Raising Atlantis

"A blog is not writing.  It's graffiti with punctuation."

-Dr. Sussmann, Contagion

Once upon a time, I was sitting shotgun as Michael J. Saringer drove eastward on Highway 1. The wind streamed reassuringly through my hair, and the starburst flashes of the sun danced epileptically among the trees. We laughed, we danced. Also, Vanessa was there. And Peter. We were chatting idly about something or other that may have seemed important at the time-- the elemental condition of man, perhaps-- but which was soon to be dwarfed beyond all infinitesimal significance as, emerging from the clouds and towering high above the skyline was this magnificent colossus:

Hold the fucking phone.

What was this monstrosity? This hulking beast that loomed high above the mountaintops, laughing at the lesser rides beneath it-- yea, scorning the very sky!-- which none of us had ever seen before?

It was the AtmosFear.

We were instantly smitten. I mean, besides the groan-inducing Szentveri-esque pun in its name, it appeared to be a genuinely terrifying ride; it's like that old, boring swing ride-- with its wicker basket seats, and rickety, definitely-too-thin-to-be-safe chain tendrils-- except that it's a couple hundred feet in the air. We resolved we had to have it, right then and there.

"I want to go to there"

So, that Tuesday, we eagerly drove to Playland (this time with the world-famous David O'Brien in tow!). Unfortunately for us, I was working that day, so we didn't get there until about 3 o'clock. Also, every god-damned person in Vancouver was waiting in line:

You see, every Tuesday, there was a promotion where admission was only $10, and apparently planet earth knew all about it. So, several miles away, we lined up and played rock-paper-scissors for an hour-and-a-half (Mike was eventually crowned The Champ.  We're having a belt made up).

"I spy with my little eye something that is long and not moving." <Insert 'That's what she said'>

[Playland: 1, Tourist: 0]

When we finally got in, we decided that we didn't want to blow our proverbial load too soon, so instead of beelining straight for the AtmosFear, we chose to tickle our adrenaline glands by getting on the Hellevator first.

Except the Hellevator kind of sucks. I mean, it used to be pretty sick-- shooting you into the air, then holding you for several tense moments at its peak, before plummeting earthward again-- but now, it just sort of halfheartedly spurts you into the air, then boredly lets you down. After waiting about an hour for this rather impotent liaison, we realized we had better get to the AtmosFear soon, as, by this time, we had about 2 hours before Playland closed. So, we gathered up our clothes and made our way over only to find that the line for the AtmosFear was also 2 hours long. And closed.

[Playland: 2, Tourist: 0]

Disappointed, but determined, we spent the remainder of the day to get on every ride we could, and resolved to come back and conquer the AtmosFear next time.  However, while Playland is cool and all, we'd all been there countless times before, and all we really wanted (besides mini doughnuts, of course), was to get on that ride-- without experiencing it, there was this queasy sense of unfulfillment. It was like when you were very young, and still not tall enough to be allowed on the bumper cars, but your older cousin was, and you would watch in mute envy as he strolled right past the "You will never be tall enough for the bumper cars, Max Szentveri" measuring stick and into that ecstatic din of big kid joy, your mother gently pulling you by the hand to tear you away from your hopeless brooding, as you glared at the tall children with a stung, bilious resentment for the unjust universe and dim desire for that cruel bastion of exclusion to burn down in a fiery holocaust, that no amount of cotton candy could ever placate.

Except that, next week, when we decided we should go back, it turned out Playland was closed for the summer.

[Playland: 3, Tourist(s): 0]

Later that week, Dara, Lilize, Karl, and I headed down to Joe's Apartment, which is not an actual apartment, or even a club that even remotely resembles an apartment-- you know, maybe something akin to the "inside-out" club in Night At The Roxbury, but with empty beer bottles and pizza boxes strewn everywhere (why on earth do I think that would have been cool?)-- but a new bar on Granville with a rather schizophrenic identity; dim, modern décor, with classic rock 'n' roll memorabilia, and a grand, ambiguously hipster chandelier looming rather self-consciously overhead.

Ooh, a modern bar with a chandelier- how 'contemporary'

And while I liked the bar, the coolest part of the night had to be what we saw on the way there--

Wearing animals, how cruel!

Yeah, that's right. There was some crazy lady roaming the streets with a gigantic snake, which she would let other people "wear" (personally, I am scandalized-- how dare these senseless brutes strut about wearing animals! Call PETA!).

"I hate snakes Jock! I hate 'em!"

Our next evening consisted of going to a beach bonfire somewhere out by UBC. Getting to this beach required hiking down a seemingly interminable trail of staircases through a spooky, Hansel-and-Gretel-ish pitch-black forest.  How pitch black?  Here, I took a picture:

"One more time guys, I forgot the flash."

Luckily, Karl, like a cellularly-telephonic Rudolph, was able to lead us down to the beach with the strobe light on his Blackberry.  About halfway down, we encountered some shadowy character, standing towards the side of the trail and staring off into the blackness.  Perhaps, I thought, he is having some beautiful, poetic moment of nocturnal introspection, isolated from his most primal sense here in the deep, sightless night, simply feeling the thrum of the earth as it lives and breathes around him in this maternal sylvan dark-- that, or wanking, or perhaps depositing some freshly-deceased cargo here in the woods (or perhaps some grim combination of both!).  As we passed with our illumined cellphones, he made some gruff remark about how "that better not have been a photo," which inclines me towards the latter.

Happily, we arrived at the fire without being murdered or wanked on.

Gathered round the fire was a diverse collection of geeks who operated well outside my personal geek specialties-- that is, George Lucas films, TV commercials, and 90's music-- convivially bantering about cephalopods and algorithms. All I could do was smile and nod politely, especially when some lad began lecturing us on the science of home brewery. "Oh, your brew is astringent? Well, personally I prefer silica to reduce turbidity, but you could always try velocitizing the esters." Mmyesss.

I had a very touristy moment when Baxter began a spirited conversation about Ayn Rand and I, an English major, realized I didn't have anything to add to even this literary discussion (as I've yet to slog through one of her leviathan works). I think I blithely offered some admittedly speculative "facts" like, "I think I read that Ayn Rand drank pee," but no one paid much attention.

Drank pee.

One of our last group activities before Cyrus and Dara left Vancouver was an afternoon on Karl's boat, which featured a lovely sushi-and-wine dinner, and will be most remembered for this:

Now, I left off my last post promising an account of a colossal discovery--comparable to discovering Atlantis, or El Dorado. Let me set the stage--

In fair Chicago, where we lay our scene, Brad McMahon lazes about his apartment, sipping on a Blue Moon and passing the late evening hours listening to Broken Social Scene and Facebook-creeping his new NU classmates, when, suddenly, his phone rings.

He notices it's his favorite ex-roommate, Max, calling- his pulse quickens. What could be so important that Max would call him at this hour long-distance from Vancouver? His mind is instantly a-dance with a frenzied blur of hypothetical possibilities, some exhilarating, some terrifying, some vaguely arousing in a "yo bro, no homo" kind of way (did I just catch you staring at my assonance?). Delirious with excitement, he reaches his trembling hand towards the phone, aware that, in a few moments, this feverish hurricane of infinite possibility is going to converge into a single, definite reality-- an entire metaphysical universe born in a moment of speculation, about to instantaneously vanish, its limitless potential zeroing, leaving only an infinitesimally small coordinate of truth. This is a rather existential tragedy, Brad thinks. A moment's pause, his small eulogy for this colossal, inevitable loss. Then, he picks up the phone. "Hello?"

Let me back up a little.

Earlier that day, David Yew and I were catching up, and decided to go for a stroll to find some dins. We came across a small Domino's that looked rather old, and suddenly, I was gripped with an inexplicable, giddy excitement-- I don't know what it was, what subtle cosmic suggestion gave me this absurd inkling, but I thought, "Could this be it? The end of my search? Durst I even dream of it?" I mean, all logical argument, all reason conspired to topple me in an avalanche of sheer impossibility-- after so many toiling hours, after troubling deaf heaven with my bootless cries!-- there was no reason to think that it even existed any more.

Yet, my instincts told me there was something about this place-- this unassuming, out-of-the-way eatery, shrouded from suspicion in a pall of modest banality-- that told me it could be what I had been searching for for so long.

As we ordered, I tried to contain myself and prevent my voice from trembling. I rallied to contain my excitement, to delicately nurse the dream, lest I should offend the universe with presumption, and have my Grail snatched away at the last moment. Indeed, the feeling was growing stronger-- there was something about the way the pizza looked in the in-store promotional photographs, the way the cashier entered our name as "Dudes" on the order screen that was undeniably encouraging in an antiquated, '90's sort of way.

"Order 37 for Dudes!  Dudes, your pizza is ready"

Our pizza was ready. I eagerly took the box, wondering if it held the gold I had sought for so long. I was so excited I actually posed for this stupid photograph, just in case this was, in fact, the momentous moment I hoped for...

Waaaay too much forethought went into all this.

When I opened this gustatory pandora's box, I could see that, against all odds, I had indeed found it. Tears came to my eyes as I took that first bite, and the intervening years of hardship and famine were washed away by the warm opium dream of childhood nostalgia and salivary ecstasy as, at long last, I tasted it again-- Old-Fashioned Domino's.

At this point I must acknowledge that many of you probably have no idea what I'm talking about right now. In fact, there is a well-defined geographic boundary separating those readers who do and do not understand: the 49th parallel.

You see, in 2009, Domino's, misled by some preposterous survey that ranked their pizza as the blandest, shittiest pizza there is (well, tied with Chuck E. Cheese, actually), overhauled their entire product, replacing their classic recipe with an overly-herby, garlic baste-soaked impostor. It was a massive project-- they launched a self-flagellating national ad campaign that was supposed to be "raw" and "honest," showing what an accountable company they were, a large corporation listening to the customer and doing their wholesome best to improve.

Despite what common sense would seemingly dictate, they did not continue to offer their "classic" recipe for its lingering devotees, such as the honorable Brad McMahon and myself (we might actually be the only people I know who actually wanted to find the old, "crappy" Domino's, but this is of little import). Foul betrayal! We were with you through thick and thin (crust)! We would never have changed a thing about you, darling!

Thus began a long and fruitless quest to find a Domino's that still would serve the old recipe, fraught with cold trails, dead ends, and false leads. Until I found this one in Vancouver, and called my (lone?) brother-in-arms, Brad in jubilant triumph. It was quite emotional-- towards the end of the phone call, we both broke down a little.

But, as I mentioned, there are many of you who have no idea what I'm talking about. This is because, as I soon learned, Canadian Domino'ses (how on earth do you pluralize that?) never adopted the new recipe.

Paradise on earth! Glory on high! Fellow Israelites, our long march is over-- we have reached the promised land, and it is cold and beautiful and full of trashy 90's 'za-- amen!  Oh, my glorious, glorious Canada, shining as a beacon of discerning pizza taste for all the world, please never change.

O, Caaaanadaaaa...

Of course, this makes my discovery rather less impressive than I thought at first. I had fancied myself akin to Heinrich Schliemann, standing atop a dawn-lit hill, looking down upon the excavation of Troy. It turns out that, instead of finding a hidden burrow of resistance against the tyranny of Domino's' revisionist regime, I had actually found an entire country.

Quote of the summer goes to Dave Yew, who, as we basked in the post-coital-like daze of eating this quite sexually-attractive pizza, engaged me in an exchange that went something like this:

"You can have the last piece of pizza. I'm not really hungry, to be honest."
"Oh," I said, "I feel kinda bad for making us get the Cinnastix, then."

"Oh, don't worry," said Dave, picking up a Cinnastick, "that's a completely different part of my stomach."



Be excellent to each other,



-Max
Twitter: @MaxSzentveri





Featured Players
People in this post:

Dara Djafarian:
But why male models?

Karl Heilbron:
A total luminary.

Vanessa Iverson:
Has always been tall enough for the bumper cars.

Lilize Maree:
Is still not tall enough for the bumper cars.

Brad McMahon:
A pizza connoisseur of most discerning taste.

Cyrus Navabi:
Is in this post.

David O'Brien:
The best Scottish rock-paper-scissors player I've ever met.

Baxter Robinson:
Fucking loves Ayn Rand.  Would drink her pee.

Michael J. Saringer:
Rock-paper-scissors world champion.

Peter St. Quintin:
Chose "The Hellevator" as his new phallic sobriquet.

David Yew:
Will kill you for the last Cinnastick.

Summer In The City

"Just listen to the music of the traffic in the city
linger on the sidewalk where the neon signs are pretty
how can you lose?"

-Petula Clark, Downtown

Thus far, my travel correspondence has focused largely on what a rugged, burly outdoorsman I have become, what with hiking, fishing, boarding, kayaking, and other equally hyper-masculine activities.  For example, the gang and I recently conquered the Chief in Squamish...

We only got halfway, but you can imagine that
Cyrus is standing atop the mountain here, looking out in triumph

And by "conquered," I mean we hiked for about 45 minutes, until Baxter said he had menstrual cramps needed to return home for a dinner engagement, and we turned around.

However, this summer has been about much more than taming Vancouver's wild wilderness-- it has also been about exploring the urban jungle.

Like, literally a jungle- there are people with fucking snakes walking the streets.

So, let me take a brief pause from slapping you across the face with my brawny manliness to relay some urban anecdotes...

One of the more bougie excursions of the summer was to the Salt Tasting Room, a sort of yuppy/hipster quasi-historic-chic restaurant that, despite its salty name (and the fact that its lone entrance is off of a shady Dickensian alley named "Blood Alley" [seriously]), rather classily serves wine and cheese & meat platters.

"It's right this way..."

Bare-walled cellars.  They're ironic, or something.

Despite the cellar looking like an old medieval torture chamber (which I suppose is meant to ironically contrast the regular, fancy-ish décor of the upstairs portion of the restaurant), the food was actually quite good, though rather expensive when you consider we were essentially eating hors d'oeuvres:

It's basically what your grandmother would serve at a party.

Oh, and there was also a lot of wine.

And while we're on the topic of classy Bacchanalian reverie, here's an anecdotally-inspired haiku:

Class, Class, Class:

Came to the party

drank iced white wine in plastic

martini glasses.

"Class, class, class!"

-Jeremy Grey, Wedding Crashers

How Gatsby-eque.  Not only, then, do I apparently bring white wine to parties now (what's my age again?), but also drink it from green plastic martini glasses.  Between that, cheese platter dinners, and using accent aigus in words like "décor," I'm pretty much klassy as shit.

As a side note on accent aigus, it is a well-known fact that the double-whammy "résumé" is pretty much the classiest word there is, and you should definitely write it that way if you want to impress prospective employers.  Absolutely.

There's no way they can't hire you now.

I mean, that's how they spell it in the Encyclopædia.

In an apparent attempt to assuage our growing confusion about just how old/sophisticated we really are, we decided our next excursion should be karaoke.

That's right.  Someone actually chose "Who Let The Dogs Out?"   Probably Dara.

I've always found karaoke to be a strangely disorienting experience.  You are suddenly assailed with a keen sense of self-consciousness, and draped in an ambiguous shame, similar to what you feel going to a strip club.  You imagine (in a vaguely racist way, I suppose) all the Asian businessmen that have been in that room before you (you probably imagine them tottering about, sloshing sake everywhere, you intolerant boor),  powering their way through a keyless tour-de-force performance of "Every Rose Has Its Thorn," swinging their necktie above their head in spirited rebellion against 9-to-5 weekday oppression.  "I am not defined by a cubicle!  I am more than an insurance policy!  I am young and in love!"-- and you think, "what am I doing here?"

Disappointed by the lack of Lou Bega songs available.

Cyrus played karaoke tambourine, thus sparing us his rendition of "Red Red Wine."

Of course, like a strip club, it's still a good time.  Ultimately, between selections such as "Who Let The Dogs Out?" and "Nookie" by Limp Bizkit, I'd say we wiped the sophisticated wine-swilling cheese dinner tally clean off the karmic slate.  Speaking of karaoke, can we all agree to put a moratorium on that whole "did you know that karaoke means 'empty orchestra' in Japanese?  Isn't that hauntingly beautiful?" thing that everybody loves to pedantically rattle off every time karaoke is mentioned?  Listening to Cyrus Navabi's poignantly heartfelt performance of "My Humps" is hauntingly beautiful, OK?

At this point, I figured it would be a good time to be self-reflexive, to step back and evaluate my progress with getting to know this city.  There is, on the one hand, a rather unquantifiable aspect to this-- I've been to loads of new places, met lots of new people, and discovered many nooks and crannies, crooks and trannies of the Vancouver scene I had never experienced before.  At the same time, there is an empirical component of my heuristic journey of discovery which can be measured.

So, about a week ago, I sat down with celebrated geography professor Michael J. Saringer, and he tutored me on the numerous areas/regions of Vancouver.  I've been conducting something of a summer project to learn both the streets of downtown Vancouver, as well as the city's broader regional layout, and it's time to see how much I've actually retained.  So, here's a map of the Lower Mainland, divided into electoral districts, which I've attempted to label:

This is what it should look like:

I'm feeling quite good about 16 out of 20 (YVR was a careless mistake, anyways).  If you find yourself underwhelmed by this rather tepid geographical awareness, compare it to my conceptual map of Los Angeles:

"Which way is the beach?"

And now for the most important news of the summer:

Yesterday, I finally beat Arsenal 3-1 on World Class difficulty in FIFA 99.  Hold your applause.  Well, perhaps a nice polite golf clap would suffice, I am a humble man.  That being said, I am fairly confident that this feat secures my spot in the storied annals of anachronistic video games as the single greatest FIFA 99 player of all time.

"The best FIFA 99 player of ALL TIME.  All time."

Indeed, it has been a summer of profound self-discovery and achievement, and we can only hope that this veritable apotheosis of human greatness can, in fact, be surmounted in the ongoing pursuit of bigger and better things-- yes, clearly my adventurous soul intends to soar above the Aonian mount, while it pursues things unattempted yet in prose or rhyme.

This is what it looked like.

My, this entry has been a tad tangential.  There is still a ton of stuff I have to relay, including more of Vancouver's sultry nightlife, beach bonfires, meanderings through pitch-black forests, concerts, and the single greatest discovery of the summer, tantamount to disinterring El Dorado or reaching Shambhala-- seriously, you will crap yourself in disbelief.  Await my next post in which this revelation for the ages shall rain down in a Roman shower of hot glory!


I did it all for the nookie,



-Max
Twitter: @MaxSzentveri




Tonight's Starting Line-up
People in this post:

 Dara Djafarian:
Let the dogs out.

Karl Heilbron:
Will pay the bill, you taste the wine.

Lilize Maree:
Loves cheese and brie.

Cyrus Navabi:
Will get you love drunk.  Get you love drunk off his humps.

Baxter Robinson:
Loves this headshot.

Michael J. Saringer:
He knows where all things are.