38E

That's right. 38E. All you AAers know what that means. I was stuck in Chicken/Yankee/Coach for nine and a half hours on a 777 sandwiched between four people, two to each side. Seventh to last row. And some people pay for this.
Things being what they were, I was plenty grateful to even board the flight. DFW-FRA is not supposed to be a high traffic route. The three cabin configuration should ensure AAdvantage people get their upgrade and non revs and Paris Hilton get first class. So what happened? Oktoberfest, Sunday, high load factors, who knows the fact is Lupita and I were the last two people to board and the only nonrevs. Thank you D1.
I was dead on my feet so slept through most of the flight anyway (thank god for that) but my bottom was sore halfway through, somewhere around New York. Those Coach seats are hard.
Aaaanyway, we got to Frankfurt as planned, crossed the street to the station, and started looking for our train. We had hours yet. Gleis: anden, or platform. Gleis 8. No Gleis 8 in sight. Gleis 3,4 5,6,7. No gleis 8. Frankfurters are not a very helpful lot. At least not the ones that are supposed to help us. Deutsche Bahn Lady sent us back to the platforms three times. Finally, a Lufthansa girl told us we were leaving from Frankfurt's Main Train Station, not the Airport Station. Take a subway, any line from here going north will get you there. A business man at the subway stop helped us buy our ticket.

So Frankfurt Main Station. Habhenhohf or something. Trains arriving and departing every two minutes. Long Haul and Regional. Twelve platforms. People travelling on business, visiting family or friends, backpacking through Europe...an astonishing level of economic activity. Where are all these businessmen going? What are they doing? Is everybody visiting their grandmother or maiden aunt today? We are in the European Union. NAFTA/TLCAN is peanuts compared to this. No borders, just treatys. Trade agreements instead of visas. Long live commerce.

Our train was certainly impressive, an ICE. We booked it over a month ago and we already had our wagon and seats assigned. Get this, a little electronic screen above the seats shows our route. Frankfurt-Weimar. So does everybody elses, so the ticket person knows if we were supposed to get off two stations ago. Or if the seat is supposed to be empty. It's not the Orient Express but it certainly beats two hours of security lines at the airport. No wonder everyone's taking the train (BTW, Frankfurt airport, awful. Looks like Monterrey's Central de Autobuses. The train station, on the other hand, 19th century building with glass dome.)

We finally get to Weimar in the afternoon, after 24+ hours of travel. The hostel looks nice enough on the outside, but it's just an old house converted to make some business. My pillow smells of unwashed bodies. Our room is half empty though, so that's a blessing, and some of our hosts are cool. We will visit Buchenwald, a concentration camp, tomorrow. Not exactly my choice but not bad either. Beauty rest is top priority for the moment.


More to come...Weimar and next stop, Athens

Party like it's 1999

El blog de Aldrete es una joyita. Neta, el tipo es un ácido, es una risa. Acaba de dar su muy particular, muy bienvenido punto de vista acerca de 1999 y lo que significó para un movie buff que es él. The year the Hollywood studios lived dangerously. And it paid off. Chéquenlo.

Movies and Issues

If it walks like a duck, and talks like a duck....

Nos enojamos mucho por los comentarios de Tony Garza. Nos damos golpes de pecho y reclamamos nuestra soberanía. Me parece que cada vez que este hombre habla, sucede algo parecido. Me pregunto si será así con el Embajador de México en Estados Unidos?

Conozco poco de Antonio Garza. Es tejano. Es republicano. Es amigo del arbusto. Strike one, strike two, strike three. Out! Por si fuera poco, se casó con María Asunción Arumburzabala, accionista del Grupo Modelo y del Grupo Televisa. Tiene aspiraciones políticas, se rumora que se lanzará de candidato a gobernador de Texas uno de estos días.

Advirtió a sus compatriotas acerca de la brutal (ojo que esto es lo que ofendió más) violencia e inseguridad en ciertas áreas de México. Señaló que policías mexicanos, así como otros funcionarios gubernamentales, han sido asesinados en Guerrero, Nuevo León, Distrito Federal, Tamaulipas y otros Estados.

"El reciente aumento de estos crímenes horrendos es motivo de alarma por muchas razones, entre ellas, que afectan seriamente los viajes y el turismo, el ambiente de negocios y la inversión."

En su calidad de Embajador pidió a los ciudadanos estadounidenses tomar precauciones, viajar de día, usar autopistas de cuota y mantenerse en sitios turísticos bien conocidos.

Y que se le echan encima. Cartas al periódico, políticos, etc.

"En Estados Unidos hay mucha más violencia que en México,"
-diputado Javier González Garza, coordinador del PRD en San Lázaro.

El procurador Daniel Cabeza de Vaca dice que las declaraciones son un punto de vista a título de representación diplomática, y no de todas las instituciones gubernamentales de la Unión Americana.
"Nosotros en la Procuraduría tenemos una excelente relación con nuestros pares en los Estados Unidos, con el Departamento de Justicia, ellos han reconocido el esfuerzo que nosotros hemos hecho y los resultados hablan por sí solos,"

Los hechos hablan por sí solos. Okaaay ¿Cuáles hechos?

Hay comentarios un poco más lucidos, como el del gobernador perredista de Michoacán, Lázaro Cárdenas Batel, "Aquí hay una corresponsabilidad de ambos países y esto debe concebirse como un problema que nos afecta a los dos. Allá está el mercado (de drogas) más grande del mundo"

Estoy de acuerdo que la DEA y todos los acrónimos gringos se la pasan cazando al narco en vez de buscar dismiunir la demanda y el mercado. Por mi que legalizen las drogas. Pero ese no es el punto. No nos salgamos por la tangente.

Nos cala que se metan con nosotros. Todavía hay vestigios de la doctrina Estrada. Sin embargo, el señor no dijo nada que no fuera cierto. Vamos a poner un ejemplo. Tú estas planeando tus vacaciones a cierto país. Te enteras que ciertos maestros de cierta región turística muy famosa están corriendo a los extranjeros. Que hay violencia y que desconocen a su gobernador. En otro estado cercano, aparecen cabezas cercenadas en la playa. En el centro, un wey se destapó como Presidente legítimo del país, y tendrá un gobierno itinerante. (Sin comentarios acerca de este) En la frontera norte, en los dizque estados más seguros del país, las ejecuciones están a la orden del día. En la costa oeste, huracanes recientes han devastado a dos centros turísticos importantes; la costa este apenas se recupera del huracán del año pasado. Dime, visitarías este país?

No nos gusta que exhiban nuestros defectos. Menos personas que representan países que también tiene problemas (como todos). ¿No sería mejor ponernos a jalar y a reclamar nuestro país? ¿A convertirlo en un lugar más seguro, más tranquilo? Cuando salieron las notas de los regios que se van a San Antonio, nadié se preocupó? A nadie se le ocurrió que eran unos mamones exagerados?

Seamos realistas, reflexionemos.

Acrópolis

Falta menos de una semanaaaaaaa!

Last Nite

So I went to the Strokes last night. Cool. Not my favorite band in the world, heck, even the Yeah Yeah Yeahs score higher on my list but it was still entertaining. Beats staying home. Box seats. Surrounded by psycho DJs. Some local, a couple "world famoso" Israeli dudes, beats me as I couldn't tell them from Adam. One of them is called DNA, that's all I know.

So anyway, J Casablancas and company. First off, kill the lo-fi. Not a good thing outside the garage. Maybe it wasn't so much the amps, but the fact that Casablancas handles his mic horribly. It was a pretty good omni but it was practically down his throat and always slanting down. Really hard time hearing him. The rest of the guys were pretty competent, although the never improvised, not even once. I especially liked Albert Hammond. The rest of them were also pretty good, although I get the feeling Nick Valensi is kind of deppresed and his guitar playing shows it. He also has this really long hair now and looks more like part of a grunge band instead of the NewWavendiepboypretty look the rest of the band has. Maybe he outgrew the fake unwashed, blazer with sleeves pushed up aesthetic. Who knows.
A funny moment, that I also saw at U2 but not at the Stones concerts, was when everyone opens their camera phones. It's a Y2K kind of moment, when everyone has the band in front of them but they're not seeing them, they're seeing their image on the screen. Life thru a lens, instead of the real thing. And it's right in your face. But you can't experience it without your gadgets. Heh.

Anyway, it was fun. Some cool tunes. Good people watching, really good vibe and all types of snobs, freaks and geeks, indies, poseurs, you name it. The Yeah Yeah Yeahs will be in town soon, I just hope it's at the end of October not September, so I can catch it. And what the fuck is wrong with Mty that Interpol can't play here? They've played Mexico City and Guadalajara so why not us?