Spring Break : Cancun (Part 2)

The shuttle took us to the hotel that Student City had booked for us to stay in, Krystal. Upon arrival, we were told that the hotel had over booked and could no longer accommodate us and we had to move to another hotel, Oasis, which was fine because that’s where we wanted to be in the first place and had only booked Krystal because we were told that Oasis was fully booked as well. We than, took a shuttle from Krsytal to Oasis. Most of our first day in Cancun was spent waiting in lines to check in. We were able to convince some boys from Australia also on break to let us cut the line, which definitely cut down on a good amount of time. We finally checked into our room and got situated. We were on the first floor and could walk right out to the beach from the sliding doors.

We next needed to find the Student City representatives to get out wristbands so that we had access to all of the hotel pools, bars and nightlife events. This was in another branch of the hotel, so we got a good feeling where everything was while we were wandering around the resort.

After this, we were free to enjoy our vacation. We found the rest of our friends from URI without much of a problem and began enjoying ourselves finally. Throughout the week, we spent most of our days in the pool drinking, or down on the beach. And we spent the nights going out to different clubs and bars. We got to attend Day Glow, and see Avicii, DJ Chuckie and Laidback Luke all during that week. It was different than in America, specifically Rhode Island because everything doesn’t close there at 1AM, the clubs stay open all night. We took public transportation buses to the city from the resort each night, which was about an 8-minute ride in. We usually wouldn’t go out until 1130 or 12Am and wouldn’t get back to the resort until around 4AM. I was awake for the sunrise just about every single morning. Living in paradise and on a different time schedule was not only different, but more exciting and a nice change of pace. 

My friends and I.

The resort's pool and beaches.

 

My friends and I before the Avicii concert.

Spring Break : Cancun (Part 1)

 During our most recent spring break a few weeks ago I traveled to Cancun, Mexico along with at least 100 other URI students. We booked our travel plans through the Student City organization. This was one of my most memorable travel experiences by far. It was my first time leaving the country so it was a new type of travel experience for me. I really don’t like flying at all so that was basically the only part of the trip that gave me any difficultly or anxiety. Other than that Cancun is mostly a tourist area so there wasn’t really much of a language barrier and having all of my friends with me helped as well. I think another reason this trip was so memorable to me is because I went with all of my closest friends, who are graduating this year and I still have to finish my senior year next year. (I transferred in a year late, so this is only my third year.)

Well, first I booked my trip a little but later than everyone else did, so I was alone on my flight on the way there. Hating to fly, that really didn’t excite me. But at least mine was non-stop where as the rest of my friends had connecting flights. Overall, the flying experience went fairly smoothly with the exception of a few things: I was confused when filling out the customs papers but I got help from the couple who was my age who were sitting next to me. They also napped on each other the entire flight, (and the boyfriend smelt pretty bad so I had to lean towards the window most of the time). I flew JetBlue, which offers satellite radio and about 36 TV channels and a few different movie choices. I watched about half of the movie “The Adventures of Tin-Tin” and than I slept for a little and listened to my iPod for the remainder of the trip when I woke up. After landing, I had to first get through more customs situations where they check your bags again and ask what your intentions in the country are, etc and than I had to wait for my friends who were on another flight to land. Because their flight wasn’t non-stop they weren’t landing until 45 minutes after me and of course there were landing at a different terminal. Since I don’t fly often, I naturally got lost trying to get from one terminal to another by myself and with my large luggage. Unfortunately, I was just about one of the only people on the trip who didn’t mind paying the extra cell phone charges for being out of the country, so there were only a few people who I could keep in touch with that felt the same. The two girls I was specifically rooming with didn’t feel that way, so finding them was constantly a challenge. Eventually after talking to multiple different people and getting many different stories about where I should be waiting and what not I finally found my friends and our shuttle to the hotel. 

A little bird I spotted in the airport.

View from up in the clouds.

Day Glow, "The World's Largest Paint Party" : An Overly Crowded Travel Experience

Last Spring, Lupo's Heartbreak Hotel in Providence, Rhode Island hosted a world famous event called Day Glow. Day Glow is a world renowned live concert, featuring famous DJ's, soaring aerial acts, stilit walkers, contortion acts, fire shows, and giant cannons that deliver it's famous "paint blast". It's known as "The World's Largest Paint Party" because these "paint blasts cover the entire audience in neon colored paint. Below, I've included a video just so you can get an idea what I'm talking about. This video is actually from the exact event I attended. My friends and I are getting off the bus in the video around 1:40 in. After seeing this, I think you'll have a better understanding about what I'm about to describe to you.

  

After watching this video, I'm sure you can get the idea that this event was overwhelming crowded with people. People were lined up and down the streets waiting to get in for hours before the event even started. Everyone was dressed up in either rave attire, meaning bright neon colors, or in all white so that when the continuous paint blasts occurred the neon colored paint would decorate their outfits. Once the line starting moving everyone poured through the doors. I've never seen people so excited for an event in my life and I've been to a lot of concerts. However, there's something about the experience of Day Glow that really creates excitement in the crowds. As I'm sure you saw in the video, everyone lining the streets was cheering. Inside Lupo's the walls were covered with giant tarps, obviously to protect the club from getting to destroyed by the paint that would soon be covering every person inside, as well as the floors and walls. Below I included some pictures, in the background of the second one you can see a clear view of the tarps covering the walls. The first two pictures are of my friends and I, prior to the paint blast. The third picture is of two of my other friends, a beautiful picture to represent the aftermath of the paint blasting! The reason why I'm not in this paint covered picture is because I chose not to be covered with the paint. As amazing as my experience was at Day Glow, and I did have an amazing time (and can't wait to go again when Day Glow comes to URI campus this Spring) the crowd of people swarming around the stage made me feel extremely overwhelmed. I can honestly say I have never been somewhere so crowded and the combination of thousands of people only centimeters apart wanting to be covered in paint and slipping and falling into each other for some reason just isn't especially appealing to me. And that is exactly what was happening. Everyone wanted to be up as close to the stage as possible so that they could get covered in paint. Therefore 1) I would have had to push through the crowd to the get through, 2) once in the crowd, I would be surrounded by people pushing and shoving, and 3) once the paint came out everyone was slipping and falling into each other. The thought of being part of that crazy crowd basically just frightened me. So, I chose to stay towards the back, where somehow the paint still reached and I slipped a few times myself, but I never ended up as covered as my friends in the last picture below. A few of my other paintless friends in the pictures stayed towards the back with me as well. Mostly we just danced and enjoyed the music while avoiding the paint. Regardless, I certainly experienced my first overwhelming mob of people while attending Day Glow, but I made it out alive and still managed to really enjoy myself.

When Day Glow comes back to Rhode Island this Spring, specifically to the URI campus I can say that I will give being part of the crowd a second chance. Mostly because the majority of those in attendance will be URI students. Knowing that makes me feel more comfortable than having no idea what kind of crazy people could of been next to my side at an event as open as Day Glow when hosted in Providence.