MY EXPERIENCES IN CALIFORNIA : Chapter 9

NOTE: Sorry for posting this later than promised. Was just a little busy settling down in Davis... And also waiting for comments on my prev post from a couple of ppl, though it never came :(

SPOILER ALERT: If you ever plan to visit Disneyland in the near future, you would be advised to skip reading this post because I have described a few of its rides. It would spoil the suspense if you knew about the rides before you embarked on them.

CHAPTER 9- DISNEYLAND PART 2

Other than this, we went for some other memorable rides as well. The Splash Mountain was a really cool roller-coaster ride through an "artificial" mountain. I put artificial in quotes because it felt so realistic. There was this rather innovative concept of installing cameras at a couple of the most exciting points of the ride, which would photograph your expression as you went past it without inhibitions. The pictures would be displayed on monitors as you exit the ride and you can go up to the counter and buy the photograph for 10 $. Being the unembarrassed uninhibited innovative Indians that we were, we went up to the monitors with our digicams and clicked a photo of the photo. That earned us a few looks, some of amusement and some of disgust, but hey we didn’t give a damn as long as it saved us many a buck. We did this at every ride. :D .

Then, we went to the "Pirates of the Caribbean" ride, which was a boat ride, though some pirate villages with realistic characters like Jack Sparrow appearing every now and then.

We then went through the horror house, which was a lot of dark passages of "scary" ghosts and creatures, which was pretty lame. We found it quite kiddish and tried to scare a couple of the ghosts away. :D . The people around us, both young and old, surprisingly seemed pretty scared and excited though.

We then went for the jungle adventure ride, which was a boat ride through a jungle which had animals on the shores. JB met his match on that ride- a girl called Ashley who was the instructor of the ride whose PJs exasperated even JB, the Master of Mokkai (MoM). Then we went to a castle, which was built such that it was shaped like all the wonders of the world. It was a brilliant sight.

But the most majestic sight was the Disney castle, which was draped with decorations of hanging blue and red lights. It was quite a sight to take in.

We then had dinner there and went to the banks of the artificial lake, where a spectacle was awaiting us. That was "FANTASIMIC". Literally. The show is held on the nights of every weekend and that day being a Saturday, we got to witness the spectacle. It is a show where Mickey, as the protagonist, uses his imagination to conjure up objects that he desires. Laser light is beamed on shape changing fountains in the water to give is a feel of the objects. It was so realistic and so majestic. The show lasted a whole twenty minutes. It seems they spend close to 30k $ for that 20 minutes of entertainment each evening. Sheesh…. that’s more than what we would spend in an entire year of graduate study in the US. The wonderful calming music added to the brilliance of the show. To think it was just lights and water being adapted to form such realistic images was mind-blowing. We were so awed by it that it took us a minute to realize we had to tape this on our cams and start clicking. At the end of the show, we swore to come back again for it the next night and witness the spectacle again.

Disneyland is in a way like drug addiction (or how people say it is at least. I’ve no first-hand experience ppl). You want to come back to it every day. Ok bad comparison but hey it is addictive and never leaves you satisfied for sure. It was about 10 pm by the time the show ended.

We had walked at least 5 miles inside the place in those 4 hours and it was only then that we noted the tiredness felt by our legs. We trudged back reluctantly to board the train which would take us back to the car as the exhibits were closing behind us. But we were satisfied by how it had gone till then and couldn’t wait for the next day when we would be coming back to the place.

We drove back to the hotel and went back to our rooms, which is when we noticed that the suite we booked was the kids suite (That was the cheapest deal that we got). Everything, from the beds to the furniture was kid-sized. We felt like a giant dwelling in Liliputian land but then we had been transformed into kids after that night at Disneyland, so we were happy to be treated as kids by the hotel room too. We dived into our beds and didn’t know anything until 8 am the next morning when we woke up, looking ahead to the day.

We woke up and got dressed and stepped out of the house within an hour, which is an amazing achievement by five generally-nocturnal 20 year olds. Such was our enthusiasm to go back to Disneyland. We parked our car there and went into the California adventure park as per our plan. This is an annexure to Disneyland, but meant more for adults as it contained some amazing rides. We went inside and were greeted by the sight of big roller-coasters. We went for a couple of water rides initially, which felt nice in the warm southern Californian sun.

Then went into the Hollywood part of the adventure park, where there was a replica of the intersection of Sunset Blvd and Hollywood Blvd.

Then we went into Monsters 3D, which was a ride which took us through some caves, where Monsters Inc characters kept popping up. The hall of moving doors in that ride was pretty amazing.

Then we went into Muppetvision 4D, which was a show where we were given 3D glasses and we could view Sesame street characters a screen on stage in 3D, thanks to our glasses and say, whenever the characters sprayed water, real water would spray on us too from somewhere, thereby adding the 4th dimension to the show, making it totally realistic. It was the first such 4D show I had gone to in my life, and so I found it really exciting.

Then we went to Hollywood hotel. It was a massively tall building, which gave everyone the creeps. We were taken to an elevator and strapped to chairs there and we could guess what was coming up, but that didn’t prepare us for what lay ahead. The elevator climbed all the way to the top of the 100 odd metre tall building and suddenly stopped there. The door opened for us to see how high up we were. Suddenly, it plummeted down in freefall with every one of us screaming on top of our voice. Then the elevator was caught as it came down and it went up again all the way to the top and plummeted down again. This went on for the next couple of minutes in irregular patterns, which made it an exciting ride.

We climbed out of that gingerly and had some lunch. We noticed a restaurant "Ariel's grotto", which was supposed to be an underwater restaurant, where tables were in the middle of glass-enclosed water chambers from all directions where mermaids keep floating. We didn’t go there as it looked too expensive a place.

After food and some cotton candy (LOL...we were quite a sight with our hands and face all pink in its aftermath), we went to the most adrenaline-pumping rollercoaster ride.

It was a 3 minute rollercoaster, which contained a lot of freefalling, vertical climbing, extreme twists and curves, a couple of 360s and that too back to back. In all it was a really exciting ride as it was a very high speed one too. We were screaming on top of our voices the whole time. We were quite exhausted when we came out. But then, we didn’t feel queasy at all like we would after a ride at Kishkinta or MGM theme parks in India. And it was less of a thrill, because we had faith in its makers that they would’ve done everything possible to ensure it’s a safe ride. Unlike a ride in MGM where you may be wondering if you’re going to fly off the cart due to a loose seat belt or if the track itself would break making the cart crash headlong into the ground. Only after this ride, I realized what a rollercoaster ride was. Exciting, adrenaline-pumping but at the same time does not cause you unease physically and mentally.

We then went out of the California adventure park back into Disneyland. We first went into bug-land, where everything was made to make us feel we were as small as bugs. We looked up to see massive trees and on closer inspection, we found they were actually small plants, with the difference that it looked as huge to us as it would to a bug. It was a really nice concept.

Then we went into the Toy story ride, where while waiting in the queue JB gave up his claim of being the best mokkai (loosely translated in English as PJ cracker) in the world after watching Mr. Potato Head (an artificial character standing outside the ride entertaining people standing in the queue with his PJs) crack a few "jokes". Believe me, they were just of another level. An example- "Say D.... (pause) Say D...(pause) Say D... (pause) Now what do we have here? (pause) 3D. ". This was one of the many PJs he cracked which had people frantically hit their heads with their hands and pray that the queue moved on quicker so that they don’t have to stand this weirdo anymore. It was too much for poor JB to learn that there were two people we encountered in the last couple of days, who were better than him in cracking such jokes, Ashley and Potato head, and he was truly dejected after that :( .

Finally it was dark by the time we were done with all this. We learned that a special Pixar parade was going to take place in sometime where all Pixar characters, would parade on the corridors. We were really excited by this as it contained many of our favorite movie cartoon characters. We sat on the corridor, and witnessed an exciting parade, where characters from Finding Nemo, Toy story, Monsters inc and many more evergreen Pixar films came by and waved at us.

We also witnessed the Disney parade, where Disney characters like Mickey, Goofy, Donald etc walked the ramps.

Then we went to witness the "Fantasmic" show again, as we had planned the previous day. We were again awed by it. I guess one would be awed by it even if one watches it every day, such was the atmosphere. Then we went again to the "Indiana Jones" show, as we thought it was worth another visit.

With our hearts filled with contentment, we went back to the car park and went back to the hotel. On the way back, we stopped at an Indian restaurant that we saw and had food there. Though it was a touch expensive, we felt we deserved it and had good Indian food after months. We hit the hay as soon as we went back to our rooms, as we had another big day ahead of us the next day.

TO BE CONTINUED...

MY EXPERIENCES IN CALIFORNIA : Chapter 8

NOTE: For continuity, read chapters 1-7 before starting on this.

SPOILER ALERT: If you ever plan to visit Disneyland in the near future, you would be advised to skip reading this post because I have described a few of its rides. It would spoil the suspense if you knew about the rides before you embarked on them.

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CHAPTER 8- THE DRIVE AND DISNEYLAND PART 1

The day exams ended, we packed and wanted to sleep early so that we could get up early the next morning and start at 4 am as planned. But we were not confident if we would get up at 4 am if we went to sleep and so we decided to have an all-nighter. We fine-tuned our plans and ironed out the flaws and took more printouts and made more notes and got ready for the trip. It was terribly tiring just planning for the trip, as it was a daring one as we were in a totally alien land and we were going to take a car for rent and travel 1000 odd miles, without any experience of driving in the US and knowing only theoretically how to get there, through the internet and so we had to have all our plans perfect. In hindsight, I am sometimes amazed at how quickly and confidently we decided to embark on the trip but at that time, all that fuelled us was our enthusiasm to see the real California.

And so we set out on our journey at 4 am sharp as planned. MS took the wheel and I got to say he drove pretty smoothly. Kudos to you man! One of us acted as the cartographer, sitting beside him, with the various printouts and maps that we had printed out and giving him instructions on which turn to take, when one came. The GPS that we had borrowed also came in very handy, as it kept telling us where to go (in a lady’s voice who we addressed as “akka”) but it wasn’t that accurate, and so we had to double check with our maps each time it predicted a route.

LA was about 500 miles from Davis and it was a straight highway, so the drive was pretty smooth. The car was pretty comfortable and spacious (it was a luxury car after all) and we all enjoyed the drive, as every sight that our eyes drank in was new to us. We passed through the bay area and caught up with the coast there and drove further and further south. We stopped for breakfast at a McDonalds on the way and also stopped by for lunch at someplace. We didn’t feel the strain of our long journey as we kept chattering in the car (its amazing how we always find something to talk about) and entertaining each other. MS also was totally at ease driving the car, and really started enjoying it too. We were on “cruise” for an hour in the middle at 80 mph. We also experienced showers in the middle of the journey as we were passing some hilly areas and that was pretty exciting too. I guess everything was exciting at that time as it was all new to us.

After a long journey, we finally reached Los Angeles at about 3 pm. From here, things started to get a bit slow, because of the notorious LA traffic.

We had to pass through LA to get to Anaheim, where our hotel was located. We also had to pay universal studios a visit to collect our tickets, which we had ordered online, at the counter. It was exciting going into those Hollywood parts and seeing quite a few really loooong limos passing by us. Who know who was in there? We might’ve been a few metres away from a Brangelina or a Scarlett Johanasson or a Will Smith. Damn those tinted windows that those cars had, else we could’ve looked in. :x

We collected the tickets and then drove away rather ruefully, as we had to wait a couple of days to come back here according to our plans. We then drove for another good hour to get past LA in its heavy evening traffic and went past quite a few interesting buildings such as the one in this pic ;) . (We even toyed with the idea of going in to see if they let us see them in aah...action...But alas we were short of time)

We finally reached Anaheim at about 5 pm. We found our hotel quickly, thanks to our maps and checked in and took an hour’s rest. Then it was time to go to....Disneyland, which was just a mile away from the hotel.

We arrived at Disneyland at about 7 pm, and after putting the car in the car park, we had to take a toy train to go into the place. It was a good 10 minute ride, with each passing minute increasing our excitement of what lay ahead.

That was when I contemplated where I was. I was in the US, in California, in DISNEYLAND, at a place where I had not even dreamt of visiting in the near future, at a place which has delighted millions with its colorful entertainment, at the place which acts as a living memory to the many fictitious characters who have made many a kid's and quite a few adults’ life more cheerful with their amazing entertainment- Mickey, Donald, Goofy...and the list goes on... I got goose bumps thinking about all this and a glance in the others directions told me they were also getting a similar feeling.

Once we got down the train and entered this wonderful world, we were babbling out of excitement. With huge expectations, we entered the gates to be beheld by a sight which took us aback even after all this anticipation. We were stunned by the amazingly cheerfully lit streets and cartoonish buildings and the characters standing at every corner of the streets and the huge crowd of cheerful equally-amazed people basking the streets was a sight which could not be described. The fervor of the night added to this experience. Also, as Christmas was round the corner, the whole place was doubly decorated with Christmas trees and the like. Nothing could’ve prepared us for this majestic sight. Now, I never for my life have imagined I would state the sentence I am going to in my next line, but then I guess this is the only way to describe it. "The majestic sight I faced was similar to the image of Lord Venkateshwara in Tirupathi". (for more on this refer to my older blog post "FROM AN AGNOSTIC TO A HAPPILY CONFUSED PERSON"). You have to be there to see it. Anyways... back to the subject... We stood in wonderment, taking in the whole scene with awe. For a minute or two, we couldn’t say anything; neither did we know what to do or where to go. All that mattered was that present moment and we wanted it to prolong it forever. Finally, we broke the ice and someone uttered "It’s beautiful", stating the obvious but getting us out of that reverie.

We then walked aimlessly the first few minutes along the streets, just along the way people flowed. Each street were filled with as many people as there would be on Ranganathan street in Chennai or on Commercial street in Bangalore or in Palika bazaar in Delhi, but this was one place we wanted to be with the crowd. There were lots and lots of excited kids and looking at them made us feel like one again and that increased our excitement level by another notch, if that was ever possible. I felt my pulse and I was positive I would count over 200 a minute just due to the excitement. There were an equal number of adults too, all as excited as the kids. I could not see one glum soul in that place. I guess, if ever someone could sulk in that place for more than a few seconds, he/she would have to be one of the most cold-hearted people.

After sometime, we recovered and looked at a map of the place and decided what rides to do in the night and what during the next day. We chose a few rides which would be a good experience in the dark and went ahead. There were just so many rides that we would have to spend a whole 3 days covering every one of them. So we had to choose wisely about which ones to take and which to give a miss. Our choices were pretty good, I guess, as most of the rides we went on were pretty exciting ones. Though we went on at least 10 equally exciting rides in those couple of hours that night, there were a couple which still give me the goose bumps out of excitement.

The best ride in the whole place was the "Indiana Jones" one. It was pretty popular, I guess, as we had to stand in a queue for half an hour to get on the ride. As we passed along the queue, we went through artificially made caves, whose every aspect looked so realistic. We finally got on the wooden cart on rails, which seated about 10 people and the ride started. It was a rollercoaster kind of ride, which took us through the massive caves, with stalactites and stalagmites whizzing past us, with cave-dwelling creatures like rats on the floor, gaps on the floor of the caves, propelling us downwards every now and then. All this was really exciting and we thought the ride over and was worth every bit of the wait. But only then, we got to know the best part was yet to come. Our cart stopped in a dark cave for about ten seconds and Indiana Jones himself came in front of us and screamed "A boulder is gonna fall on you. Duck!". I looked up to see a HUGE boulder of at least a 5 metre radius falling freely right towards our cart. It kept getting closer and closer and it was only a few feet above us, when I realized how realistic it is and I in fact felt it WAS real. Had I lifted my hand, I swear I could’ve touched it. It was that close. I thought there was some technical flaw as the boulder should’ve never come this close and it was going to fall right on our head. I looked at the others and everyone seemed equally panicked. Suddenly, the track our cart was perched on gave way, and we underwent freefall for a couple of seconds as another track caught us down below and we looked up to see the boulder stuck in the hole we had fallen through. We sighed with relief for a moment and only then it dawned upon us that we were actually in a safe ride in Disneyland and not really adventuring in caves a la Indiana Jones. That’s how realistic it was. We came out stunned and swearing to come back to this ride again the next day.

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P.S: I had such a wonderful time just recollecting my memories of LA and Disneyland that I want to go on describing the whole thing, but I guess I'll have to cut off here because of the sheer length of the post may turn people away from reading it. So..

TO BE CONTINUED... NEXT POST MONDAY, 6th SEP (Following the Pacific Standard Time from now, as I ll be in California while posting the next one)