10th of May 2005
TRAVELLING WITH MY PARENTS!

Hello, hello,

As you all know by now my parents have arrived to America a little while ago and they are just getting to know this country. This country I tell them it is a very friendly country because before the Spanish people came here nobody was here. I know, there were Indians but the Americans do not think of them as real people. If that would have been the case they would not have tried to kill them and they would not have tried to keep them all in small pieces of land where they can gamble and drink alcohol any time they want for a very smalls amounts

Of money before Custer and this guys will kill them but now it is Jim Been and Johny Walker. It is a joke.

But apart from that small detail Americans are really friendly because everybody comes from somewhere. My mum when I say that she looks at me with a suspicious face and she says I am sure they are but I do not understand anything of what they say, I do not speak English.

Well nobody speak English in this country any more, most of the people speak Spanish. The people that matter speak Spanish the one that clean the toilets, pick up the fruit, drive the buses etc. My mum looks at me and sight.

With that piece of information my parents and me took our car and went on a trip to the Grand Canyon, Monumental Valley and Breeze Canyon and Zion National Park.

Lots of time driving by themselves with all in front of them to learn, from the way you feel the tank to the way you get the sandwiches to the way the coffee is made.

The journey to Grand Canyon was really good. The soundtrack of Avenue Q was in the stereo of the car and Miren, Angeles and me where having a real laugh listening to the witty songs of the musical.

My parents in another car they were driving behind us trying to balance not to break the law with the speed limit and not to break the vision of our car in front to them. More that three times we stopped in a high places and wait for them. That was nice because it gave is nice chances to talk about what we were seeing on the road.

Finally we arrived to the Canyon and the first view is the best and everybody was very impress, lets go to the hotel and then lets go for lunch. For all of us, people of the Basc Country, to go to lunch, dinner and breakfast are highlights of our days. We found somewhere to it and as soon as my mother said lets go to the market and make some sandwiches I say I am going to have a hot burger or a steak. That was mistake because I got real cocky and the restaurant of the lodge was real shit. But who cares when you are in the Grand Canyon.

It was a beautiful place full of different colours and different views and beauty. It was very funny to see my parents walking around as if they will be going for hike in the hills of my village. "Vamos, caminar un poco no es tan malo" while the bus that goes all around the park take us over. Or my mum getting into the coffee place and looking around like she would be in a Bar in Spain. The waiter looking at her and saying with a very thick English accent cheeseburger and fries, Que dice? So she went for the salad.

Started to snow and it is even more spectacular but very cold. In the middle of the afternoon they left for Monumental Valley and we left for Las Vegas. It was a little bit scary to let them go disappearing down the hill with all the snow falling over the car.

They are learning how to be in a foreign country by themselves and it is not going to be easy.

Have fun

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9th of May 2005
PETRA IS SICK

Hello everybody,

It sounds a little bit stupid to state this fact in a title what everybody seem to know by now. I am not giving any new piece of information for all of you who know her.

Petra is the female member of spymonkey. She is also founder and artistic director and in her resume says that she speaks Spanish, French, German and Italian fluently. She is English and I have seen her speaking some of these languages that she mention on her resume but not all of them.

At this point of time she is sick. Well, she is a not terrible sick, she has a kind of flu that is keeping her in bed and it has made us to have to replace her in the show. Finally Sophie has played her part and she was very good and very funny. She is also a little bit sick but not as sick as Petra.

Toby told me that she went to see her and she had her nose full of cream. Moisturising cream because she is been blowing her nose so much lately that she need it to do that.

She would not like to think that I am doing a blog about the fact that she is sick and I am talking about someone else, and no she did not tell me to write a blog just about her. Why she would do anything like that? Yes, it is possible that she would do some thing like that because Petra is sick.

Now she is in bed but the rest of the time she is sick standing up, walking on the streets and having fun all over the place.

But let me tell you that apart form the very best reason why I am writing this is because she mention to me that I do not mention her enough in this little things and then she got sick and I had the funny idea of the word

game of Petra is sick and she is wonderfully sick.

Have fun

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8th of May 2005
GUY CAME

Hi everybody,

One of the most incredible things about Cirque is that it belongs to just one person. Yes, there is one person in the world that is the owner of the whole Cirque du Soleil and for you to understand it means that he owns cirque as you probably own a bicycle, the same thing.

He goes all over the world with his cirque and does business wherever the cirque is. And these days cirque is everywhere.

For us the little parts that make the bicycle move it is very important to know when the owner of the bicycle will be here because it is not very good that the day he is here there is a flat tire. So everybody is a little bit nervous and everybody try to have the whole bicycle real shiny and ready for him to enjoy and be proud of his ride. Also it does help a lot that he like the people who pimp your bike gets paid money and if you do not pimp your bike properly he will not pay you ever again.

Also he has a big entourage that follows him. They all are nice people, some are nicer than others but they all come with him. They arrived to the show and we are advice that Guy will be here and everybody is nervous. So for you to understand is like you are riding the bicycle of somebody else and the owner of the bicycle is coming to see how are you doing? At least you will have the bike clean and ready to go, as courtesy.

And that is what we do, we clean the bicycle for him, like these car washes where the girls put very small clothes that once they get wet they shrank and you can see trough while they wash the cars we put our small costumes and go almost naked to the stage to once more entertain the owner of the bike. He appreciate it but I think it is not completely fair on us because we keep the bicycle always ready and shinny so the day he comes it should be just another day.

Probably it is just fear to be taken the bicycle away from us.

Well, lets all try to be free and be sure that everything would be fine if we cannot ride this bike again.

Have fun

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7th of May 2005
HER (because I am angry)

?Hi

I am angry, very angry. I do not get angry very often, you could ask my friends and they will tell you different just to be funny but is not true. It takes quite a while to get really angry. It is true that I am moody, very moody especially when I am working in a show.

But this day I arrived to the show and I found out that Petra was out of the show. Well, I had already known that she was not going to be in the show because Petra had call me and we had already organize that Sophie, as we told HER before was going to take over her part.

We are very self organize in spymonkey and many times that does not sit very good in the cirque

do soleil power structure.

So I arrived to rehears and HER comes to me as I am walking with Toby and Sophie and tells us that Sophie is not going to be aloud to do Petra's part because she did not know. But she did because we told her. She told us that there are priorities that have to be taken care and she is needed in other places.

That did it for me and also the fact that Miren; my wife was with me and she was watching the whole thing. I had to show her that her husband has balls. So I told her that we are never a priority and that it is not fair. The number in animation when is done with three men is not very good, is actually very creepy to see Stephan, Toby and me around the girl-virgin and pumping her from every angle dress as puritans. It is terrible and I told her. I also told HER that she can do what ever she wants because she is the boss but she need to know that once more I disagreed.

It create a very high tension situation but by now, after working for a corporation for a year and half you know that they can stub you in the back at any moment and I have with spymonkey stubbed many times so it does not hurt anymore.

We did the show with no girl and it was bad. And one more day we were bad and nobody care. We made a fool of ourselves and it hurt.

Have fun ?

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6th of May 200

TRAVELLING WITH MY PARENTS !

Hello Everybody,

And that was that, once my mum started to cook and people started to eat her food and people started to say how good the food was to be in America it was like being at home. And we had a very nice day and we suffer for a while the suffering of someone that try to be there where is important holding the glass and tilting the bottle of the red the white and the beer so people would not be thirsty. Now my head hurts but I had to go to service my car and there was nothing that I could do to avoid that.

It was thou like a very boring day because I do not remember much. And it is sad because there must be always something nice to remember for every single day that you live. Once I red that you forget things so your brain will make more space for things that keep happening all the time.

But I seem to be part of another category because I remember things that happen quite a while and then things that happen yesterday I do not remember. Thou now that I think about it deeper I remember many important things that have happened during my life, still a very short life, and all the things that I consider of not importance they have disappeared and it is scary because there is people and places attached to them and who know if I will ever meet them or see them again.

In that case perhaps the memories related to them may come back and then I would have the chance to enjoy them again because they would have more meaning to me.

But let me tell you that with this thing I do not mean that you should not get drunk. I love getting drunk if anything I like it too much I just like to think about what it happens when you drink to much and the combination of age and abuse of alcohol make your memory to get hurt.

Have fun.

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5th of May 2005

TRAVELING WITH MY PARENTS II

Hi everybody nice in this world;

My parents are still here. I am going to write there names here so if ever they Google their names will appear in our page. My mums name is Maite BarruetabeÒa and the name of my dad is Patxo Basauri. They are in their early sixties and as I say in previous blogs this is the first time they have crossed the Ocean and the first time they are in America.

After a wonderful time in the Grant Canyon they came back home. They came earlier because I had organised a little party for the Latin people to meet them and more for my parents to meet the people that works in my show.

We cocked chicken breasts stuffed with ham and cheese in a mushrooms sauce, Spanish Omelettes and ham and cheese sandwiches. For deserts my mum did a typical Easter desert, Torrijas.

Many people came. Late as usual because everybody has lots of things to do when is their day off. Larry and Marcela, Linda the Pilates teacher and her man, all the spymonkey and their families and ... let me thinks Jacobo but he came very late.

Many people were there and I think my parents had a very good time. They talk as much as they could with all the people thou in the beginning they struggle a lot. Of course some people go real drunk and that was funny.

For him or her to be able to meet all this people or better to be able to cook for them it was a very nice treat and made them happy.

We even managed to go into the pool thou I thought it was very cold.

As I was looking at them in the party I could remember when I was young in the parties that they use to do and I was one of the kids running around and they were someone like me enjoying the company of their friends.

Have fun.

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4th of May 2005
LYNN

Hi fellows,

Her name makes people jump on their sits. So when the sheriff comes to town to check if the deputy is doing a right job everybody gets nervous but when the ex-sheriff comes to town and now it is not a sheriff anymore but he does not expect to be treated less than as a sheriff them everybody gets extremely nervous.

As I was waiting to hear the boring tapis rough the ex-sheriff appeared there. As a very good sheriff she had already hired another deputy, this time with no power but if you are used to give orders when you become ex immediately you have to find someone that you can bossy around because then you do not have a purpose. And they do know that at Cirque so the ex has hired a new ....how should a put it, boy? Yes, a new boy so she has someone to give things to do. And guess what is what she was doing? Well, the she-ex is writing a book.

Well, the she-ex said that but then she invited to all of us to talk to her boy so he can collect material to write a book that the she-ex will write. Even more boring because after a long time the she-ex is very boring and this is because the she-ex does not have anything to do and the she-ex does not want to go back home with her husband as the she-ex say is going to do, the she-ex would rather be with all the boys playing powerful and making tons of money and powerful decisions.

The she-ex left and the boy stayed longer to talk to nice people about how nice everybody and everything is and then the she-ex will write a wonderful book about the wonderful time with the wonderful cirque. Perhaps while the she-ex write the cirque will need the she-ex again and then the she-ex would not have to write and could play high again with the big boys.

Have fun

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3rd of May 2005
TRAVELING WITH MY PARENTS

Hello my dear friends,

I have mention before that? my parents have arrived here on the 20th of April. For all of you that do not know they like me are from Spain. This is the first time they have cross the ocean and have arrived to America. It is a big step. I want you all to remember that first time you went to a very long and difficult trip. It is always scary but I have to say that they did very well. I should say as good as they could. When I saw them for the first time they had shrank. Every body gets smaller when they get old but for me my parents were far too small for their age. And I have to tell you that I am not bigger than when I arrived here.

As soon as my? mum arrived home she started to take all the things that they guys in costumes had not seen and she started to get bigger again.

I love my parents for what they are and how they are.

The first time they went for a walk on the strip the strip become the main avenue in my town in spain. It was like going for a walk on the promenade in a sunny spring afternoon. The same speed in their walk, looking at things with that attitude that make the things look smaller or we have the same things in our town. It was great the only thing missing was to meet someone on the street that you know to say hello and to make a clever comment about the weather.

When we arrived home they both say that this place is incredible, the buildings are so big and beautiful, every thing is fabulous and fantastic. Perhaps my mum made a snide comment about the food but that was all because by that time we were eating a fantastic Spanish omelette at our house.

Miren was happy because my mum does the best Spanish Omelette in the world with the one of the mother of my friend Botella. But she was not so please with the kisses and strokes and holding hands or whatever my mum can get grip of that she was receiving. The tension got a little bit higher but soon they arrived to a solution and that was to reduce the amount of physical affection that they were going to give to each other.

Anyway they are going to stay here for a month so I will tell you moirÈ things about it.

Have fun

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2nd of May 2005
LOW ENERGY

Hello to all,

I just got my OSX word thing that you use to write in the computer. It is really fancy but from now I am going to have to learn how to use this so I ask you to forgive me if I make any mistakes.

Monday night first show and I am at the back of the stage in the wings and I am dancing away like everybody else. The salsa moment allow me to see the people in the auditorium; they seem to be having fun. Someone told me that today you could fell how everybody was really low energy.

I thought about it during the whole show and I did not notice anything. We had a great run with our numbers. Even if today we have had rehearsal with Leticia and we were completely tired. In pom-poms I could fell my legs so heavy that I was all the time fighting to make it to the end of the show.

So when we all were at the finale I try to look for signs that would tell me if this person was right. I arrived upstairs too late and I could see some people giggling and going for the finale almost dancing in the corridor. I was dancing away in my part of the stage, it is the left one if you look from the audience, and I was looking to everybody. Everything seemed to be normal. People happy with happy faces and dancing away with their beautiful faces. When suddenly it hit me. It was like on of these moments of Mrs. Marple the detective of Agatha Christie; everybody was avoiding the audience and dancing with each other's. Everything it made sense at once. If you dance for the audience you have to work giving attention to them but if you do not want to work then you can dance in automatic pilot but having fun with your friends.

It was beautiful. It looked like a party of friends that like each other's but had not had the opportunity to have fun together for a long time because they had to work a lot. Finally at the end of their teders they dance to have fun because they know that as long as they are having fun the audience will enjoy looking at them.

Well done everybody.

Have fun.

 

1st of May 2005

 

WORKERS DAY

Yes, it is workers day. Please lets not forget ever.

Of course is tempting to forget because for now the big companies have won the battle. It is a little bit of information for all of you that were living in the middle of a forest for the last 50 years and now you are back here in between the people of this world.

We do not celebrate anymore that we all work and that is a quality that make us stronger and better that a animal.? We work really hard but for the wrong reasons. When I was young in my country we had a dictatorship and every first of May everybody, all my everybody will go to the street to try to celebrate. It was forbidden and the police will end up taken people to prission and will beat the shit our of all the workers. After he died everybody could celebrate but people did not want to celebrate any more because you could be celebrating all the time. I do not mean by this that? dictatorship is good so people celebrate much more what I am trying to say is how quick we all forget that some time ago people will work many hours for no money and after lots of fights and lots protest and shit they got rights and now we have forgotten and we do not celebrate.

Well, I think we lost the battle, I am sure of that and they won. And now I am working for one of this big corporations that have changed the way we all think in this society. Now everybody wants to be rich with out working. Nothing wrong with that but lets not kill the thoughts that made us be more equal and better people.

Because now the big corporations as soon as the won the battle they got rid of the title that we gave to ourselves, WORKERS, and change it for associates. Ja, ja, ja, I piss my self laughing of the irony, no one of the thousands of people that work in Wall-Mart for example think for a second that they are what that word really mean. For god shake call them workers because that is what they are.

Happy Workers day to all of you that work and suffer because they fell that work too much for the money you make.

Have fun