San Antonio and Austin, TX

i was in san antonio and it was really hot, 100f during the day and 80f at night. this is a bit freaky for this time of year i think but im beginning to understand where the american love of air conditioning comes from. although someone did try to tell me in needed to be 40f cooler indoors for hygiene reasons. what. i'm also beginning to see why texans are so fat. its impossible to work off any calories as you have to walk everywhere very slowly to avoid over heating. something esle distinctively american is the alamo which i visited. basically the story of the alamo is a bunch of texan republicans where laid seige by the mexicans back in the day and although overwhelmingly outnumbered they decided to persue a policy of 'victory or death' or in reality, certain death. it has come to symbolise texan bloody mindedness. the alamo itself is a former mission turned fort but now is revered as a shrine to the 'martyrs' of the alamo. i use inverted commas here because the space is no longer a church in any way but a shrine to the religion of federalacy that the americans persue. inside theres loads of flags everywhere and weaths and a glass case with davy crockets waistcoat in it. i cant think of anything like it in britain where we worship the spirit of the nation in an idolatry fashion.

they have the state capital in austin. its huge and modelled on the capital in dc, although its actually a bit bigger and completely dominates the small downtoan area. i think texas is trying to make a statement there. you'd think it would be antagonistic to austin which is in some ways very un-texan but i think the city is just too cool to care. all anyone does here is hang out anyway i think. everywhere you go its vintage shops and food places and music venues. 6th street is a bit touristy but at the same time just how you imagine it from sxsw reports on the radio. you walk along there at night and its all lit up with signs and music blasts from the bars onto the street. i went to a gig at emo's, kinda unfortunate name but its actually a pretty revered venue with cool silk screen style posters everywhere. now admittedly instead of going to a night with the austin sound (kinda american) i chose a post punk funk line up of bands because hey i know hat i like. i was all austin bands thou including the arm's reunion gig. they were very good actually but here i was at a gig on my own where everyone knew each other so i made friends with the opening act who was this crazy guy called neiliyo (google it). i actually thought he was quite good so he gets a plug here for being nice to me. he also loved my sunglasses so definately scoring extra points there. he introduced me to the most popular beer in texas "its great it tastes like water!", 'lone star' (legend: 'victory or death'). it really does, not only is it a bland lager but its quite flat. to be honest i think austenians could do with drinking a bit more. music audiences are famously static and everyone is too cool or perhaps too reverent to dance or look excited. i might go and see the bats over lake austin tonight, apparently they swarm at dusk, im right on the lake here in my hostel and its very luch and green and beautiful.