Mexico GRB conference
For some reason (hopefully a good reason?) this is a year in which I'm getting a lot of conference invites, often to interesting places: Bormio in February and Aspen in August (which I attended); Rome in July, South Africa in August, and Armenia in October (which I did not, due to scheduling conflicts and/or lack of time). The last invite of the year was for a slot at a December meeting in Playa del Carmen (near Cancun, Mexico) where some Mexican astronomers were planning on hosting a small "invite-only" GRB conference at a beach resort.
There were few weeks during the year during which a trip to Mexico for a conference would make any sense, but as fortune would have it this was one of them: December 2-6, immediately after Thanksgiving and before MFF. So I said yes right away - it would be an opportunity to advertise some recent work, keep a toehold in a topic I don't follow very closely these days, and finally visit Mexico - a country I grew up less than a three hour drive from, and yet had never visited.
Not that I was particularly excited about the location - I'm not really a tropics person, and if anything the exotic location was a minus, since I was fearful of looking greedy or non-serious if I were to go to the university to ask for travel support to spend a week at a beach resort. In fact, partly because of of all the other conference invites (and non-invite conferences and visits I hope to make), I decided not to ask for any funding at all and just pay the entire thing out of pocket. Perhaps this wasn't necessary, but it did at least absolve me of some potential guilt I might have felt about it.
In any case - after my very brief Thanksgiving visit back to New Mexico, Sunday morning found me on a plane to Houston and then another to Cancun. Immigration was quick - a little too quick, as it turned out, since I had to wait an hour in the chaotic arrivals area (with dozens if not hundreds of taxi company employees milling about competing for potential customers) before linking up with the two other scientists I was sharing a ride with over to the resort hotel I'd be staying at.
Said resort was in the town of Playa del Carmen, which was about 45 minutes south of the airport. We arrived there just after 5pm, and it didn't take long after checking in to bump into some other attendees I knew. We had a snack at the free snack bar, dinner at the free dinner buffet, and then a couple of drinks at the free bar. (The resort, apparently like most of them in that area, is "all inclusive" - all food, drinks, and activities are covered by the daily rate.)
However, that was really the only day in which I allowed myself such indulgence. For most of the rest of the week it was a standard conference - indeed, a harder working one than usual for me, since I was far behind on my preparation (the semester was just too busy - and so not only had I not written my talk, I'd not done any of the calculations behind it). The afternoons between 1pm and 4:30pm were breaks in the official schedule, but I spent all of them working to get ready for my presentation for the last day (along with Monday through Wednesday evenings). I also had to spend most of the sessions themselves preparing (rather than paying close attention to the other talks) - which was not ideal, although as it turned out the conference had a very heavy GRB focus anyway, and so there was not a huge amount of content that was particularly relevant to me specifically.
Because of that, and because beaches have never really been my thing, the resort atmosphere was somewhat wasted on me - sitting on the balcony in the warm afternoon sun overlooking the pool while I worked on my talk was nice, but ultimately I was still working!
There were two main exceptions. On Wednesday, the conference arranged for an afternoon excursion to Tulum, the ruins of an old Mayan seaside city about an hour south of the conference. This was at least moderately interesting - the architecture and the very different culture from amy present-day society behind it, as well as the beautiful location. It was not the most efficient excursion (there was a lot of waiting around and general non-clarity about the timing) but we got back in time for the evening talks, at least. Then on Thursday, I'd finally finished my talk and could enjoy the official conference dinner at a nearby restaurant. This was notable mostly for the fact that there was a group of raccoons living under the restaurant deck (who appeared from time to time during the dinner), which obviously made my night. After that most of the conference headed a few blocks away to a Cuban bar for a couple of shots of rum, before eventually heading back to the conference hotel.
My talk was the first one on Friday morning - and it went fine, although as is often the case I felt a bit rushed, and while I stayed within the time limit I didn't maybe emphasize everything I wanted to communicate as much as I planned. Still, I did end on time and the talk provoked a lot of interest, so hopefully it left a good impression (as I'd very much like to be invited to more conferences of this nature)! I then stayed for a few more talks - but then had to dash to the airport shortly before the end of the session to catch my 3pm flight.
The taxi ride back to the airport gave some insight into world affairs and the nature of the tourist industry in developing countries - the taxi driver was a former US illegal immigrant who was taken by his family to Nebraska in his teens in the 1990's, married there, had children there - he's probably lived in the US as long as I have. But lacking citizenship, he decided to return to Mexico two years ago to "play by the rules" and apply for some sort of forgiveness visa that would allow him to re-enter the US. Who knows whether that will ever happen, now. In the meantime (at least by his account) all tourism jobs in Mexico apply minimum wage only (roughly $15/day), and despite being Mexican by birth the country was not home for him. An unenviable situation.
In any case, following the ride I reached the airport in time, spent way too much on overpriced airport goods and food (who knows where that money goes), and was off to MFF by mid-afternoon.
There were few weeks during the year during which a trip to Mexico for a conference would make any sense, but as fortune would have it this was one of them: December 2-6, immediately after Thanksgiving and before MFF. So I said yes right away - it would be an opportunity to advertise some recent work, keep a toehold in a topic I don't follow very closely these days, and finally visit Mexico - a country I grew up less than a three hour drive from, and yet had never visited.
Not that I was particularly excited about the location - I'm not really a tropics person, and if anything the exotic location was a minus, since I was fearful of looking greedy or non-serious if I were to go to the university to ask for travel support to spend a week at a beach resort. In fact, partly because of of all the other conference invites (and non-invite conferences and visits I hope to make), I decided not to ask for any funding at all and just pay the entire thing out of pocket. Perhaps this wasn't necessary, but it did at least absolve me of some potential guilt I might have felt about it.
In any case - after my very brief Thanksgiving visit back to New Mexico, Sunday morning found me on a plane to Houston and then another to Cancun. Immigration was quick - a little too quick, as it turned out, since I had to wait an hour in the chaotic arrivals area (with dozens if not hundreds of taxi company employees milling about competing for potential customers) before linking up with the two other scientists I was sharing a ride with over to the resort hotel I'd be staying at.
Said resort was in the town of Playa del Carmen, which was about 45 minutes south of the airport. We arrived there just after 5pm, and it didn't take long after checking in to bump into some other attendees I knew. We had a snack at the free snack bar, dinner at the free dinner buffet, and then a couple of drinks at the free bar. (The resort, apparently like most of them in that area, is "all inclusive" - all food, drinks, and activities are covered by the daily rate.)
However, that was really the only day in which I allowed myself such indulgence. For most of the rest of the week it was a standard conference - indeed, a harder working one than usual for me, since I was far behind on my preparation (the semester was just too busy - and so not only had I not written my talk, I'd not done any of the calculations behind it). The afternoons between 1pm and 4:30pm were breaks in the official schedule, but I spent all of them working to get ready for my presentation for the last day (along with Monday through Wednesday evenings). I also had to spend most of the sessions themselves preparing (rather than paying close attention to the other talks) - which was not ideal, although as it turned out the conference had a very heavy GRB focus anyway, and so there was not a huge amount of content that was particularly relevant to me specifically.
Because of that, and because beaches have never really been my thing, the resort atmosphere was somewhat wasted on me - sitting on the balcony in the warm afternoon sun overlooking the pool while I worked on my talk was nice, but ultimately I was still working!
There were two main exceptions. On Wednesday, the conference arranged for an afternoon excursion to Tulum, the ruins of an old Mayan seaside city about an hour south of the conference. This was at least moderately interesting - the architecture and the very different culture from amy present-day society behind it, as well as the beautiful location. It was not the most efficient excursion (there was a lot of waiting around and general non-clarity about the timing) but we got back in time for the evening talks, at least. Then on Thursday, I'd finally finished my talk and could enjoy the official conference dinner at a nearby restaurant. This was notable mostly for the fact that there was a group of raccoons living under the restaurant deck (who appeared from time to time during the dinner), which obviously made my night. After that most of the conference headed a few blocks away to a Cuban bar for a couple of shots of rum, before eventually heading back to the conference hotel.
My talk was the first one on Friday morning - and it went fine, although as is often the case I felt a bit rushed, and while I stayed within the time limit I didn't maybe emphasize everything I wanted to communicate as much as I planned. Still, I did end on time and the talk provoked a lot of interest, so hopefully it left a good impression (as I'd very much like to be invited to more conferences of this nature)! I then stayed for a few more talks - but then had to dash to the airport shortly before the end of the session to catch my 3pm flight.
The taxi ride back to the airport gave some insight into world affairs and the nature of the tourist industry in developing countries - the taxi driver was a former US illegal immigrant who was taken by his family to Nebraska in his teens in the 1990's, married there, had children there - he's probably lived in the US as long as I have. But lacking citizenship, he decided to return to Mexico two years ago to "play by the rules" and apply for some sort of forgiveness visa that would allow him to re-enter the US. Who knows whether that will ever happen, now. In the meantime (at least by his account) all tourism jobs in Mexico apply minimum wage only (roughly $15/day), and despite being Mexican by birth the country was not home for him. An unenviable situation.
In any case, following the ride I reached the airport in time, spent way too much on overpriced airport goods and food (who knows where that money goes), and was off to MFF by mid-afternoon.