Fort Lauderdale, Florida - American Adventures 2014 (Part 1 of 8)

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At the beginning of this year I moved away from Portugal for a few months to spend winter times in a hot place. My journey led me to 2 months in Miami and a month in Brazil.

I’ve been to the US many times and although I like the place, I don’t have the best of times travelling there being a British Pakistani (who is resident in Portugal and was born in Bradford). The journey for me begins at the UK airport when I’m randomly selected for a thorough inspection. This part I don’t mind so much, it’s dealing with the ego-driven officials at the US end that is the hard part.

My flight to Miami from Manchester went via New York. At the customs I saw many brown people so I felt good watching them all clear customs. Now it’s my turn … positive thoughts “Im a nice person, Im a nice person, this will be a breeze” …. Less than a minute into the chat and I’m taken into the special room full of darker brown people. The atmosphere here was horrible and the crew were just rude and aggressive, physically pushing people and shouting at them. One guy was asking a couple to come into the room and when they step in he'd shout "HOW DARE YOU COME INTO THE ROOM, GET BACK OUT". It made me feel like I didn’t want to go back again. However I got through in the end and it was soon forgotten. I hopped onto my connecting flight to Miami.

I had no idea what to expect in Miami, all I know was that I was going to spend 2 months there and that I wanted to find some job projects for when I returned to Portugal. A friend of mine came to get me from the airport all the way from Fort Lauderdale and I decided that’s where I would spend the first few nights. First stop …. Get my suitcase. As I was waiting a thought came into my mind, “Im so lucky that in all my years of travelling I’ve never had my baggage go missing” …. This thought made me feel peaceful and thankful. 30 mins on I was feeling less peaceful, another 30 and seeing the same few bags go around and around I was feeling less thankful. It happened didn’t it …. They left my luggage in New York. At least they knew where it was and promised I’d receive it the next day at the location I was staying at.

I hopped into my friend’s car and off we went to his pad in Fort Lauderdale. And oh my what a pad … very high up, concierge, rooftop swimming pool, jacuzzi and gym … this was what I needed. That night I decided to use the Jacuzzi despite the fact it was raining heavily. There were people inside looking at me thinking I was crazy, but it felt so good and I needed to relax after my long journey. After the Jacuzzi I was in the elevator going back down and although I knew which floor to get off on, I didn’t realize that the elevator stopped before this floor to pick someone else up and that it wasn’t my floor. I just walked out and a guy in dirty overalls coming into the elevator said “you’ve got the wrong floor” … I said “erm no mate, I know where I’m going, it’s not that hard” … the elevator goes down, I turn around and am facing diy, paint, ladders and definitely not the floor I should be on. I hit the button and wait for the return of the elevator, going back to the apartment looking at the floor in shame in case I bump into that guy again.

The next day I woke up to somebody knocking on the door. I strolled to the door, opened it and saw an attractive Spanish-speaking girl at the door who said she was the cleaner. I believed her and let her in since my friend told me he had a cleaner. She could have been somebody else but it turns out I made the right call. While she was cleaning the apartment we got chatting and just when I thought the ice was broken and we were in comfort zone …. She told me I look like a terrorist … nice. My friend wasn't too happy I was talking to her though, she was there to work and not socialize.

I was feeling dirty at the time … no not thinking of her, I mean because I still didn’t have my suitcase or clean clothes. My friend called the company who was doing the delivery and then he showed me an app on his phone where he could monitor the route this guy was taking along with his photo and other details … great system. I guess this was so when he showed up you could make him feel happy by recognizing him and saying “Hi John, father of 3 and fan of spaghetii bolognese, how are you today?”.

I was hungry and I knew there was a subway across to road. I ate so much subway whilst in the US. I actually thought I was eating healthy with my tuna-supreme on honeyoat when after a month I realized they had 1000 calories in them. The staff at this subway were completely useless. They had a shorter memory-span than fish do. An example conversation went like this:

Subway: "what would you like in here?"
Me: "tomato, spinach, olives, sweetcorn and peppers"
Subway: Puts the tomato on and asks "what else?"
Me: "spinach, olives, sweetcorn and peppers"
Subway: Puts the spinach on then looks at me waiting
Me: "olives, sweetcorn and peppers"
Subway: Puts the spinach on and asks "anything else?"

And on it went. It was like the supermarket memory-building game but in reverse.

After breakfast I decided to take a walk around Fort Lauderdale and headed to the mall. I was quickly reminded that in the US it makes sense to have a car … places are far apart with wide pedestrian-unfriendly roads. This didn’t bother me on my trek, not even when I’m breathing in pollution and dust trying to avoid getting runover by HGVs. When I landed in the mall I took a break and sat down in the public chillout area. A few people were napping here too. As I was thinking about whether I really look like a terrorist, this elderly woman sits beside me and starts staring at me. I give her a nervous smile and she says “you have such beautiful eyes”. I have hazel eyes and they’ve been complimented on before so I was used to it. As I’m about to thank her she says “they are lovely blue eyes, where did you get them from?” …. huh? Blue? From where? Without thinking my brain made me say “My auntie gave them to me” … she turned away and started talking to somebody else. It was ok as I received a phone call at that time from a friend of mine from Miami who told me he had fired some people and needed my help in his business. That made me decide to head back to Miami in a couple of days time.

Later that day I visited my friend’s workplace as he has his own office complex. This was also nice and he has a room with a sofa … I immediately bagsied it. After working for a few hours there I went back to the apartment and decided to hit the Jacuzzi again last thing at night. No rain this time and it should have been locked after midnight but it wasn’t. I saw a couple in there and it was clear they wanted to have some midnight fun, soooooooo I decided to ruin it for them and joined them in the Jacuzzi. This guy was over twice her age and this is what it’s like a lot over there, rich older men buying the minds of hot young girls … and damn was she smoking, half Columbian, half Puerto-Rican, full fantasy girl. I was chatting with the both of them but when they decided to heat the Jacuzzi up more than it already was, that was my cue to leave ... pretty sure those bubbles weren't being created by the machine.

Next morning I picked up my suitcase from the lobby, got myself clean and looked into options to retrieve cash whilst I was over in the US. I obtained a gift card which is like a debit and credit card and it’s a bit strange how it works. The US is actually primitive in a few ways and this is one of them …. They still haven’t mastered the art of chip-and-pin on credit cards, you have to sign for purchased. I’m surprised I wasn’t reported for fraud the number of times I was writing my signature like I was trying to forge one … I haven’t had to sign something in a very long time.

2 days in Fort Lauderdale … it was time to head to Miami for the next phase of my adventures ........

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