Pop a Cork... Fingers Snapping...
by Ben Dobson (4-29-02)

There wasn't a red carpet welcoming the visitors. Nor was there any triumphant music trumpeting the virtues of arriving at the world's largest resort casino in the world. Instead, it's just a bumpy Route 2 which brings you to Foxwoods' front steps. But not before it branches in a half-dozen confusing directions.

I circled around the sprawling complex for about fifteen minutes before I found a parking garage to my liking. It took another ten minutes of driving in the garage's roundabout, until I settled into a parking space three floors underground.

I quickly found the garage elevators (perhaps the first thing clearly marked since I arrived) and summoned one. The hallway already had the faint stench of cigarette smoke, a scent not unlike a hotel room slightly stained by the smell of tobacco.

I had come under the specific instructions of meeting by "the Indian at the main entrance next by the valet parking at 6:30." I wandered through the sprawling complex, finally finding an information booth with a map. When I explained where I was supposed to meet to the kind woman staffing the booth, she told me I'd already found the spot. I turned around and saw an Indian, near the main entrance, next to the valet parking. This was by 6:20.

I found a seat and staked out the area. The Indian, translucent and illuminated from below, rotates ever few minutes. As it turns out, this Indian is the "rainmaker," and like clockwork, it performs a rain ceremony. Foxwoods describes it on their website as a "must-see high-tech show." If your definition of a high-tech show is a rotating, illuminated Indian that beams a laser from the tip of its arrow, then stop dead in your tracks! You wouldn't even need to waste your time gambling to find occupation here. And evidently the exhibit is captivating! I counted no fewer than two dozen people that stopped to watch this... spectacle.

By this point, I'd begun people-watching, and people-judging. I conclude that Americans combined with buffets are dangerous things. I happened to be seated with my back to a nearby "outdoor" buffet. Actually, it was the "Festival Buffet," which must mean "fun!" A woman, who I shall refer to as "Heavy," rushed up and asked me, "How do you get into this buffet?!" I explained that this was my first trip to Foxwood's and that I hadn't a clue. She huffed at me, as I surely delayed her feast by a few moments. Once she put on her thinking-cap and found the entrance, I noticed she ended up getting seated quite near me. Her plate contained the following items: penne pasta with meatball sauce, shrimp, barbeque chicken, salad drowned in dressing, two rolls and some gelatin. I assumed that this would just be her first round.

I would have kept an eye on that one, had it not been for another "Heavy" that decided to keep me company on my bench. This woman couldn't have been past her mid-thirties, but her overweight face, tugged on for years by the brutal forces of gravity, added at least ten years to her life. Couple that with her heavy smoking habit, and another decade is lost. Yes, she smoked, making Los Angeles' airspace look clean as Canada. Evidently smoking is such an onus, it took too much effort to actually hold her cigarette above her body in between smokes. She chose to rest it on her built-in shelf between puffs. I immediately scoured the room for fire extinguishers. Before I finished that, she'd already left. I knew she was leaving because I could feel the wood on the bench retracting and moving to its original position, actually groaning at the chance to be free once again. "Heavy" seemed typical of the average gambler at Foxwoods, and I soon felt like a minority, what being a skinny non-smoker not bent in throwing away my life savings in a fleeting attempt at grandeur. I figured that would be the last I'd see of "heavy" since moving took such effort, but I would end up having to dodge her ample-sized figure throughout my night.

But I have gotten ahead of myself. By now it is 6:45 and my party has not arrived, and the Rainmaker Indian had rotated it's rear-end into my face, which indicated I may not be in the right place. It turns out there are several Indians at the complex's three main entrances – all with Indians at the front. Funny, this casino just so happens to be built on an Indian reservation. Perhaps some clarification would have been in order. But no matter. Thanks to cellular phone technology, I was able to track my party down at the opposite end of the casino. Realizing the distance I'd have to travel through the gobs and gobs of people, I began to understand what "heavy" must feel like – not wanting to budge a muscle. I shuddered at the thought of her contracting any muscle and it quickly motivated me to find my friends.

I found them. Interestingly, they were at an Indian at the main entrance just beyond the valet parking. At least this Indian came across considerably less tacky and probably less of an insult to the few remaining Native Americans that might still have a hand in running the operation. The advantage to this one is that it is featured in all of the Foxwoods TV commercials, so I had essentially found fame within minutes of my arrival. Now that's what I call living for the wonder of it all!

Once we linked up, the rest of the night went quite well, save for a glob of fat within my hamburger and a snobby cocktail waitress. The fallacies surrounding me virtually evaporated while in the company of good friends, which would probably be the best advertising concept that Foxwoods hasn't thought of yet.