or milk. I f***ing hate milk!" I returned to Melbourne and for a reason which escapes me now, but seemed good at the time, decided to get a job as a corporate events waitress for a couple of weeks. Who would have thought that the art of handing out plates could be taken so seriously, it was like working with the men in black, scowls, dark glasses, headsets and all. Luckily for me I made some friends in the industry who gave me some useful advice. Never make eye contact with a manager, always keep moving and, if possible, find a trolley to push - apparently no one ever questions you, if you are pushing a trolley.
When I wasn´t running around looking busy I was hosted by my good friends, Dave, Lauren, Corina and Andrew, you are all wonderful, thank you. I even got to cook a good old Sunday roast, Yorkshire puddings and all. Next up was my trip to New Zealand. Being as it was, the first anniversary of Rory passing it was a difficult first week in Kiwiland, separated by such a giant distance from all my family. Thank you Tom for keeping my spirits up. To happiness. And Rory. After seeing a mist behind which I was assured was a glacier I bounded down to Hamner Springs for Allie and Carl´s nuptials. My job as bridesmaid was to: work the crafts table, making all manner of favours out of card and sticky backed plastic; keep the bride calm; and hold down 3 bottles of pinot noir without vomiting. It was a beautiful day and you could not have picked a more picturesque spot for a wedding. As a bonus I was upgraded to a super deluxe, spa, hot-tub outside suite, with a bathtub that had controls which wouldn´t have been out of place on the starship enterprise. Typical when you are going stag.
Next I decided to visit the North Island and stay with Owen. Whilst he went to work, Owen courageously lent me his car (albeit after eliciting the promise that I would not drive on the motorways following a very minor changing lane incident). I don´t know who was more scared, me driving a giant manual car alone for the first time or the drivers of Auckland behind me, the city of hill starts as I invariably rolled backwards before hitting the gas and revving the engine to 5,000.
Finally after 5 flights and a good stopover, I landed back into the warm embrace of the Andes family in Los Angeles for a post thanksgiving dinner and black Friday before heading again south of da border. Mexico City - I love it, I love walking around and stumbling across an open dance class given by old men in their Sunday best. I love gawping at the beautiful architecture. I love spending afternoons alone in one of the thousands of museums or galleries. I love being immersed in a beautiful language and struggling ineptly to get to grips with it, rolling my ´r´s and my 'anas'. Did I mention I love Mexico DF? I spent my first 3 weeks wandering around the city, practising Bikram, catching up with old friends and making new ones. Fortunately for me I met Jessica, who loves her home town as much as me and kindly spent days and nights showing me culinary hotspots and cultural highlights.
For Christmas and New Year I decided to fly to Playa del Carmen to reconvene with Tam and the Andes family. First stop Cancun. I've been here twice before, always managing to make a swift exit 15 minutes later. Cancun is not the type of place that appeals to me, all man made beaches, super resorts and spring break. However this time I was couchsurfing. Sergio met me at the bus depot and swiftly spirited me away to his friend´s house for good chat and great food. Making me feel slightly inadequate Sergio is an uber talented artist, having established an artists' community centre in Aguas Caliente he is now hoping to set up an exhibition space, come permaculture farm, come mezcalina bar in Playa del Carmen. He's also a published author, lawyer and photographer. Oh and he can speak Latin. Whatever, I can recount the more pertinent plot points of Hollyoaks for the past 12 years...
Heading to Playa del Carmen I discovered Mexico's answer to Kuta, though with marginally better roads ; ) Still the sea is beautiful and the beach a great place to meet friends, drink copious amounts of Sol and hang out. You can't fight this lifestyle - you can only join it. Tam had managed to find us the cheapest room one block from the beach, then after a bit of Yorkshire negotiation I got it even cheaper. The four varieties of Mexican music played from 7am until 5am outside our window were just an added bonus. Eventually, after the lovely Lauren joined us, we had five people sharing the room - you can't call us anything if not friendly - a little tricky given we had only one key, and the front gate was permanently padlocked - lord knows what would have happened had there been a fire, it was hard enough to open the padlock sober and in daylight, still T.I.M baby.
A la Indonesia I had almost forgotten how it was to be catcalled the entire length of the Calle. Hitting on tourists appears to be a serious pastime in PDC, making the Kuta cowboys look like rank amateurs, still you can't blame the vendors, no one appears to be going into any of the shops to buy the same tat that is sold the length of 5th avenue so I suppose they have to do something to amuse themselves. Even so, when I asked a waiter what he would recommend to have, I earnestly scanned the menu for the word 'camarero', his delivery was so dead pan.
Tam arrived with her son and friend Joss 'man hands´ McLaine, 5ft 7 of Canadian swimming instructor muscle who bruised my palm after our first high five. The three of us wasted little time in getting to meet lots of other Christmas nomads, cue the fabulous Luiz, Paulo and Abraham, and other awesome transients too numerous to mention. Luiz is a brilliant, b****y Brazilian who can speak 8 languages, or 12 if count pick-up lines (really now Luiz - Esperanto? You are just showing off). Paulo, my sensai, like Nokia: connecting people, who told me I had him at hello, my 'hello' being "yes" in response to his question "Do you want tequila shots?" on arrival at his Xmas Eve house Party. Coachella is going to be legen-dary!
Xmas was celebrated traditionally, on the beach with Margaritas and Jon cooking us up a taco feast. New year was crazy. Imagine Octoberfest, the Melbourne Cup or my last Kings Cross NYE house party, but by the beach, and with a lot more alcohol and less clothing. In Brazilian style we ran into the sea to jump waves to bring in the New Year.
Most days we would plant ourselves at the same spot on the beach, close enough to the Oxxo for supplies, people watching, singing along to a guitar and for me continuing with my piss poor attempt to learn poi from the Mexican hippies.
After 10 days I was just about Playa del Carmen´d out. It didn´t help that I had accidentally fallen off an infinity pool, cracking my tibia, and without insurance (as my Mum says: it´s like betting against yourself) having just ibuprofen and a lot of tiger balm to see myself through. I decided to head to Palenque to see me some ruins.
"No matter how much money they offer you, it´s not worth it" "Australian hip hop - it´s called skip hop" "You´re a... what´s the opposite of a misogynist? a... femogynist?" "See even English people need affection, even if they can´t express emotions" "That´s what we call it - Kerryoke" "Just because you´re part of the Commonwealth doesn´t mean we have to hang out with you" "Thank you New Zealand for teaching English to the Germans" "You´re a gay Brazilian man trapped in an Australian woman´s body" "There are only three things I won´t put in my body: heroin, a penis, or milk. I f***ing hate milk!" I returned to Melbourne and for a reason which escapes me now, but seemed good at the time, decided to get a job as a corporate events waitress for a couple of weeks. Who would have thought that the art of handing out plates could be taken so seriously, it was like working with the men in black, scowls, dark glasses, headsets and all. Luckily for me I made some friends in the industry who gave me some useful advice. Never make eye contact with a manager, always keep moving and, if possible, find a trolley to push - apparently no one ever questions you, if you are pushing a trolley.
When I wasn´t running around looking busy I was hosted by my good friends, Dave, Lauren, Corina and Andrew, you are all wonderful, thank you. I even got to cook a good old Sunday roast, Yorkshire puddings and all. Next up was my trip to New Zealand. Being as it was, the first anniversary of Rory passing it was a difficult first week in Kiwiland, separated by such a giant distance from all my family. Thank you Tom for keeping my spirits up. To happiness. And Rory. After seeing a mist behind which I was assured was a glacier I bounded down to Hamner Springs for Allie and Carl´s nuptials. My job as bridesmaid was to: work the crafts table, making all manner of favours out of card and sticky backed plastic; keep the bride calm; and hold down 3 bottles of pinot noir without vomiting. It was a beautiful day and you could not have picked a more picturesque spot for a wedding. As a bonus I was upgraded to a super deluxe, spa, hot-tub outside suite, with a bathtub that had controls which wouldn´t have been out of place on the starship enterprise. Typical when you are going stag.
Next I decided to visit the North Island and stay with Owen. Whilst he went to work, Owen courageously lent me his car (albeit after eliciting the promise that I would not drive on the motorways following a very minor changing lane incident). I don´t know who was more scared, me driving a giant manual car alone for the first time or the drivers of Auckland behind me, the city of hill starts as I invariably rolled backwards before hitting the gas and revving the engine to 5,000.
Finally after 5 flights and a good stopover, I landed back into the warm embrace of the Andes family in Los Angeles for a post thanksgiving dinner and black Friday before heading again south of da border. Mexico City - I love it, I love walking around and stumbling across an open dance class given by old men in their Sunday best. I love gawping at the beautiful architecture. I love spending afternoons alone in one of the thousands of museums or galleries. I love being immersed in a beautiful language and struggling ineptly to get to grips with it, rolling my ´r´s and my 'anas'. Did I mention I love Mexico DF? I spent my first 3 weeks wandering around the city, practising Bikram, catching up with old friends and making new ones. Fortunately for me I met Jessica, who loves her home town as much as me and kindly spent days and nights showing me culinary hotspots and cultural highlights.
For Christmas and New Year I decided to fly to Playa del Carmen to reconvene with Tam and the Andes family. First stop Cancun. I've been here twice before, always managing to make a swift exit 15 minutes later. Cancun is not the type of place that appeals to me, all man made beaches, super resorts and spring break. However this time I was couchsurfing. Sergio met me at the bus depot and swiftly spirited me away to his friend´s house for good chat and great food. Making me feel slightly inadequate Sergio is an uber talented artist, having established an artists' community centre in Aguas Caliente he is now hoping to set up an exhibition space, come permaculture farm, come mezcalina bar in Playa del Carmen. He's also a published author, lawyer and photographer. Oh and he can speak Latin. Whatever, I can recount the more pertinent plot points of Hollyoaks for the past 12 years...
Heading to Playa del Carmen I discovered Mexico's answer to Kuta, though with marginally better roads ; ) Still the sea is beautiful and the beach a great place to meet friends, drink copious amounts of Sol and hang out. You can't fight this lifestyle - you can only join it. Tam had managed to find us the cheapest room one block from the beach, then after a bit of Yorkshire negotiation I got it even cheaper. The four varieties of Mexican music played from 7am until 5am outside our window were just an added bonus. Eventually, after the lovely Lauren joined us, we had five people sharing the room - you can't call us anything if not friendly - a little tricky given we had only one key, and the front gate was permanently padlocked - lord knows what would have happened had there been a fire, it was hard enough to open the padlock sober and in daylight, still T.I.M baby.
A la Indonesia I had almost forgotten how it was to be catcalled the entire length of the Calle. Hitting on tourists appears to be a serious pastime in PDC, making the Kuta cowboys look like rank amateurs, still you can't blame the vendors, no one appears to be going into any of the shops to buy the same tat that is sold the length of 5th avenue so I suppose they have to do something to amuse themselves. Even so, when I asked a waiter what he would recommend to have, I earnestly scanned the menu for the word 'camarero', his delivery was so dead pan.
Tam arrived with her son and friend Joss 'man hands´ McLaine, 5ft 7 of Canadian swimming instructor muscle who bruised my palm after our first high five. The three of us wasted little time in getting to meet lots of other Christmas nomads, cue the fabulous Luiz, Paulo and Abraham, and other awesome transients too numerous to mention. Luiz is a brilliant, b****y Brazilian who can speak 8 languages, or 12 if count pick-up lines (really now Luiz - Esperanto? You are just showing off). Paulo, my sensai, like Nokia: connecting people, who told me I had him at hello, my 'hello' being "yes" in response to his question "Do you want tequila shots?" on arrival at his Xmas Eve house Party. Coachella is going to be legen-dary!
Xmas was celebrated traditionally, on the beach with Margaritas and Jon cooking us up a taco feast. New year was crazy. Imagine Octoberfest, the Melbourne Cup or my last Kings Cross NYE house party, but by the beach, and with a lot more alcohol and less clothing. In Brazilian style we ran into the sea to jump waves to bring in the New Year.
Most days we would plant ourselves at the same spot on the beach, close enough to the Oxxo for supplies, people watching, singing along to a guitar and for me continuing with my piss poor attempt to learn poi from the Mexican hippies.
After 10 days I was just about Playa del Carmen´d out. It didn´t help that I had accidentally fallen off an infinity pool, cracking my tibia, and without insurance (as my Mum says: it´s like betting against yourself) having just ibuprofen and a lot of tiger balm to see myself through. I decided to head to Palenque to see me some ruins.
Luiz arranged for his 'friend' to pick me up at the bus station. "Is he a couchsurfer?" I asked - "nope" he responded "I found him on Gaydar." Which is how I came to find myself being picked up at 7am and taken into the jungle by the lovely Luis, after a 12 hour bus journey and xanax cocktail.
Luiz is my ray of human sunshine, the man never ceases to make me smile and I think I have finally found someone who loves karaoke and high-fiving as much as me "High 5 for Brazil, high 5 for possibly, high 5 for hope, high 5 for being different..." You could not ask for a better travel buddy - he is the party! (I am the fun, Joss is the Canadian ; )
Unfortunately it was pouring down with rain on our arrival to Palenque, so we were left with no choice but to buy all the ingredients of pina coladas (which since I've made from the age of 7 I am quite adept at) and crash at our new friends' much nicer hotel (as has become our habit) for an all day pina colada pool party to celebrate Abraham's birthday.
As an aside, I can understand how Mexico has a national obesity crisis on its hands. I've been living on tacos, cupcakes and cerveza for the last 6 weeks. Who could have thought there were so many names for, and ways to, fry tortillas and small obscure pieces of meet with cheese - by my count, ooooh 247? When I wanted something healthy for breakfast in PdC I went to McDonalds. Even Tam is, shock, no longer vegan: though to be fair it is a gastronomic impossibility. If it wasn´t for our strict aerobic routine of bouncing on stage 7 hours a day to AKON at the blue parrot, we would have piled on even more kilos by now.
Still eating's cheating and before you worry that I am developing some alcohol abuse issues please note that this is the special Christmas addition blog entry and anyways i'd rather be a popular drunk than an anonymous alcoholic
And so back to Ciudad de Mexico...
Hasta
Kerry
- comments
MUM Another great blog Kerry - see I do read them all - love and hugs MUM xxxxxx
Tam Come on Kerry you can put what you like about me in your blog, but telling people I slipped of the Vegan wagon, hmm I am feeling shame :)
Tom Dobbels :-) Cheers!
Jules Finally i remembered that you said you had written a new blog. As usual have been giggling to myself. Keep them coming, huge hugs honey xxxxxx
Tom Hi Kerry remember me Tom the piano player, we met at the Boys Club in England. Just thought I'd touch base with you & play catch up. How's your globetrotting adventure ? I recently went back to the US during most of January of this year. Oregon, Washington, Texas, New York Rode Island & Massachusetts, the reason for all this was I was on a mission looking at classic cars. Which I did buy in th east coast before going back to the UK via Dublin, Ireland. I was also refreshing my roots back home in Oregon & Washington revisit my past. So where are you in the world ? Drop me a line. I just played the Boys Club again last friday. Hope we meet again somewhere.