I guess I should start at the beginning where all stories start. Many things occurred that, for lack of a better word, were extremely strange while in Aruba. We checked into one of the world's most beautiful hotels and were immediately offered cold towels for our hands and champagne, now this, I could get used to, we all know how much I LOVE champagne. We were told that our room would be on the third floor, but if we wanted to wait we could have a room on a higher floor, of course we would have to wait at least four hours for the room. This was something that we weren't so excited about since we were ready to hit the beach. We checked the room out, it was fine and had a partial ocean view and the room itself was beautiful. We decided, why wait? Lets get to the beach and start this vacation. However, when we started getting ready for the beach my gift for observance really became more of a curse. After we called down for more towels, foam pillows, and a fridge I started the observations. I noticed that one of the lights in the room was out, so another call down to the front desk was made for a new bulb. While we waited for our necessary things to arrive we started getting beach ready...until I noticed what seemed to be either ketchup or sangre...that's blood in Spanish ladies and gentlemen. (I learned a lot of Spanish in Aruba despite the fact that Spanish is not the native language on the island.) Now when I say maybe ketchup I really mean, it was blood not ketchup. Feeling a bit woozy from my discovery I went over to the balcony to get some fresh air...and noticed that the door handle was SEVER LY broken! Needless to say by the time the fridge arrived the front desk had told us we were going to get a new room. The front desk now hates us.
Beach Time Weird Moment: A dog with a collar and no tags comes to hang out with us. Not only does it just saunter up, check us out and look for food, instead he decides to lay down and chill for a long time. Weird for most people, not too much for me...dogs always seem to gravitate towards me, which is okay because I gravitate towards dogs as well.
Dinner Time Weird Moment: We go to Pelican Pier (my favorite restaurant) and we are seated 3 feet from the
ocean...not the sand...the ocean...no railings. As I mentioned before, a kid decided to fish off the pier about two feet from where I was eating causing my blood pressure to rise as I feared that the hook would eventually get stuck somewhere in my head or worse...in my food. I didn't get hooked, but 3 fish did, that kid was a good fisherman.
Day 2 at the Beach Weird Moment: We see a raft full of people
rowing towards the shore. This is not a para sailing boat or a banana boat, this is a straight up life raft, WHAT is going on here? For the first time ever I go out in the ocean really far. I am fascinated by sharks, unfortunately I also harbor an irrational fear that I will meet my demise by the mouth of a shark. I went out really far...on a float...the next best way besides a surfboard to make a shark think you are its prey. I floated towards a woman, was told to "WATCH OUT!" The woman freaked out and let me know she thought I was a shark...I thought she was a shark...how ironic.
Dinner Day 2 Weird Moment: This is where it all comes to a head. This is where the blackout comes into play. We go to one of the "best restaurants" in Aruba without reservations, Madame Jeannette. The hotel tells us not to worry that we will get a table, the locals laugh in our face...this might not turn out well. As it turns out the gods of luck were tired of laughing at us and we were shown to a table immediately. The table sucked. We moved outside. It started raining. We moved inside. The gods of luck did this, those laughing bastards! The food comes and this is when I have the largest piece of Grouper that I think ever existed, for those of you that read "The Aruba Grouper Mafia" this shouldn't surprise you as much as it did me. Just when I take my last bite, the lights flicker, then come back one, then flicker, then come back on, then go out. Our waiter tells us that sometimes this happens, but the lights always come back on. The lights don't come back on. Wait, there's a light, it's bright, where is it coming from? Oh that guy at the table next to us has a flashlight, no wait it's a head lamp...no, wait, it's a hat, a hat with a flashlight attached. I mean really, my dad is Mr. Prepared and my friend Jen I commonly refer to as Mary Poppins, but this guy totally outdid both of them.
Now, knowing that my dad is Mr. Prepared it will come as no shock that before we left for our trip my dad said, "Hey, why don't you take a flashlight?" We asked why and he responded by saying, "I mean, what if there was a blackout in the hotel, this could come in handy." I now think my dad was in cahoots with the Grouper Mafia. So, eventually we find out that the power is out on the entire island due to the fact that lightening hit the main transformer on the island. This is an island that is far away from everything, well everything except Venezuela and I am not a fan of Hugo Chavez so I'm thinking he isn't coming to the prince charming rescue, the power is clearly going to be out for a while. In the meantime the skies have now opened up and there is what the people at the table next to us (with flashlight hat) describe as a Tsunami. Apparently these people aren't vocab people...no we soon find out they are Florida people, Florida people who love BJs Wholesale. Florida people who apparently must have their passover dinner in the dark as the blackout has caused them to start reciting the four questions in Hebrew. It's a monsoon lady, a monsoon!
At this point I am laughing so hard that I have to use to restroom, in part to control my laughter, in another part to check out what the situation is with getting out of here. Oh, I forgot to mention something interesting about Madame Jeannette, they sort of operate like a cruise ship with two seatings, one at 6pm and another at 9pm. Just as the power goes out the 6pm diners are just finishing up and all of the 9pm diners have shown up for dinner, so now there are a zillion people in a restaurant with no power (which hasn't stopped the waiters from serving mind you, it was impressive to say the least) who are going to need to find a way out. What else do I find out on the way to the bathroom? Two feet of water has now pooled in the parking lot and no one can get out of the restaurant. I have flip flops on and a dress, I am ready to wade it. We sit there for a while longer until finally the manager comes over and tells us he has a car waiting for us. We walk to the door and he has rigged the exit so that it is "walkable" and we don't have to wade our way out, however, we do have to climb onto a table, hop to another 3 tables, jump down onto a bench, jump down onto a large stone and then get into what appears to be a waiter's car. (When I say appears to be, I mean I am 99.9 percent sure, he has a name tag on and wears the same uniform as the rest of the waiters, also he has a CD blasting music so clearly he is not your typical cab driver.)
We get back to the hotel and there is...drum roll please...no power! Except characteristically the casino is lit up like Christmas. The security guards in the hotel hand out glow sticks when we enter and let us know that the elevators work, there are lights in the hallway, but there are no lights in the rooms and the toilets don't flush. Oh great, I am so glad that I decided to drink two soda waters at the restaurant, this is not going to end well, I can already tell! After gambling for two seconds and then realizing that the AC is not working and a casino is no fun without ventilation and sitting in the lobby listening to high school kids fight about one thing or another, possibly how one guy killed another guys chances with a girl, but in reality it was probably due to the fact that he was with his parents that killed his chances, we decided to just go up to the room and go to sleep.
The wait wasn't long, three hours without power. At around 12:30am the lights in our room came back on and I was nominated to shut the lights out even though I had just fallen asleep. All in all, it was an adventure and believe it or not, it probably made the night even better!
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