Gambling and Gaming!!

Ever watched the movie 21? I had not watched the movie till I came to US. I was another person, like many, who was least interested in English movies-no songs, no dance, and on top of all these- American English spoken by actors who hardly open their mouth to speak the words. I hardly even understood what they said. Why trouble yourself by watching English movies when you have plenty of Desi movies in languages you know, and that have songs, handsome actors and beautiful actresses in it! Ever imagined how would it be to land in this place and not being able to watch a desi movie? Well, I understood it. And without an option, I had to switch choices. I started watching Hollywood movies, and Kichu suggested me to watch the movie 21. There was nothing much evident about the movie from its title. But I watched it. And I fell in love with it. I had always wondered how gambling would be, how casinos would look like, how will I ever learn what were the different choices I would have to gamble and so on! 21 had all the answers. Do watch it if you need the answers too. And as you guessed right, the next thing I wanted to do was to visit the Gambling capital of the world- Las Vegas.

Inspired by 21, I learnt how to play Black Jack, one of the most dangerous gambling games. Fell in love with the game so much that, I started reading about it all the time and asked Kichu to teach me too. We had even downloaded the app for Black Jack on our iPhone. Now it was time I really wanted to play that for real. Kichu, one day gave me a surprise saying that we were really going to Vegas. Oh My GOD!!! I can legally gamble! That too as anticipated, for the first time. I started preparing for the trip again. Read through few articles, got to know of the various options one would have there and here you go- April 9 had finally arrived. Las Vegas was located in the West Coast of USA, in the desert state of Nevada. West Coast was in Pacific Time, which was 3 hours behind the East Coast time. Obvious was the haul time, yes, single flight, 6 hours. I could have travelled back and forth between Dubai and Cochin by that time.

We arrived at the Cincinnati Airport, which is when we got to know that our flight was delayed by 3 hours. We waited, waited and waited. We were all accompanied by a group of guys and girls, who were really excited to be to Vegas. Once we got into the flight, all of them just shouted in chorus, "Viva Las Vegas"!!! After the long haul, we finally started to see the Strip of Vegas, which is the most expensive place on earth. Thousands of Volts of light, 6 miles, "The Strip" , pulled all of our brains and eyes on to it. People in the other parts of the world, do not even have one day of electricity. This place did not have a moment without this thousand volt of power. What a contrast!! Partial right?

Kichu was being to Vegas the 2nd time. Hence, he got the chance to drive through the Strip again, while I enjoyed the lights, traffic, hotels and people, with some amount of fun and guilt in mind. But ultimately, we had come here to enjoy right.... so just chill girl! It really did take a while to digest the fact that I was in the heart of the gambling capital! I enjoyed the short drive to our hotel- Trump, which is where we had to stay for 3 days. We were welcomed to the Trump by the bright lights from the Chandeliers hanging from the ceiling to the floor. We collected the keys to our room and know what? Our room was in the 45th floor. woohoooo!!!! never even had thought of that! And another surprise was that, we reached the 45th floor in less than 30 seconds!!! Human brains- really a wonder. As we were tired after our journey from the Atlantic to Pacific, we were ready to just doze off after a hot tub jacuzzi.

Day 2 started with drive to Grand Canyon, one of the largest Canyon in the world, Kichu's favourite part of the trip. He says, Grand Canyon is much more pretty than Niagara. Well, I did deny that though. After all , Beauty lies in the eyes that see it right? We started off our 5 hours drive to the Canyon, with a 10 minutes halt at Hoovers dam, on the border of Nevada and Arizona States. Both sides of the road had mountains, desert,desert, desert and desert only, with some greenery of dry cacti, here and there. Well, it was nothing new to us, as both of us had seen this plenty of times. Finally, we arrived there, found a parking spot, grabbed our camera and rushed towards the look out area. To be frank, for a moment I really did feel what he said was right, this place was just too good to be put in words. Can earth be more natural and beautiful? It is not water and sky that are always beautiful. Indeed mountains and canyons are! The prettier it was, the scarier it was too. It was just because of the heights and it was definite that if one falls down, he would surely reach the ground that was more than 4000 feet below. Is not that scary? Well, I did not care for the scary part, I just enjoyed the beauty part. We kept on walking, walking and walking. Not even once did I take my sight of the beauty on my right. Most of the people who come to Las Vegas, definitely would drive 5 hours to see Grand Canyon even if it was for a matter of one hour. It is really worth that 5 hour drive. We started to get late to drive back, but we did not want to go. Wish we could have just been there, the whole day. We also got a peek view of the Vishnu rocks( foundation rocks of the Canyon- 4000 million years ago ), Buddha temple and Siva temple in the middle of the Canyon. Surprised by the names right? So were we! We did not find anybody to clarify the names but. With half minds, we started our journey back to Las Vegas. We were halted by the traffic, for almost 2 hours, on the border. Finally, we reached back, took a hot shower and started to explore the Strip for dinner options- and we found an Indian restaurant. :)

Day 3 was a real jam packed, tight scheduled day. We started off with the Treasure Island hotel, exploring the Casinos, Shows and exhibits each of the hotels had. We then walked to the Caesar's Palace, where I had the first casino experience of my life. Being inspired by 21, I wanted to play only Black Jack. We took tokens and headed to a table. Despite learning so much about Black Jack, we did not win any money. The best part of it was that, we gained some money and then we started losing it, so before we even lost further money, we decided to move ahead with the money we had! :) With the remaining money, we tried our luck at the slot machines and poker tables. None of them yielded a penny! What a satisfaction to have gambled for the first time and won nothing except a souvenir token!! Well, that is the dark side of Gambling! You win, only if you are ready to start off with a real huge amount! :) The day was busy with our visits to Flamingo, Tropicana, Luxor, Mandalay Bay, Monorail, Venetian, Palazzo, The Fire show by Mirage, Dancing fountains at Bellagio, Harrahs, Monte Carlo, MGM Grand and finally Trump. We did also find time to have dinner and lunch at the same Indian restaurant. During lunch, Kichu met his old friend there. We had some time with them too. I did also get a small chance to view the table dance from outside, but due to well heavy rush there, Poor me could see nothing! :)

Gambling, Casino, money making are all fun- with the tons of electricity being used there just to light up the strip for making money- did make me think and feel bad for a while! Way back- I really got time to find out- how did the 6 mile strip get so rich? Just with casinos? How are the hotels surviving the peak of recession, when people who come to gamble would have either been laid off or are having a pay cut? Where does the money come from? Where does the power come from? Why is it being wasted so much? Did Vegas have that much in it? Well, I still wonder! May be it is all fair in gambling!What do you say?