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Waking the Fallen
By Avenged Sevenfold
I Won’t See You Tonight
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Sorrow, sank deep inside my blood
all the ones around me,
I cared for and most of all I loved
but I can’t see myself that way
please don’t forget me or cry while I’m away
Every once in a while, I’ll post something that I don’t think a lot of people would actually read. In some ways, I almost don’t want you to read them. Today is one of those days.
I think a lot and I self evaluate a lot. These are some of my current thoughts…
The way I treat people. I will treat you with utmost respect unless you disrespect my parents or my brother in any way. There is no tolerance here. They’ve been through a lot tougher life than you ever will. I didn’t make it any easier on them. I won’t let you make the same mistakes. This philosophy has been fairly consistent for the past 3 years.
There is almost a single, unilateral way I look at every relationship. If something was to happen you at any given point in time, would I ever regret the last words I spoke to you or the way I last treated you? I won’t deny the fact that I have my judgments about people, and it’s hard for me to not generalize and stereotype. I personally believe this is very human. But how I treat you won’t be any different than how I would like to be treated, regardless of what I think of you. If you think I am being hypocritical, please let me know. I cannot catch all the errs of my ways.
I am horrible at holding babies. I always have been. I was so excited about my second niece, Faith, and so nervous at the same time to be holding her. But man, I am immensely excited at the opportunity to be even a small part of her life. I am almost giddy with anticipation.
I have somewhat of a sleep disorder. It seems to have happened after my military deployment. I can’t fall asleep easily between the hours of 11PM and 2AM. In fact, I’m typing most of this at 2:45AM, and I have work in about 5 hours.
I still wake up to an excruciating migraine every once in a while . But my TMJ is still a lot better than what it was 4 years ago.
Above all else, I fear any threat to the well being of my family, dying alone, and sinking into my own complacency, probably in that order.
I am starting to use Yahoo as a search engine a lot more often, although Google’s still leading most of my searches. I’ve always used Yahoo Finance, weather, my page, and even prefer their mail service over Google.
I’m tired of Hilary Clinton and Mitt Romney constantly attacking the other candidates. I am hoping for an Obama McCain nomination. If I was in the Hilary Clinton camp, though, the first thing I would do is getting her shorter podiums to make her look taller.
I predict John McCain will run with Rudy Giuliani (or Mike Huckabee) as his running mate.
Hilary Clinton will run with Barack Obama as her running mate.
Hilary Clinton will win. She will be the director of which policies to pursue. She will choose Barack Obama as running mate because many people will view her as polarizing. She will accept this and also realize that her and Obama agree, for the most part, on many policies. Barack Obama will be Chief Operating Officer, through whom most of sensitive discussions will be filtered through. If there was ever an analogy, albeit a very loose one, he’ll be like the pastor’s wife. At least that’s how I view this ticket, and, of course, I could be completely wrong.
If you’ve read this far, then today will be the first day (unless I’ve already told you) you find out about a few things.
I spent almost $20,000 on my trip to south america. A lot of people seem to be shocked and puzzled as to why it cost so much when I tell them exactly how much it was. Consider the fact that I bought a car just for the trip, something I never meant at any time to bring back. I shipped the car in a container ship to bypass the impassable Darien Gap, flew 4 times in 3 different airliners, drove over 14000 miles with ever increasing price of gas, and slept alone and ate out almost every day for 3 months. They all add up. Try doing something similar and let me know if there’s any way you could have brought the trip down more than $3500. I don’t think you can.
I was robbed in Colon, Panama.
Written to my family on 5 Jul 07.
Subject: I am going to keep going.
Yesterday was a day of days. I probably can’t explain a lot over the email or even over the phone, but I will try my best.
I got shoved by 2 black males, no more than 20 or 21 years old, into an alleyway no more than 100 meters from my hotel. I was on my way back to the hotel because the internet cafe was closed. They ripped off my money belt and ran away. I ran after them, but to no avail. Inside as my passport (which I needed to get out of the country, and also to my vehicle in Cartagena, Colombia because a stamp proved that I had properly exited out of Panama), my Visa Credit Card, my Bank of America ATM card, driver’s license, 2Gig memory stick, some $30 in cash, and $200 in traveler’s checks.
I went to the nearest cop, who called for backup. They got a pickup truck to get me to the Colon Police Station. That station is a joke. The entire city, including the police station, smells, looks and feels dirty. They had a couple attendants, who wrote something down on a piece of paper with writing all over it which reminded me of mom’s phone book. I kept going around, asking for some policeman to help me. They made a few phone calls, and told me I need to use the payphone to call the Embassy. This is after they clearly knew I just got robbed.
Along the way, policemen laughed at me, pointed fingers at me, and spoke so much spanish so fast as to say they don’t want to understand me. There wasn’t a single computer in sight, and for a city this size, was quite disturbing how small the station was. It was no bigger than our house, in much much worse condition.
Somehow, I worked up to the mayor’s office, Mayor Carlos Delgado of Colon. He is also the chief of police, so his office is in the police station. He was doing absolutely nothing, just chilling at his office with the safety of cops in the station. The place wasn’t bad, but it wasn’t anything you’d expect. I sat down at a sofa as he looked through his dell laptop computer. He let me use the phone. I called the US embassy for the first time at this point, a full hour after I was brought into the police station. I don’t trust him, but at least he was nice enough to let me sit down and make some calls.
Yesterday was the 4th of July. As such, the Embassy was in holiday and was not operating. I called for the operator, but the telephone prompt kept going around in circles. I gave up, and left the police station. There was no official file number or anything. I felt, for some reason, more unsafe in that station than out in the streets.
I cancelled, then, my Visa Credit Card and my Bank of America ATM card. I thought about cancelling the airplane ticket as well. But I decide against it at the last minute, thinking I can always cancel it later on.
I’ve been in Colon for about a week now, so I had gotten to know a few people. One guy, an old, skinny white man that spoke good english, ran into me. His name’s Juan, and had shown me a couple shipping agencies about a week ago. I told him about my situation. He says, I think I know who did it. Don’t worry. I will find him and get you your passport. His name’s Juan. I tell him I don’t want the police involved, for their sake as well as mine, and I don’t care about the money. This was the third or 4th party, including the police, who knew about the robbery and said they’ll try to help me. I am skeptical.
He calls me downstairs an hour later. He says I need to give him $5 because he found someone that knows who did it but won’t tell him unless I give him money. Thinking this is a scam, I give him the money anyway and go upstairs. $5 to find out if he’s for real or not is a risk I am willing to take. This as about 6 30 PM.
He calls me again from downstairs of the hotel at about 9PM. Alongside him is a young man, no more than 20 years of old, wearing an orange polo shirt. This guy, Edgar, tells me that he saw the whole thing, and went to the guys who did it with a gun and threatened them to get my passport back. He says he took a big risk in getting my passport, and wants $60 for his troubles. He takes out a green bag, with my money belt inside of it. My passport is inside. But I’m missing my 2 Gig memory stick, my money obviously, and $200 in traveler’s checks. (I had called American Express and cancelled the traveler’s checks. Little did anyone know that the shipping schedule called for putting the car in the container on Wednesday, paying the $1100 shipping fee on Thursday and putting the container on the ship on Friday. I had over $1100 in cash ready for payment upstairs in my room.)
That was all yesterday. I didn’t believe the whole story then and I still don’t. I was walking around with another man today named Vans, who I had gotten to know and learned to trust enough to walk around with. Edgar hollers at us wearing the same clothes as yesterday. He is holding one $20 traveler’s check, and says I can collect this check and he’ll just ask for $5 in return. Did he risk his life again in getting this check? Of course not. By then I know I can’t trust him. But I need to make it look like I do. I tell Vans to translate for me, and tell him if you go try and cash this, they will arrest you. If I don’t tell him that and something happens to him, I know something will happen to me. They clearly know where I live.
I did get a return call from the embassy today. They received my email from yesterday about what happened, and was sorry the place was closed for 4th of July. I tell him I got my passport, and he says I’m 1 in a 100. Colon is a very dangerous place, he says. I’m in God’s hands. And it wasn’t always like that. 10 years ago, Colon was crown and jewel of Panama. But the politicians are now getting more and more corrupt, and as more money gets spent into Panama City, all the bad people are moving in to Colon and Panama City to overpopulate the cities that aren’t physically expanding. The man was sincere, and I very much appreciated his phone call.
So that’s the gist of it. I will be getting out of this city soon. And I will email again in Cartagena, Colombia, or sometime soon. The ship is coming and leaving Colon, Panama tomorrow, Friday the 6th of July.
I am going to go on with this trip. There was a point in time yesterday, with all the frustration and the logistical difficulties I was having, where I had serious contemplations about sending the car to Houston, Texas or Miami, Florida and calling it quits. But I got my passport back, and I have another credit card and another ATM card with a different companies I can use. I had it in my backpack back in the hotel, and that emergency set of credit cards will get me through this trip. Plus, remember the ticket I called to cancel but never did? It leaves tomorrow.
I hope you know that I love you all and that although I did think about not letting you know until much later, I am glad that I didn’t keep you too worried about the situation. All in all, my right fingers are jammed a little as if I jammed them against a basketball or a wall, and my right arm and shoulder was hurting this morning but it’s much better. Otherwise, I am not physically hurt, and I can only imagine what could have been. I do believe some $100 that I lost yesterday is nothing compared to that.
(I left the city on the same Thursday night that I wrote this message. Too many people that I didn’t trust anymore knew that I was leaving on Friday morning. Instead, I chose to leave the city a little earlier. I cannot thank the hotel attendant enough for referring me to the taxi driver that she confided in. I easily lost 5-10 pounds these three days.)
I almost died in Peru.
En route from Abancay to Cuzco, I was driving along the windy mountain paths that took me from elevation 9000 feet, up to 14000, and back down to 11000. The road conditions varied drastically, and was mostly horrible. I was coming down from 14000 feet, winding to the right on the mountain path when the road suddenly changed from concrete to gravel. My tires lost traction and started skidding out of control. The tailend of my car headed towards the barrier-less cliff, a 3000 foot fall straight down the mountain. I estimate that less than 2 feet of level gravel road separated me from my certain death before the car regained control.
Was Cuzco and Macchu Picchu worth it? Yes.
I drove 14000 miles without cruise control. I got pretty good with accelerating with my left foot.
Towards the southern tip of South America, I thought it was striking how the sun was at such a low angle that it created a sharp contrast with a snow covered trees on one side and snow-less trees on the other.
I’m not sure if people are sick and tired of hearing about the south america trip. But that is single handedly the biggest accomplishment of my life. Some people ask how I did it. And I reply that I really don’t. After I gave it every conceivable thought of its dangers, I blinded myself to the same when I finally committed and started the cause. I still make my drives back home from work, thinking about how long the 22 mile drive is only to look back and wonder what led me to leave everything behind to pursue what I gave myself a 15% chance of accomplishing. What must my mother have gone through, knowing that she couldn’t possibly stop me? What the hell was I thinking when I hit the road with no real next day destinations? What was I thinking when I drove into a country whose language I will never fully understand? Was I thinking at all?
But you see, I was. I did think. I thought about how life’s a distraction from the only inevitability of our lives. I thought about how my family’s reputation. I thought about how little I know about the world. And I thought about the irreversable mistakes I made as a teenager in Kuwait and Africa serving in the armed forces. And I thought about myself as a brand… what the hell is so different about me? I know I’m not the smartest man around… I wasn’t exactly at the top of anyone’s list. But I knew I was clever. I could almost always devise a way into and out of things. I may not be able to solve the complexities of linear algebra or financial engineering, but I believed I was more clever than the average college graduate. Put me in an unsolvable real life situation, not some abstract problem in a classroom, and I will solve it.
And now I don’t have to look back in shame at my military deployment: that’s just there because enough people know about it and it helps light up the interest of my resume. What shame? I won the Soldier of the Quarter board, guidon bearer of my class and designated leader by my drill sergeants and I am ashamed? Yes. Perhaps not every veteran will put it in those terms, but we all feel the weight of our mistakes and miscues during such times when much weighs down on our collective shoulders. Any veteran will tell you that we could have done more. And personally, that burden shames me to talk about my experiences overseas.
After my redeployment back home to LA in June of 2004, I pushed a lot of people away. If I wasn’t comfortable with how highly you thought of me, I almost always pushed you away. I could care less about people that didn’t too highly of me. I sometimes went to great lengths to ensure this… I don’t know why, I can’t explain it. Perhaps a remnants of PTSD symptoms? I don’t know, but I know that a lot of veterans go through similar stages. But I’m not making excuses; I would like only to apologize.
Look out for Nanosolar. I think it’s gonna be huge in about 5 years. It’s not a public company. I’m hoping that its utilization rate will go up exponentially in that timeframe. They “roll-print thin-film solar cells.”
http://www.nanosolar.com/
Sing into your microphone to find out the name of the song you know the lyrics to but don’t know the name of.
http://www.midomi.com/