Due to the extreme circumstances that are my job, coming home from work at 11 and 3 a.m. have kind of left me very little time to write this blog that I usually look forward to writing, especially after traveling to new places. So here we are at Saturday morning with plenty of time to give my final thoughts on a bomb trip. (more…)

I always like meeting new people, and learning about what they do. Even better, I like telling people what I do and how much I love my job. Since being down here in Texas, I’ve not only realized that this conference is about learning and networking, but the more important thing being, how to network. (more…)

So even though we arrived yesterday, it wasn’t until late in the evening. So this was the first full day that we have been able to take Austin by storm. And we, and I mean me and Andrew/business partner. So during the day, we just got registered for the conference and whatnot. Took a stroll around downtown Austin, which is quite interesting. (more…)

The past week has been crazy busy with work at the day job, work at the side job, and work on my personal site. I finished up a design for my design blog, and started coding the hell out of it basically all weekend so that I could push it out before I left for Texas. Mission: accomplished! (more…)

Oh how good does it feel to be back on native soil. Lots of things are taken for granted when taken out of your normal flow of life. And those things become even more noticable when you’re in a 3rd world country. I was going to continue the “Too Much of Something Good is Just Enough” series with this being the Jamaica edition, but then I realized the things that we were able to do didn’t add up to the amount of money that we paid for them. You’ll see why, so lets do this….

So we were set to arrive in Jamaica on Thursday, May 25th, but we realized plans had changed very very quickly. I met Carter up in the airport in Chicago then we flew to Miami, and he had mentioned that they hadn’t sent his passport to him in time, and his birth certificate was with it. Then airport people refused to give him a ticket to cross the border because he didn’t have proper papers. Ok, no problem, we’ll just change our flight until the next day and see what we can do over night. What if nothing happened and he got no papes? That made me think that I need my bags to come off the plane. So I tell the lady that I need my bags off the plane before it leaves, and she procedes to say that I could just pick them up the next day. But I told her there’s a chance that I might not be getting on that flight the next day, so she tells this guy to go get my bags. The guy comes back a few minutes later and says that my bags will be at baggage claim so that’s where I headed.

I arrive at baggage claim, no bags. I ask the person there, she tells me to go to a different. I go there, no bags. I ask the person at that desk, they tell me to go file a claim. I go to the front desk, they know nothing of where my bags are, and didn’t seem to care either. At this point I’m fucking pissed, because I’m getting sent all around this damn airport by a bunch of people that don’t know shit. After about an hour of running around and getting more pissed by the minute, I gave up.

So basically we were stuck in Miami, which, wasn’t too bad because well it’s Miami. So since Carter works for the Ritz Carlton, he booked us a room at one of them in Miami. Let me just say that this was the sickest hotel I’ve ever been in. A nice modern look, most comfortable beds, marble floor and countertops in the bathroom, etc. Plus we only paid $50 for the night, when rates there started at like $400. So Miami it was for the first night, where we just chilled, walked around the streets, which was nuts because it was some hip hop convention down there, so there were tons of people in the streets, it was quite the scene. The next day I called the airport to try another go at finding my bags, and come to find out, they were in Montego Bay. So basically that jerk-off lied to me and sent me off. Was not happy about that.

So anyways, it’s Friday, and we were supposed to be in Montego Bay, but we’re still in Miami. We also switched hotels to a JW Marriott in downtown Miami. If you ever see a Marriott with a ‘JW’ in front of it, be ready to shell out some coin because it’s the highest end Marriott. Carter got a discount on those too, so again, we were paying $100 a night for a hotel that starts at $300 a night. The room was sick too. 46″ flat panel tv on the wall, huge plush bed, robes, marble tops/floor, and a computer with internet. I wonder how I could get so lucky to be able to say in these kind of places.

Bare with me, I will get to the actual Jamaica trip shortly. So by Friday, Carter’s papes hadn’t come yet, and basically we’re starting to chalk this trip up as a loss, and we were seriously planning on staying in Miami for a few days to party, then just going home. I wasn’t going to bounce to Jamaica with everyone else and just leave Carter like that. So I figured we’d just make the most of what we had……….and that’s when Justin called and said he was in Miami because he flight got cancelled, and he started asking if we Carter got his shit together to leave the country. We told him the whole deal, and that was more than enough for him to do what he does best, and that’s close deals.

He calls the Department of Health in Texas (where Carter was born) and told them that he needed a birth certificate by 9 a.m. the next morning. I won’t spill the beans on his tactics, but lets just say, he did what he does, and closed the damn deal. At damn near 9 a.m. on the dot Saturday morning, a state issued birth certificate arrived at our hotel room door. Justin is the man and handled major business. And now, it was Jamaica time!

We arrived in Montego Bay Saturday evening, and then took a cab to the Rui Resort. And this place was gorgeous. It was then time to start the homies trip of 2006!! Justin and his boys had gotten there earlier in the day, so we met them at the bar of the resort and the games began. We pregamed there for awhile, then we went to this club called the Jungle. This was probably the best night because the club was really fun, and they played great music. The thing about the clubs there, is that they don’t close until people leave. So it could be 4 a.m. and people would still be partying, it was so fun.

The next day, we went out on this boat tour on the ocean for Justin’s parents 25th wedding anniversary. They were on the trip also. The boat was sweet, there was tons of food a booze to have all day long. The water was easily the bluest water I’ve ever seen. We stopped at this place, suprising called Rick’s Cafe where we went cliff diving. It was such a crazy experience. Most people jumped in feet first, but I decided to test the size of my balls and dive head first. It was nuts, I had never done anything like that, but I figured, if I broke my neck or worse, at least I was having fun doing it right? I didn’t get a picture of it, but wow it was crazy. We also got to see an amazing sunset that can’t be put into words and barely in a picture, you had to be there.

After the boat tour, we all went back to catch a quick nap before going out. The destination that night was this place called Alfred’s, which is this local bar that had live reggae there. It was really good, the music was sweet, but the highlight of the night, and easily one of the highlights of the trip, was this dance off that these locals had. Now I consider myself a good dancer, but that got put to instant shame when we saw these guys going at it. It was seriously the coolest thing I’ve seen at a bar. We’re talking guys doing flips off a walls, grabbing hats off of random people and doing all these crazy moves like kicking the hat off the ground to have it land on their head and not miss a beat. I really wish I would have gotten it on video tape or something. It was nuts.

Outside of each of the bars after closing, you would have these locals outside cooking/selling pan chicken with jerk sauce. Oh my god it was amazing. These guy would seriously make a killing if they were to be in the U.S. selling this food after the bar. So we ate that like every night.

The bar scene didn’t change much throughout the week, most of the places were the same, just different locations. During the days, at least the first four nights in Negril, we would just sip cocktails on the beach all day, swim in the pool, and play some beach or pool volleyball. And at the Riu, it was all inclusive, so we didn’t have to pay for any drinks or food all day long. That proved to save alot of money. I also went jet-skiiing for the first time, which was all kinds of fun. I was going as fast as I could just whipping that thing around. I definitely want to do that again, and soon if possible.

The locals there were either really cool, or really fucking annoying. You start to notice the fine line between these guy hustling to make a dollar, and just plane harrasement. You would have guys at the bars offering you a “free” bracelet, so they would put it on your wrist, then ask you to buy them a beer or something. That got really old real fast, but again, it’s a very poor country, so you have to expect someone to be hustling somewhere.

We ate good the whole time, and I was very impressed with the food. I wanted to make sure that when I went there I didn’t eat the same food that I could get here. And that I did. I became obsessed with jerk chicken. Obviously I’ve had it here before, but it doesn’t compare to what I had down in Jamaica……….it was priceless. It was the first time I went to a country that drove on the other side of the road too. That was extra weird to see, and the drivers down there are crazy. They drive like they just don’t give a shit.

One thing I learned was that it’s very smart to go around with a local if you can. We had some cabbies hang out with us and two of the nights in Negril, Justin’s cousins with out with us, so they knew how to get around and what was safe and such. Because people will easily try to take advantage of tourists, which I can imagine would happen in any foreign country. We (Americans) seem to think that we can be untouchable sometimes, so it is easy to become naive to the ways that other cultures do things. I didn’t consider myself as apart of the majority there, so I went there knowing that I could exactly do what I want, because my health is a little more important than a cocky American attitude.

So anyways, we only stay in Negril for the first 4 nights, then we went back to Montego Bay to stay at their Ritz Carlton, which was damn amazing. The rates there started at $760 a night, but we got Carter’s hot discount, and only paid $50 a night per room. How tight is that?! We had an amazing view from our balcony too. Since things weren’t exaclty all inclusive here, we didn’t really drink much during the day. We just pregamed before we went out at night. Both of those nights, we went to the Margaritaville, which was alot of fun. They had this dance off there one of the nights, but they would have gotten destroyed by the guys we saw in Negril.

I consider myself very lucky to have been able to do the things we did, and stay in the places we did for very little money, hence the title of the blog. All in all, the vacation was great. It was very fun and relaxing, and just what the doctor ordered before getting settled in this new life that I seem to have now. I didn’t take as many pictures as I wanted, but I still got some good ones. We’re starting to rally up quite a team for the annual homies trip. Aside from the delay in actually getting there, we had a bomb ass time, and it was a successful trip.
We all agreed that the destination for the 2007 homies trip will be in the NYC. So I am already looking forward to that. We’re going to have quite the homies team in a few years.

I start the new job tomorrow, and I’ve geeked, so I will give you an update on that in a few days, so until then…..

peace