Month: April 2008

On the final day of our adventure, I had declared it to be a sunscreen-free day considering everyone else was tan and I was not.  I definitely don’t know much about absorbing some suns rays but one of the girls had told me how she started out with SPF 30 at the beginning of the week to get her body used to the sun and then moved down to SPF 5.  This explained why the sun didn’t absorb into my skin at all during the week considering I was using SPF 30.  Also, this may inadvertently explain why I am like Casper the Ghost for most summers of my life.  😉  Of course, I’m sure one of you can verse me in the ways of tanning.

So with that, a bunch of us manly men decided to go without sunscreen for the day.  This was Vero and my first real day at the beach to be honest…we had usually done things around the resort but had never gone to the beach in the morning and stayed there for the entire day.  It wasn’t in our interest to do so…we need a little adventure during the day!

It was clearly the wrap-up day as tons of pictures were taken of all of us and we said goodbye to the great bartenders on the beach.  I read a book for awhile and just had great fun body surfing on the waves and enjoying the sun.  Around 1PM I thought that maybe this ‘no sunscreen’ idea was a little silly and lathered myself up but the damage had been done.  I was a human lobster!  It was quite irritating and it nearly killed me on the flight back home.  I literally had to apply ice down my shirt to ease the pain.  Yes, yes, I know, I am a fool.

Vero and I headed back to the resort and hung around the pool for awhile before leaving on the bus to the airport.  Once again, Vero’s grandmother got screwed over.  Remember she got some free spa time?  Well it turns out that there is some small print and that she would have to pay extra for the massages she received.  So when she went to check out at noon, there was a $45 charge in her name.  In the end, it was never paid because of the dispute of it all.

However, when we boarded the bus, they needed to see some tag that the reception would give you to indicate that you have checked out.  Her grandmother had not received this tag because of the dispute over the $45.  So she went back and in the span of six hours the charge had increased to $80!  Highway robbery!  We were not impressed but what can you do?  We had to leave for the airport.  She forked over the money and we said goodbye to this place forever.  Note, if you ever want to stay in the Dominican Republic, DO NOT GO TO THE BAHIA PRINCIPE.  Not worth it.

We got to the airport and had a bite to eat at Wendy’s (of all places in the Dominican Republic).  We saw our pictures up on a wall taken from when we first entered the airport the first time!  We didn’t really feel the need to pick up the picture but we were pleasantly surprised to see that Vero’s aunt had picked it up anyhow and sent it our way!  Thanks!

I was in pain from the sunburn and grabbed a few drinks of Gatorade to get over the feeling of nausea.  At one point we were in the gift shop and we were contemplating picking up some mamajuana for Mike.  But then while in line I realized that this wasn’t even the duty free shop!  I hustled down to the other end of the airport to find the glorious cheap liquor which adorns the duty free shops.  We are talking a litre of Crown Royal for $20.  Beautiful.  I picked up a bottle of Crown and some Tangueray gin for Krista and headed to the cash lineup.

In comes Vero’s uncle saying that the plane is boarding NOW!  What the heck?!  It’s 30 minutes before it’s supposed departure!  We start freaking out.  There’s no way I’m leaving this liquor behind!  Vero runs towards the other end of the airport while I wait in line.  After the booze is paid for I hightail it down the airport.  I can hear my name over the PA!  They are calling me, last call, last call!  I swear this is a bad dream!  I round the corner and find Vero looking worried around the front desk.  Everyone cheers me as I run up, give my ticket and board the plane!  All is well!  I guess the pilot just wanted to leave earlier for some reason.  I have never heard of that happening!  Case in point – look for the duty free shop BEFORE anything else in the airport!

The flight home was brutal for me as I was sunburned but other than that, pretty uneventful.  We arrived in Toronto around 1AM and headed to the hotel.  We crashed for a few hours and then got up the next morning so that Uncle Richard and Aunt Dinah could pick us up.  Unfortunately, there were some of our crew that got on a later flight and it was actually delayed for a few hours so they didn’t even arrive into Toronto until six in the morning and they had booked a room for the night before!  So they didn’t get much use of the room and didn’t have the chance to cancel them.  That is unfortunate.

Vero and I said goodbye to the crew as they were heading to the airport to get a flight back up North.  Vero’s grandmother actually got a ride with us to Ottawa as she had an appointment there.

Can I say that it’s quite hard to switch your brain into another language after speaking it for such a long time?  The waitress at breakfast asked if I wanted any juice and I replied “Oui, merci!”.  Ha ha.  She gave me a look that said “I don’t speak French.”

All in all, I personally had an amazing time down south with Vero’s family.  They were fun and it was great to actually get to hang out with them more than the obligatory holiday visit which is usually too short and doesn’t really get to see the real side of people sometimes.  I think I impressed them with my amazing videotaping work and my amazing bilingualness.  Plus, I don’t look too bad in sandals or with red skin.  All joking aside, I had a great time getting to know the family, the wedding was amazing even though we had a hell of a time at some points, and the excursions were a lot of fun.

I can’t remember if I spoke about this already but Vero and I have realized that we aren’t beach people.  While we had fun, we can’t picture ourselves hanging out by ourselves at a beach for a week with nothing else to do.  We enjoyed coupling the beach with the excursions though.  I guess we are more of the adventurous type.  Does this mean that we would never go back down South?  No.  But I don’t think we would choose to go alone.  It would definitely have to be with a group of people and I don’t think we would ever actively spearhead that movement.  Don’t get me wrong, we had a great time…but at least this experience allowed us to realize what we don’t and do like about travelling.  Gaetan’s trip to Peru comes to mind as something great to do…a little adventure, that’s what we’re looking for!

Cheers to the newly wedded couple!

Punta Cana. Martine 197, originally uploaded by palm0014.

 

Panic time. Everything is happening today. Food eaten, pictures to be taken, multiple things to do.

What was my mission that day? Make sure to videotape every moment of the day. I pulled out my fancy schmancy outfit for the wedding, put it in the washroom with the hot water running, realized it didn’t change a thing, and then realized that there was an iron up in the bride’s room.

I got relegated to videotaping the women getting ready while Al got to head over to the guys room. No harm, no foul. I grabbed a few videotapes and a beer and headed to the room. Vero gave me some pointers of what she wanted videotaped as she had the idea of the wedding video brewing in her head. I got action shots of the girls fixing up their hair, ironing some clothes, etc. It was quite the tough job to just stand there and point the camera…probably the hardest job of the day. 😉

One funny moment came when Vero’s stepmother asked for a lit cigarette to be passed to her (which is a surprise since she doesn’t smoke) and I just happened to filming in her direction but I didn’t really realize what was happening until it came into the viewscreen and by that time the damage was done. I quickly panned the camera away from her while you could hear her screaming at me “Get that videocamera away from me!” Ha ha…we all had a good laugh.

It’s interesting to actually have all of this on videotape because it is so fresh in my mind. Unfortunately the hairdresser didn’t get the style that Anne-Marie wanted so her sisters went to work at making her hair beautiful (which they succeeded at). I can only imagine how horrible the feeling must be to know you have an hour to go until your wedding and realize that your hair is in disarray.

We then headed out of the room, onto the trolley that took us down to the wedding chapel. A crowd has already formed and I took my place near the steps where the party was going to take place. Filming an event like this is quite surreal…you don’t really have the time to allow yourself to exist in the moment. You’re capturing it so you’re more focussed on the angle of the shot, how the shot looks in the sunlight, is everyone in focus…so I basically lived out the entire ceremony in a virtual-screen world. I didn’t mind at all, but I can see why it’s probably more beneficial to hire someone to videotape your wedding as they are not invested in the process as much. Speaking about hiring someone to videotape your wedding, you should talk to Vero in case you want someone to tape your wedding this summer (blatant promotion here).

Smiles were had, rings were exchanged, Vero bawled like a baby (no joke! This was quite a surprise. Clearly she does not have the thick skin she thinks she has.), jokes were made by the band…it was a great wedding. The weather was great (maybe a little too great as the sun was in our eyes for all the pictures) and everyone looked top notch. We had pictures taken on the grass and I’m sure they will look great when we get a look at them.

After the wedding ceremony I relaxed for awhile as Vero and others had gone to the beach to take some more pictures. It had stormed while they were there so they had to take cover under some palm trees. I was comfortable in the hotel room having a beer and taking a snooze.

That night we headed to the Italian restaurant where the reception was taking place outside on the patio. It was a good setup and it was quite comfortable. The wedding party showed up and the videocamera was in full recording mode. It was a little dark on that patio so the video came out a little wonky but the only way to prevent that is to have a spotlight on the people.

I got to sit with some of Anne-Marie and Steve’s friends whom I didn’t get that much chance to talk to before that night. They turned out to be a great time. Speeches were made, laughs were had and crazy dances were done to get the couple to kiss. The waiters were quite crazy in their own right. They would come in dancing half the time and sneaking drinks of beer under the table so their manager couldn’t see them. I thought it was quite hilarious. I think at one point the waiter came in and danced with Vero’s grandmother at one point. I’ll have to check the pictures.

I don’t know what else to say other than the wedding went off great. After all the obligatory dances, some fun music came on and people got up to dance. The best part of the night was when out of nowhere a man appeared from the edge of the patio and jumped into the dance floor. At first we thought it was the guy from the night before at the karaoke bar but we realized it was Vero’s father dressed up in a chippendale outfit! It was quite hilarious as he danced around the area. He has quite the sense of humour which I love. Vero even mentioned that he was thinking of wearing that outfit for the entire day but Vero managed to talk him out of it.

Only a few songs were played before they had us leave the patio. Before leaving I recorded a bunch of good wishes to the wedded couple which will end up on the video. I also took some footage for my eventual “Palmer Edit” of the trip. Let’s just say that it will probably have a little more flair than Vero’s version!

We headed over to the discotheque for a few songs and after we grew tired of that, we headed back to hotel room for the night. A great wedding was had and I’m sure Anne-Marie and Steve as happy as they could be.