The Marcos Kirsch Experience®

It’s been a rough week. The SXSW Music festival started on Wednesday and for four days in a row I endured the trip downtown and the concerts and the partying. I know, it’s a tough job but somebody has to do it. Nathan came over from Dallas for the whole thing. A bunch of the local usual suspects were here too. Moi and Beto joined us for a last day of all-Japanese rock.

If you’ve never been to SXSW, you should go. It’s by far the largest of the two big music festivals in town (the other being the Zilker park based ACL) with some 1,400 bands from the whole world spread over all of downtown Austin. Last year sadly I couldn’t attend.

We saw some cool bands, some known (to me) and some new: Fobia, Moby, Sussie4, Presidents of the United States of America, just to name a few.

Some photos and shaky digicam YouTube-quality videos I took embedded below (or go to The MKX® Photo Central). Enjoy!

Sussie4

Fobia - Regrésame a Júpiter

Fobia - No eres yo / El Diablo

The Presidents of the United States of America: Peaches

The Presidents of the United States of America: Ladybug

The Presidents of the USA: Truckstop Butterfly / Lump

Moby

This week I had the luck of going to not one, but two concerts by Israeli musicians. Keep reading for photos and videos.

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For the first time since I moved to Austin I went to the yearly Carnaval Brasileiro. They have it every year for 31 years now. I kept hearing about it but never actually made it there for one reason or another.

Carnaval-Nice 156 by RickyRicky.

The Carnaval has gotten so big that now they have to hold it at the Palmer Events Center. I was told this is the biggest indoor Carnaval party outside of Brazil (around 6,000 people) but I can’t verify that. The eclectic crowd includes a smaller-than-usual percentage of students, surely due to the $35 ticket price.

They had a really good samba band playing the whole time, and lots of people in full Carnaval attire -which means anything but full attire. Lots of very attractive girls wherever you looked (there was this skinny topless chick dressed as a Hawaiian hula dancer… unbelievable!).

In order to maintain The MKX®’s PG13 rating, I have uploaded a censored subset of photos from the party to The MKX® Photo Central.

Photos at The MKX@ Photo Central

Video of Capoeira dancing at the Carnaval

Other people’s photos at Flickr

Enjoy!

It’s a bird!

It’s a plane!

No… it’s Arturito!

As you can tell from my last post, my cousin and former La Guarida dweller Arturo Karakowsky got married to the beautiful Debbie Forkowitz last Sunday. This was their religious wedding, as they held their civil wedding a few months ago (and I had the distinct pleasure of attending as well).

This wedding was unique because it was held right here, in the Live Musical Capital of the World, even though neither the groom nor bride were born here, but it’s the middle ground where both went to school. It also means that I was one of the few locals (a minority in this party) and had a house full of guests. It was cool and sort of surreal to see so many people from Monterrey at bars that weekend and especially at the rehearsal dinner and wedding banquet.

Without further ado, I leave you a link to a few photos I took. Feel free to email me any photos you’d like added to the album. Also, I took some video of the traditional dancing at the wedding. Since Arturo weighs around 40 Kg, he could really fly. Sadly his best acrobatics were not captured in my videos, as I was too busy throwing him up.

Originally uploaded by ralphsanchez.Many, many years ago, man dreamed of flying like a bird. Countless people shared the dream.In order to pursue this dream, the Flugtag was invented. An event in which the brightest engineering and scientific minds come together to test their latest attempts at the elusive flying machine in front of a knowledgeable crowd.Yesteday, we had one of said events here in Austin. A bunch of friends and myself headed to the Auditorium Shores park to check out the different flying machines. I must say, none of them flew, but I strongly believe that the advances we saw yesterday put us closer to this ancient dream of finally having a man fly inside a machine of his creation, like a bird.See some photos of the event, courtesy of many people at Flickr.com.I also uploaded a short video with some of the attempts, but Youtube.com didn’t manage it very well, so I’ll reencode and upload again shortly.

Feels like it was yesterday… but it’s actually been more than two days!

I have uploaded a few photos from the party on Saturday. But before that, look closely at the photo above and this photo… and tell me in the comments how I haven’t aged a bit (I still look 35).

Thanks to everyone who came, especially the out-of-towners (we had people from Monterrey, San Antonio, Houston, Dallas, and we were a few hours away from having people from Munich). And those who helped out before, during, and after the party, you make life worth living. Well maybe not so much but thanks.

Now click here to be taken to the password request page so you can gain access to the The MKX® Photo Central and finally see some photos!

[Update May 8th, 2007] I uploaded a few more photos I was sent.

[Update May 11th, 2007] Added photos sent by Vanessa.

[Update April 4th, 2008] Full evite text below.

Goodness golly. Is it May 2007 already? Time flies, things change and yet they remain the same. For example, back when we were 16 years old we used to love bullfighting, playing russian roulette, Maradona and going to really fun parties. Now that we are almost (approximately) 21 years old, we still love the same things, except for Maradona who let us all down with his drug-related problems.

Sorry, this is not the evite for the 2007 Russian Roulette Tournament (expect that one sometime next week). This is the evite for the one and only, exciting, super fun, unforgetable Birthday Party of Karine, Julia, and Marcos.

We’ll be meeting at the same place as last year (La Guarida). Bring some booze: Vodka, Tequila, Rum, Whisky, even that disgusting Smirnoff Ice (but no beer as a keg will be provided), lots of energy and be prepared for a good time.

For those of you who are too lazy to read through the whole thing (95% of you), here’s the executive summary:

What: Birthday party
Whose: Karine, Julia and Marcos
When: May 5th
Where: La Guarida
Who: The good looking, a.k.a. you, the recipients of this evite
Why: To scratch that itch - or something
How much: Free! But some alcohol and a good attitude are always appreciated.

[UPDATE 4/30/2007] It’s almost Saturday! We know you’re so excited you can barely hold in your pee… can’t blame you, I already had to change twice today!
If you haven’t replied to the evite yet, do it now or the organizers won’t know how many jello shots to make! You never want to be short on jello shots, now do you? A “Maybe” is better than a “No Reply” in the eyes of the all-powerful party throwers.
See you soon:
Marcos, Karine, Julia, and the supreme polka-dancing midgets.

Hope to see you soon!
Respond to the damn evite!
Be merry!

Your hosts
Karine, Julia and Marcos

[UPDATE 4/17/2007] Moved the party back 12 hours. It’s 9:00 PM, not AM (duh!)

[UPDATE 4/25/2007] We have now confirmed the participation two of the most popular DJs in South America, Eastern Europe and some parts of Japan: Extreme sports enthusiast and Master of the Venezuelan Gozadera DJ Fucho plus American Idol runner up and the King of Rythm DJ^2. Things are looking good for the party.

As some of you may already know, we had a little get-together in my place last Saturday to celebrate Julia’s, Karine’s and my birthday. It turned out to be a lot of fun. Since most of yesterday was spent cleaning and sleeping, I have not uploaded any photos. I’ll try to do that tonight.

Four years and counting… (see previous New Year entries: 2003, 2004, 2005, 2006).The MKX Staff® wishes all its readers a Happy New Year, even better than 2006. May all your wishes come true.Personally, I had quite an interesting New Year’s evening. Went to five different parties through the night, and then had to go take care of something that involved policemen, fights, lawyers and jails (nothing too serious, don’t worry). I finally got home and went to sleep around 11:00 AM. Not a night that will be forgotten soon, that’s for sure.I have selected a very appropriate photo to grace this post: Mr. Aaron Kirsch and Moishele sent me two boxes of Special Edition 2007 Nochebuena and Casta beer. Andres was kind of enough to bring them to Austin.

Nochebuena and Casta beer, yummy

The Ugly Nun takes a break. “El Biker” makes an appearance. A bunch of friends and I headed downtown to check out the costumes. Just like every year, there were thousands of people on the streets wearing some very cool costumes and most women were dressed up as “slutty ” (but not my friends, they’re nice girls.Note my cool mustache and sideburns. I had girls all over me, even more than the usual. Like flies all over a honey-smeared Marcos! I thought about it loooong and hard this morning, but at the end I shaved it all off. I’ll miss you mustache and sideburns. You made other guys fear me in the streets and the woman lust after me.Anyway, go see the photos, but keep in mind Andres is semi-nude in them. So if you’re pregnant, have back problems, or a weak stomach, don’t say I didn’t warn you.

It’s been a long time since the Ugly Nun was seen in Austin. Some say she was hiding (no, not in the closet). In reality, she was traveling the world…

AND NOW SHE’S BACK, UGLIER, HAIRIER, DRUNKER AND BEST OF ALL…SHE’S NOT ALONE

Follow the adventures of the Ugly Nun and her sidekicks Die deutschen Nonnen. Also included are: the Bearded Boy, the Hassidic Jew that looks like Jorge Campos, the Devil’s Bastard Child, the cutest bunny, and many more in The MKX® Photo Central.

Also, hurry up and head to The MKX® Gift Shop to snatch some Ugly Nun merchandise, such as the ever popular Nun Thong and the fashionable Mad Nun Baby Doll… while supplies last!

[Update 10/30/2006]: I just received a link to the official album from the party. Enjoy.

[Update 10/31/2006]: Jaramillo posted his own photos.

Last Saturday, May 6, 2006, Julia Gallegos, Karine Kowenski and myself threw a little birthday party. Read on to get to the photos… (more…)

 Last night we celebrated Gustavo’s bachelor party, as a reminder of the fun you get to have when you’re still single (even though about half of the people there weren’t). First we had dinner at Bone Daddies (see picture). From there, Gustavo, Chaparro, Katrina, Mota, Correa, Zepeda, Cetrulo, Cassandra, Andy boy, Jaramillo, Colibrí, Liza, Brody and others went back to Gustavo’s place to play a gruesome game of Monopoly. Andrés was lucky and snatched Boardwalk and Parkplace early in the game (double one?! what the hell?!?!?) and ultimately won the game. I had terrible luck with the die, but through my cunning business savvy and ruthless negotiation skills I was able to place a respectable, yet forgettable, third place.This is our story and we’re sticking with it.Gus, best wishes to you and Lucy.

For no good reason, we decided to have a party last night. But not just any party. A darn good party. 100+ people showed up and utterly trashed my house.

Special thanks to logistics specialist Julia Gallegos, Cheff Nathan Finkelstein and decorator / all around nice guy Arturito Karakowsky. Music and technical expertise were provided by DJ Cetrulo and DJ^2. If it wasn’t for them, we would have been listening to nothing but Soda Stereo all night.

Also, some special words go out to everyone who came from out for the party: Sarai, Efrat, Vanessa, David, Don Filemon, Nancy, Betty, Johnny Kings, Sandrita and Juan. The party wouldn’t have been the same without you. We would have had more beer-per-capita.

The “cleaning the day after” turned out to be the real party. A lot of poeple helped there too: Efrat, Arturito, Sofía, Carolina, Julia and Arturo.

And… if you read this far: Photos.

[UPDATE 11/21/2005]: See more of Darth Cetrulo. Jaramillo has posted some pictures of his own.

[UPDATE 2 11/21/2005]: Johnny Kings posts even more pictures. Darth Cetrulo unleashed!

[UPDATE 3 4/30/2008]: Read on to see original evite text.

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I just drove back from a night of bar-hopping downtown.The smoking ban is now in effect, and I don’t reak of cigarrette smoke. This is great!