Imagine That...

The Third Largest Party in the World

For ten days in late April, the city of San Antonio hosts what is known as "Fiesta" - a city-wide celebration only topped in attendance and duration by Mardi Gras and Rio respectively. This was my third Fiesta, and though you'd think I'd had enough of the parades, endless onslaught of confetti in my hair, and generally wholesome merriment, I succombed gleefully in the direction of fun.

I am told, Fiesta commemorates the Battle of San Jacinto. For those of you non-Texans (myself included) who were not lucky enough to sit through an entire year of Texas History in high school (yes - they really do that here), San Jacinto was THE battle that severed the burgeoning Republic of Tejas from the unruly control of Mexico. For the record, San Jacinto is not even remotely near San Antonio. It's near Houston. Even though there was a perfectly good battle fought at our quaint city landmark, it's San Antonio's nature to oddly go with whatever makes the least amount of sense. Which is why, I rode my bike with some friends to my first Fiesta event of the year - "A Taste of New Orleans."

Fiesta,

Wait. Did I read that right? A Taste of New Orleans? As if being third on the list of world's largest parties wasn't bad enough, we have to dedicate an entire event to the city that inhabits the top spot? No knock on Creole or Cajun culture, but I think Fiesta should be all about what makes our city particularly unique.

Now that I've gotten that out of the way, I can totally show off my handlebar mustache:

Me and Matt Fleeger - the Fleegers were kind enough to share with me their extra ticket. Marc Toppel also biked with us to the Sunken Gardens - a fine, but completely under-utilized musical venue.

There was a ridiculously great zydeco band on stage and the lead singer fervently displayed his washboard talents for the crowd.

We met up with Karen and Chris Krajcer who were keen on informing us how badly we needed to find crawfish.

So we desperately tried to find some, but for some reason they only found a crawfish etouffee. I went for the fried shrimp which is a pretty close substitute. Once we were out of tickets, we begrudgingly stood a few yards from the funnel cake booth and sulked about not having any more tickets. The garbage can against the tree near us provided a sufficient eddy within the continuously heaving crowd. All of a sudden a little girl emerged with a half eaten funnel cake on a paper plate and headed determinedly toward us. We all winced as she carelessly tossed the remnants of her treat into the receptacle. Karen and I looked at each other in dismay as Marc reached into the trash can to fish out this delectable treasure. And then he ate it, without offing us a crumb.

The Fleegers and the Krajcers.

Me with the Fleegers - we headed out soon after the zydeco Marvin Gaye cover. Aside from the music which was incredible - especially in the amphitheater carved into the old cement quarry, the best thing about this Fiesta event was the fusion of San Antonio's major ethnicities. It was hands down the most diverse experience I've had in SATX.

When Marc moved into his new place several months back he stumbled upon a gold mine. In his garage were almost 12 dozen (what is that, a gross?) hollowed out eggs, and several bags  of confetti. Rather than paying inflated rates for in-season cascarones (confetti-filled eggs), Marc had Vicki and I over to watch a movie and fashion our own. It was a simple procedure: dye the shells, dry, fill, and cover with tissue paper.

 

The only problem was that Marc and Vicki put me in charge of getting things started, forgetting about the fact that Jews don't know how to dye eggs. I didn't boil the water first or remember to put in vinegar until after the fact, so our eggs were on the pastel side.

Vicki really enjoyed this. We could tell as she proclaimed, "We should do this every weekend!"

And with that we abruptly ended our weekend. And Monday morning, in a feeble attempt at being taken more seriously around the office, I hastily shaved off my handlebar mustache because I couldn't help but burst our into laughter every time I glanced at my reflection.

But Monday night brought the Fiesta River Parade. And in a strange twist of fate too complicated to recount - myself, Vicki, Alison, Marc, and Raina found ourselves at a riverside table at Casa Rio enjoying a free Mexican meal, margaritas, and in range of throwing confetti-filled eggs at Senator Kay Bailey Hutchinson, the parade's Grand Marshall.

All I'll say is thank you Mamie - your family was so kind to let us go in their stead.

Having found confetti in my hair, house, car, etc..., I took Tuesday and Wednesday off from Fiesta-ing.

On Thursday, my architecture firm (looking forward to our paid day off city holiday - Battle of the Flowers Day) we had a Thursday afternoon happy hour and barbecue.

The courtyard outside the new office, co-workers abound.

The newly installed fountain.

Later on, Marc and I decided to check out the San Antonio Current party for the Best of San Antonio 2007 at the San Antonio Museum of Art (SAMA). Anyone who is anyone in San Antone was there.

And with the free food, free drinks, sublime atmosphere provided by the courtyard architecture, and the sense of euphoria derived from the fact that I had a paid day off in the morrow, I found there was very little to complain about.

Here I am with my usual dance partner - the graceful and lovely Desiree Garza.

Her grace and loveliness was trumped, however, by my impending clumsiness, and several minutes later we were found floor dancing.

In the morning, I biked downtown, which is normally easy enough. But with half a million people clogging the city's central arteries I certainly had to get creative in my efforts to meet some friends to watch the Battle of the Flowers Parade. I circumvented the parade staging area North on Broadway and around to the Lake|Flato office near the Alamo Plaza.

There, I met up with Marc and Raina and her mother. I ditched my bike and we decided take the parade route (prior to it starting) over to our optimal parade viewing spot courtesy of Stephanie and Patrick.

We marched past the auxiliary en route.

Like I said, our parade viewing spot was optimal, in the air-conditioned, shaded, second floor of the Commerce Bank building, whose empty offices are overseen by real estate company that Patrick works for.

I was glad that S&P brought the kids from the neighborhood with them. And they were glad that Marc brought over dozens of our home-made confetti-filled eggs.

Marc and I perched ourselves, cascarones in hand, above the stone cornice over the building's entrance.

Texas flag.

The Queen of Fiesta - one of the traditions of Fiesta is a pageant for well-off debutantes. All the girls from the pageant are provided extravagant floats for the Fiesta parades to show off their intricate dresses. Rumor has it these dresses and ten-foot trails cost about 30K each. The girls all were off-beat foot ware such as bunny slippers or flip-flops and lift up their skirts to reveal them as people in the crowd call out to them, "Show us your shoes!"

The girls are also bestowed odd titles like the Royal Highness of Magical Indonesian Splendor or the Dutchess of Radiant Chinoiserie Delight.

All the balloons had to be lowered below the traffic lights.

Me, Mark Jones, (who joined us eventually) and Raina's mom in our window.

Dance Party Float.

Tiger.

 

Caleb, Me, Jones.

Travie.

When the parade ended, the Marc(k)s and I biked over to the East Side to test out a new eatery that Jones was to review for the Current. We tried out Tank's Chicken and Waffles. That's right, I said Chicken and Waffles. You can read Mark's article here...

After a respite, some folks gathered at my roof terrace for our regular Last-Friday-of-the-Month bike ride. We ventured down to the Alamo to gather with forty of so other bikers, which was a lot more folks than usual.

Alamo Plaza.

Nico and I.

Kristen, Skyler, and Victoria IV.

Ready to go!

Because it was Fiesta, downtown was really hopping, and we knew it would be a challenge to keep together.

And after an unfortunate encounter with a belligerent cop, headed south, leaving downtown in our dust.

But the bike ride was full of snags. Someone split their chin open, spilling in front of a truck. Several minutes later we encountered a long pause near the railroad tracks to fix a flat tire and then we were delayed further by the passing of a slow moving train.

At our first pit stop, the Union Stock Yards, we were asked to vacate the premises by the security guard.

Then after loosing several members of our gang in the West Side, someone fell off their bike and scraped their leg. Vicki waits underneath the highway overpass.

Despite all the problems, Mark Jones took us on a really interesting route around the West Side. We traversed along a particularly memorable section of town that had the prison on one side and an endless bombardment of bail bond shoppes on the other.

We concluded the evening at the VFW Hall (the oldest in Texas) which was having a Fiesta party of it's own.

We arrived just before last call.

Marc and Nico.

As the evening progressed, our formidable bike gang dissipated. I ended up biking back to Monte Vista where I live with only one other.

By the light of the morning I was up and ready (0nly after picking up a bunch of breakfast tacos, and Marc, his friend Catherine, Raina, and her Mom of course) to head down to King William - Southtown's historic district, where they hold an annual King William Fair. The fair is christened by (guess) a parade!

With breakfast tacos in hand, we were delighted to be able to watch the parade in the comfort and shade of Brian's porch.

Brian and Marc.

Alison drinkin' coffee and Mark taco eatin'.

Parade view.

Folksies on horsies.

Men in white dresses.

Miss Southtown.

Looking pretty.

The best float.

Marching band. I don't miss that.

Before heading over to the fair, we sat around and had a lot of coffee.

King William, as I said, is one of the oldest neighborhoods in San Antonio and one of the nicest. They really do this Fiesta-thing up. Alison and Catherine stand outside the gate and dream of one day soon...

After getting some food tickets, we realized it was noon and headed up to Justin Parr's balcony to tap his pony keg. Caleb takes in the mayhem.

The well-shaded King William streets provided an almost delightful trail on our journey to find...

ROASTED CORN! Yeah! (Its a Fiesta delicacy).

We ran into Juan Carlos and Desiree, who came with us to the mainstage.

There we saw our favorite local band -

Buttercup. Grammy Award winning Joe Reyes with frontman Erik Sanden.

Odie, the bass player, at the end of their killer first set.

Marc snapped this one of Desiree and I. For the record, there is STILL confetti in my hair.

Betsy, Chris and Karen Krajcer.

Mark Jones with Fidel Castro.

Desiree and I (as we so often do at Buttercup shows) riled up the crowd and started a really fun dance at the foot of the stage.

Then it was back to the porch.

Overall, probably the most leisurely day I've had in a while.

Alison might agree, if only there wasn't all that confetti to clean up off the porch.

Desiree, Vicki, and I went and picked up dinner at Cascabel (one of my favorite Mexican restaurants). Desiree was demonstrating how great of a mom she is going to be someday, playing with the little Mexican waitress girls. Vicki was ignoring me on her phone.

At some point after we returned to Brian's porch, it occurred to me that I had been on that porch, drinking beer on and off for about twelve hours. It was time to go...

Fiesta came to an end the next day and I weened myself off such festive cheer by going to San Pedro park and playing some kickball with my friends. We used up all the cascarones that day, so I can breathe only slightly easier until next year about finding confetti all over my life. Until then, I'll watch my back around those tricksy neighborhood kids.

I Met Al Gore Yesterday

Every year the overwhelmingly bureaucratic institution that controls my profession hosts a national convention. This year San Antonio hosted the AIA in what was, I admit, actually worthy of it's hype. It was a whirlwind of a half week as 25,000 architects from around the world descended upon our unsuspecting city. There were tours, seminars, book signings, events, great networking, and the largest hoard of exhibitors to ever grace our bustling convention center. Despite my animosity toward the conformist agenda of the AIA, I couldn't help but sink my teeth into these glorious opportunities to perhaps better myself.

The convention's theme was "Growing Beyond Green" - a nod to the ever expanding necessity to make green architecture, thereby possibly giving hope for the survival of our way of life. No one understands this concept better (over 50% of the world's carbon emissions are derived from the building sector) than the Honorable former Vice President Al Gore, who was the last of several notable speakers at the convention.

I had been looking forward to being in the presence of this democratic luminary for months and months. But given that there were thousands of others equally enthusiastic about absorbing his energy, the competition was fierce, and I didn't know if I would attain my goal of meeting him face-to-face.

I spent hours in line yesterday on two separate occasions. He would be signing only 700 books and luckily, I was the 466th person in line. We were told by the convention volunteers that he would not be signing any personalizations, just his name, and that we had to have our books open to page four, and that we would be ejected from line if we attempted taking pictures because the glimmering flashes in the crowd disrupted his aura or something.

"Would we be able to talk to him", I begged?

Thankfully yes, though very briefly. I wanted to say something memorable, and not just plead for him to run for president which 465 people in line before me did. Not that I don't think this would be a terrific idea, but the only way I could express this in a way that he might remember would be to rip off my t-shirt to expose the phrase "DRAFT GORE 2008" scribbled across my chest in black sharpie, and even I am not that crazed.

My absolute dream statement would have been, "Mr. Gore, I was a disenfranchised Florida voter in 2000, would you, er, could you forgive me?"

To which my dream response of his would have been, "That's ok - I'm sure you've done everything you could since then to restore the integrity of our democracy."

As I stood next in line, inches away from the hero-candidate-of-redemption, I watched in awe as the Costa Rican women in line beside me who I had spent hours getting to know, expressed their admiration of him in Spanish and he replied in Spanish.

This distracted me from uttering the sure fire attention-getter, "Hey - aren't you that guy from Futurama?", and instead I dove into a pit of gushiness to proclaim, "Mr. Gore, it's an honor and a privilege," as he warmly shook my outstretched hand, before scrawling his name across page four of my new book.

I then promptly bolted upstairs toward the ballroom to wait in another long line to see his keynote address. We all assumed he would simply regurgitate his Academy Award Winning-Global Warming powerpoint presentation. Instead, he did away with visual aides, and by only eying his notes but twice during the hour and half to which he spoke, he communicated his visions for a better tomorrow and that it could be attained if we, as architects, step up to the plate. It was, I thought, a very impressive oration, as well as startling proof that this man should be in charge.

One can only hope that someday this prophecy, for the sake of our children, will manifest itself upon my reality. But until then, I guess it's up to me, an aspiring architect, to heed his call.