Chapter 4: A Toast To Friendship
Drinks with Cleopatra
Just an attractive title to catch your attention :) But its ok. There is a Cleopatra in the story. Read on!
After freshening up in the hotel, we decided to visit a few more casinos. We headed to the heart of the Las Vegas Blvd strip and considered parking in Ceasar's Palace parking lot. We enter the parking lot without taking a parking ticket or anything. It was free! Its not what you'd expect in US where in most big cities, parking is like $15-20 bucks. I did tell my friends about this little fact but they didn't seem to believe me. At that point though, everybody agreed with me that parking is indeed free all over in Las Vegas. Actually, my friends never believe me the first time for anything as I come out with these wierd facts which simply sounds, umm, made-up. Well, sometimes they are not! :)
So, as we entered the parking lot,
[Again, this section is censored. Its the damn confidentiality agreement of 813ers].
... and we walked out of the parking lot as if nothing had happened. I call it the "Seinfeld Effect". Insensitive to most matters to which people would be touched, moved, afraid, careful or emotional. Not us! We enter the casino, fearless! Reminds me of Kaante or rather, Resevoir Dogs. Inside Ceasar's Palace, we decided to take a break at their night lounge, "Cleopatra". We got on its 2nd floor lounge-area and settled down at a table right next to the stairs. Soothing music playing in background, comfortable sofas and the dark, redish tint made the ambience really relaxing. Pritam left early to gamble and rest of us chilled out with some casual talk, cold beer and that kind of reminded us our time in Clemson. Good ol' days at TDs, TTT and Keith Street! Some day, I'll write a few chapters of my Clemson days. An experience that went off from ugly to bad and finally to good is indeed worth blogging! :)
Live Music
I would have rated this pub an 8/10 (-2 cuz drinks were not free as in beer) had it not been for the live music part. A band (and a really diversed one) with a lead Asian singer started playing live music (some American classics I guess). But that wasn't the annoying part! The "live" part was annoying! The volume of their music was so loud that it became irritating to me after some time. And ofcourse, the very scene that a middle-aged Asian singer in a band was freaking unbelievable for me. Not that there is anything wrong with that! Still, we suffered (or was it just me?) and continued to wait at the pub for the arrival of "My name is ..." star. Nope, its not Eminem.
Flashback (Summer of 2004)
Cut-one: A bunch of us from Clemson go to Six Flags. My friend, Pradeep Korade, is amongst us.
Cut-two: While waiting in line for a ride, a bunch of teenage girls start checking out Pradeep. I was fortunate to stand next to Pradeep and see the entire incident. These girls were pretty young (alright, they looked like 16!) and so, Pradeep knew they weren't the *type* he was looking to chat with. So, Pradeep didn't quite wanted to talk with them but one of the girls started asking him a few questions. I believe she asked him his name and Pradeep gave her a sincere reply, "Hi, M-y n-a-m-e i-s Pradeep". The "My name is" part took about 3 seconds to say. Say it loud, you'll realise the joke!
Cut-three: Back in Clemson, Pradeep gets famous for his slow-motion dialogue and becomes the "My name is ..." star! Famous for the wrong reason, that is!
Fyi his voice message was about 43 seconds long with just 16 words at one point.
Illusion
Pradeep has changed (or rather revealed) a lot after Clemson. He's a different person to me but yea, he still struggles some times to keep up with his speech-timing. He drives Acura nowadays (at 100mph), a bike (fastest one) and has a *healthy lifestyle*. He was the only one left to arrive. With a schedule mix-up, he bought a ticket 24 hours late :) He arrived straight to the pub missing out on the sight-seeing part. Anyways, we were thrilled to have him and he quickly joined the gang. All of sudden, Patil signals us to come close as if he wanted to say some secret. He tells us (it sounded more like a whisper with that damn music behind) that he found a table next to ours with a bunch of *Thakele Desis*. It was funny cuz all Patil saw was an Illusion. It was actually our reflection in the mirror. Probably he saw himself (I assume) and passed that remark. Who knows? ;)
Flamingo Dinner
We left Ceasars at 10ish and hurried our way to Bellagio. We reached there but the famous Bellagio fountains were silent. We spent so much time in the pub that we missed out the fountain-show and even, dinner. All of the restaurants looked closed. Everybody was tired to even look for a restaurant. They wanted to go to IHOP. Argh! I complained and protested and so, Dsu, Pal agreed to accompany me to search for a restaurant. We found a 24 hour restaurant at Flamingo casino and called the others inside.
At 11ish in the night, we wait at the restaurant door. The head-waiter made us wait at the door for about 10 mins. The restauarnt was mostly empty and still, the jerk was figuring out something. Here's what extreme hunger made me think about him during that 10 minutes. Either he was
A Racist - That mo****f***** discriminates us browns!
A Gentleman - I guess he wants the rest of my friends to arrive so that we may seat together (you know, like being courteous and stuff).
A Corrupt - Do I have to pay *extra tip* to enter the restaurant? To hell with that! Or,
A Moron - yea, that fits more to his personality! A**-h****!!!!
Even when we sat down at a table, our orders were delayed. My hunger was growing exponentially every minute. I had to repeatedly take in some quantity of water to supress the dragon inside me. My order of chicken sandwich was a safe bet to fill up my stomach. Especially, when you are really hungry, you don't want to take chances! I forgot to give this advice to Bonda. He ordered some freaking sliced salmons! For some 10-12 bucks or so, all he got was a few chunks of salmon (or imitation-meat?) scattered in the plate. Lol! It was a total rip-off and I guess, Bonda must have cursed the hell out to Flamingo.
After the meal, we headed back to the hotel. Before sleeping, we decided on a Getting-up policy. One of us in the room gets up first, takes bath, gets ready, wakes up second and so on so forth!! I was glad to get the last slot.
Overall, a satisfying (first) day of our trip :)
Just an attractive title to catch your attention :) But its ok. There is a Cleopatra in the story. Read on!
After freshening up in the hotel, we decided to visit a few more casinos. We headed to the heart of the Las Vegas Blvd strip and considered parking in Ceasar's Palace parking lot. We enter the parking lot without taking a parking ticket or anything. It was free! Its not what you'd expect in US where in most big cities, parking is like $15-20 bucks. I did tell my friends about this little fact but they didn't seem to believe me. At that point though, everybody agreed with me that parking is indeed free all over in Las Vegas. Actually, my friends never believe me the first time for anything as I come out with these wierd facts which simply sounds, umm, made-up. Well, sometimes they are not! :)
So, as we entered the parking lot,
[Again, this section is censored. Its the damn confidentiality agreement of 813ers].
... and we walked out of the parking lot as if nothing had happened. I call it the "Seinfeld Effect". Insensitive to most matters to which people would be touched, moved, afraid, careful or emotional. Not us! We enter the casino, fearless! Reminds me of Kaante or rather, Resevoir Dogs. Inside Ceasar's Palace, we decided to take a break at their night lounge, "Cleopatra". We got on its 2nd floor lounge-area and settled down at a table right next to the stairs. Soothing music playing in background, comfortable sofas and the dark, redish tint made the ambience really relaxing. Pritam left early to gamble and rest of us chilled out with some casual talk, cold beer and that kind of reminded us our time in Clemson. Good ol' days at TDs, TTT and Keith Street! Some day, I'll write a few chapters of my Clemson days. An experience that went off from ugly to bad and finally to good is indeed worth blogging! :)
Live Music
I would have rated this pub an 8/10 (-2 cuz drinks were not free as in beer) had it not been for the live music part. A band (and a really diversed one) with a lead Asian singer started playing live music (some American classics I guess). But that wasn't the annoying part! The "live" part was annoying! The volume of their music was so loud that it became irritating to me after some time. And ofcourse, the very scene that a middle-aged Asian singer in a band was freaking unbelievable for me. Not that there is anything wrong with that! Still, we suffered (or was it just me?) and continued to wait at the pub for the arrival of "My name is ..." star. Nope, its not Eminem.
Flashback (Summer of 2004)
Cut-one: A bunch of us from Clemson go to Six Flags. My friend, Pradeep Korade, is amongst us.
Cut-two: While waiting in line for a ride, a bunch of teenage girls start checking out Pradeep. I was fortunate to stand next to Pradeep and see the entire incident. These girls were pretty young (alright, they looked like 16!) and so, Pradeep knew they weren't the *type* he was looking to chat with. So, Pradeep didn't quite wanted to talk with them but one of the girls started asking him a few questions. I believe she asked him his name and Pradeep gave her a sincere reply, "Hi, M-y n-a-m-e i-s Pradeep". The "My name is" part took about 3 seconds to say. Say it loud, you'll realise the joke!
Cut-three: Back in Clemson, Pradeep gets famous for his slow-motion dialogue and becomes the "My name is ..." star! Famous for the wrong reason, that is!
Fyi his voice message was about 43 seconds long with just 16 words at one point.
Illusion
Pradeep has changed (or rather revealed) a lot after Clemson. He's a different person to me but yea, he still struggles some times to keep up with his speech-timing. He drives Acura nowadays (at 100mph), a bike (fastest one) and has a *healthy lifestyle*. He was the only one left to arrive. With a schedule mix-up, he bought a ticket 24 hours late :) He arrived straight to the pub missing out on the sight-seeing part. Anyways, we were thrilled to have him and he quickly joined the gang. All of sudden, Patil signals us to come close as if he wanted to say some secret. He tells us (it sounded more like a whisper with that damn music behind) that he found a table next to ours with a bunch of *Thakele Desis*. It was funny cuz all Patil saw was an Illusion. It was actually our reflection in the mirror. Probably he saw himself (I assume) and passed that remark. Who knows? ;)
Flamingo Dinner
We left Ceasars at 10ish and hurried our way to Bellagio. We reached there but the famous Bellagio fountains were silent. We spent so much time in the pub that we missed out the fountain-show and even, dinner. All of the restaurants looked closed. Everybody was tired to even look for a restaurant. They wanted to go to IHOP. Argh! I complained and protested and so, Dsu, Pal agreed to accompany me to search for a restaurant. We found a 24 hour restaurant at Flamingo casino and called the others inside.
At 11ish in the night, we wait at the restaurant door. The head-waiter made us wait at the door for about 10 mins. The restauarnt was mostly empty and still, the jerk was figuring out something. Here's what extreme hunger made me think about him during that 10 minutes. Either he was
A Racist - That mo****f***** discriminates us browns!
A Gentleman - I guess he wants the rest of my friends to arrive so that we may seat together (you know, like being courteous and stuff).
A Corrupt - Do I have to pay *extra tip* to enter the restaurant? To hell with that! Or,
A Moron - yea, that fits more to his personality! A**-h****!!!!
Even when we sat down at a table, our orders were delayed. My hunger was growing exponentially every minute. I had to repeatedly take in some quantity of water to supress the dragon inside me. My order of chicken sandwich was a safe bet to fill up my stomach. Especially, when you are really hungry, you don't want to take chances! I forgot to give this advice to Bonda. He ordered some freaking sliced salmons! For some 10-12 bucks or so, all he got was a few chunks of salmon (or imitation-meat?) scattered in the plate. Lol! It was a total rip-off and I guess, Bonda must have cursed the hell out to Flamingo.
After the meal, we headed back to the hotel. Before sleeping, we decided on a Getting-up policy. One of us in the room gets up first, takes bath, gets ready, wakes up second and so on so forth!! I was glad to get the last slot.
Overall, a satisfying (first) day of our trip :)
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