On The Auditory Road

I arrived in Austin around 10pm after an extremely long journey back up from Mexico. Getting back into the USA was a lot easier than I had originally anticipated; as the immigration officer left my visa waiver form in my passport when I went into Mexico it was still technically valid for when I came back in and it took all of 2 minutes before I was given the green light and re-entry to the country.

The first thing on my mind was to try and make my way into town to either find some kind of internet cafe that was open so I could find someone to couch surf with or to simply get nearer the centre so I would feel safer sleeping on the streets for the night. Austin is not built for pedestrians, not even a little bit, it took me about an hour to get half a while down the road traversing over barriers and gravel, it was horrid.

I decided that I was never going to get to town that night and so I went to try and find a cheap motel for the night. I went into a super 8 and asked how much the cheapest room was that night (the sign said $39) and they said the cheapest was $120 to which I scoffed heartily at said “you’re alright thanks” and walked out. SXSW was already having a detrimental effect on my time in Austin.

I walked for a further mile down the road and came across a very small very dirty looking motel and thought I would try my luck again and this time a small Asian man came out and asked me what I wanted and then explained that my room would be $40 for the night, I happily accepted this price, gave him what seemed to be my entire life’s details and he gave me my room key.

The room was a usual grotty motel one, a shower that barely worked, a bed that barely gave support and a television with very little on except adverts and porn. I had myself a quick shower and went straight to sleep so I could get an early start the next morning and try and sort out what was going to happen.

I woke up and trekked all the way down town past a thousand fast food restaurants, parks and highways. I made a brief stop at the University of Texas, went into their library, get myself an ID (after blagging some rubbish about doing a collaborative course with the uni) and used their internet to try and find myself a couch. From there I went to capitol building (which is beautiful) and eventually down to sixth street where the majority of SXSW stuff was happening. It was ridiculously busy even though it was only the interactive part of the festival and not the music.

I spent most of the morning getting free food and drink from people who were trying to advertise their products at the festival and then found an interesting place called “Space” down one of the side roads. It was a place that was open just for 4/5 days payed for by some kind of social networking company. It was simply a place for people to come and relax and use the free wi-fi (as well as a marketing ploy of course.) I chilled there for a few hours enjoying the free beer and getting a little tipsy before wandering off into the evening air after still not finding a place to sleep.

I came across a traveling college street kid named Uma, she was playing a harp on a corner leaning up again a lamp post. I sat down to listen to her play and talked to her for a while about traveling and the right way to do so. She explained that she was living in the green belt of Austin while SXSW was on and then would go back to college when spring break was over. I asked her for directions to the green belt because I still had no place to stay and was sure as hell not walking back to the motel I stayed in previously. I gave her $20 for her music was truly beautiful and she thanked me and looked a bit astonished and we parted ways.

I walked south of the city for a while, came across the green belt (I think, to this day I’m still not sure) but for some reason kept on walking and walked all the way down S. Congress until i got to a suburban town called Penn Field which is apparently has a large Mexican community because I was the only white person and everything was in Spanish. I found another motel and the price was $35 and I gave up on my idea of being outside and had another trashy night inside.

The next day I FINALLY got myself a couch host called Berkay who was originally from Turkey but was in Austin studying, the only problem being that he live in the north part of town and I really don’t like paying for buses, another long walk awaited me. I decided to put it off for as long as was viable and spent my time eating Texas BBQ from a trailer attached to a different trailer.

After walking through sunny Austin for just over an hour I came across the apartment I would be staying in for the night and settled down to talking with my new host about England, Turkey and the many idiocies of the USA. After a while we decided we would go down town and drink and had a few shots of tequila each before to get in the mood, his room mate Yuri also came along. The night was a usual drunken one going to rock clubs and heckling the terrible bands that we heard play before retiring back to the apartment and falling into sweet inebriated sleep.

I had got another OK from a couch surfing host for a place to stay so decided to save being rude I would stay at his (Justin’s) house that night. He lived slightly further north still in a more suburban neighborhood and I walked yet more to his place where the back door was left open for me.

Justin and I got on like a house on fire straight away, we had the same sort of interests and sense of humour and as it turned out within the hour, beer. He showed me his kombucha making set-up and then went drinking at a couple of bars. The usual chit chat happened, we then met up with his friend and his friends friend ate Thai food, came home and watched south park for the next 2 1/2 hours.

I had one more day left in Austin mostly just because I really couldn’t be bothered to move on and needed to save up some money after getting so many long and slightly expensive bus tickets everywhere. Justin gave me some of his delicious kombucha and suggested I went down to the east village in Austin which I had and had yet more BBQ and this was even better, i ate a pound of the ribs which were amazing and chugged down a bottle of Big Red soda which, from what I can tell, is simply water, fructose syrup and colouring, it was the American dream.

After spending the day there and on 6th street (again) I had decided I’d drunk enough so I returned back to the house (this time by bus, i was definitely done with walking!) and entered the house to have another blissful sleep before having to wake up at 6am and (luckily) being driven to the bus station to get my next exciting bus to New Orleans.