Sunday, February 14, 2010

Debauchery in Espana - The Finale

I am going to combine the last couple evenings into one post, because quite frankly I'm ready to move on from this subject. Also, it kind of blurs together into one spectacular event. We had taken our journey to the Playa del Sol. This was supposedly going to have the nicest weather, and the most beautiful beach of all time. Instead what we received was torrential downpour. This weather pattern seems very consistent in my life. It certainly seems to rain often wherever my travels lead me.

The first night's schedule was formulated by Kirsten, our tour guide, and it was a delicious recipe on the menu. This night would consist of exploring the Spanish night life. That meant hitting up the clubs and bars around town. Our chaperons attended the first bar with us, though we still were not allowed to drink at this location. Of course, many of us were already in a drunken stupor at that point in the evening. At this bar the tables we were once sitting at were suddenly pushed aside and the dancing had begun. I do recall that at one point 50 Cent was requested as he had just hit the scene with "In da Club." The crowd of Americans got wild, and much dance floor grinding occurred. Then an event happened that I will always remember.

One of the 2 fellows I was with had gathered the courage to make possibly the boldest move of his life. About 10 feet from us there were 2 attractive Spanish mamasitas getting their groove on. One could see the confidence start to brim from him, and he tailored his dancing to swiftly move away from the boring American ladies towards these Spanish ladies. We speculate to this day that they were lesbians, but they may very well have simply been 2 ladies having a good time on the dance floor. As he approached them, the determination in his eyes shown brightly. He made a valiant attempt to squeeze between the two of them, doing so in a very smooth motion. However, they appeared to ignore him altogether and even made a move towards the left together to get him out from in between them. Dejected and with his pride shattered, he continued to dance but this time back towards our group. This has been dubbed the "Dance of Shame" by all those that witnessed it occur.

Upon leaving this bar, the chaperons returned to the hotel. The tour guide was expected to keep a good eye on us. She was suddenly open to us all purchasing drinks at the bars from that point. Perhaps it was because she was there to monitor us, but she seemed to encourage it. In fact, she drank right along with us. The club we went into was not terribly eventful. I believe that the entire crowd that evening consisted of members in the 50+ age bracket. I don't recall the night of the week, but this seemed quite unusual. The only memorable part of this evening that I can recall is asking the Danish bouncer what language they spoke in Denmark. Under normal circumstances I obviously know the answer, but I was a bit intoxicated at the time. The night culminated with us returning to the hotel. This is where my night got a bit more interesting.

For some reason or another many of us ended in the same hotel room. A couple beds were pushed together and we crowded in. The bed I was lying in consisted of me and a couple ladies. No, this did not get interesting in the manner you may be thinking of at the moment. I had chosen a nice comfortable spot on outside. Suddenly one of the ladies started complaining that I was taking up too much room, and she was squished in between the two of us. I found this outrageous since I was not a big guy to begin with, and I could feel the edge of the bed. However, she kept complaining. At that time I said, "Ok, let me roll over for you then." I knew what would occur, but I did it to get my point across. I rolled, and went tumbling out of the bed. This sent laughter throughout the room, though I still a bit annoyed by her complaints. I got crawled back in, but could not fall asleep. Eventually I heard much snoring around me, and that wasn't helping me fall asleep. I made a decision to exit the room and attempt to return to my room.

I had left my room key in the room, so I attempted knocking at the door. One of my buddies answered, but only opened the door a crack and peered out. I realized I had actually left my shoes in the room. I'm trying to recall at this point in time if I asked to come into the room, or if I simply asked for my shoes. Either way, he denied my entrance. I would later discover that he was partaking in sexual intercourse, and he didn't realize that I was actually locked out of all rooms now. Without shoes or a room, I decided to venture around the premises. As I walked through the lobby in my socks, the lady at the front desk politely stated, "Sir, we ask that you do wear shoes in the lobby!" Keep in mind this is a 5 star hotel, and I was some crazed American stumbling around in socks. "I'm sorry, I'm locked out of my room!" I yelled back and bolted out the front door. Now I was actually stuck outside without shoes at 4 AM. What was I to do? Obviously the answer was stroll down to the beach and walk along the water in my socks. No, I was not intelligent enough to actually remove the socks. I wore them the entire time.

There was a McDonalds that I had spotted at the end of beach at our arrival to the hotel. I decided perhaps I could take a jaunt over there and have an Egg McMuffin Spanish-style. I passed numerous homeless Spaniards along my journey that had set up shop along the beach. It turned out to be a much longer trip than I had anticipated. Eventually I reached the McDonalds to discover that it was of course closed at that hour. Dazed and reaching a sober state of mind I decided to simply park it at the beach for a while. I attempted to actually fall asleep on the sand. Probably not an entirely wise decision, but it seemed like a great idea at the time. An hour passed and that plan had also not succeeded. Eventually, defeated I decided it was time to return to the hotel. I was once more scolded from across the lobby by the front desk employee. I bolted to the elevators and returned upstairs. By this time it was about 7 or 8 AM.

Once I arrived back to the room, I was greeted by both of my roommates. They were concerned for my well being upon noticing that I was nowhere to be found. I told them the story of my travels along the Spanish coast. Laughs were shared, apologies were spread, and we all went our separate ways to gather rest for the evening ahead.

That evening would involved an intense karaoke session. The entire group came together to attend this event at a bar downtown. The first performance was chosen by the group. The group of males on the trip were to perform "Bye, Bye, Bye" by N-Sync. I feel that we performed admirably, and I even attempted to do the dance number to the best of my ability. My next performance was a terrible decision on the song choice. Two of us stood up to perform "It Wasn't Me" by Shaggy. Now, I could only understand one of every 4-5 words that Shaggy utters in this song. This was also prior to my Lasik procedure so my vision was heavily impaired. I could not see the screen, so I was usually simply relying on memory to attempt to sing these songs. This song turned out to consist of me often muttering nonsensical lines in hopes that it vaguely sounded like Jamaican "rap." To compensate for this failure I attempted a dance move that likely should have never shown up at a Karaoke bar. I fell back onto one hand and proceeded to thrust my pelvis into the air multiple times. It seemed somewhat appropriate with the song at the time, and seemed fairly well received. However, it's not likely something that I should have brought out without proper notice to the audience. This move was a bit risque after all. Our final performance was a stirring rendition of Enrique Iglesias' "Hero." My voice quivered with each note, as I strived to achieve a perfect imitation. Between these performances a Spanish woman was bringing her A game to the table. After each one of our dreadful performances, she would proceed to get on stage and perform a heart-wrenching ballad that would bring tears to the bar patrons eyes. She even appeared to have a coach at her table that would critique her performances. It was a very odd sight, and she was taking it very seriously. Yet, we would immediately return to the stage and make a mockery of the entire process once more.

The next morning we boarded our flights to return to America. It was a glorious trip, and there are so many great memories that I was able to take from it. Honestly, there was so much more than I even shared here that simply happened in this one week's worth of time. It was truly an amazing experience, one that I will always cherish.

No comments:

Post a Comment