Oil Rigs, Arbor Day and Nothingness

I recently went on a business trip to Houston for an Oil and Gas trade show called the Off-shore Technology Conference (see previous post). Note to all of my environmental-hippie friends: I didn't feel good about it. This conference happened to fall over Arbor Day, likely the second biggest hippie holiday since Earth Day. This confluence of events is strange enough, but my trip to Houston got even stranger.

I was in my hotel room on the 14th floor of Hilton's Medical Plaza hotel checking work email and eating lunch (a rather tasty Philly steak sandwich if I recall correctly) when I just happened to look out of my window.

Now as some of you may be aware, Texas is somewhat famous for its lack of zoning ordinances, which means this 19-story hotel was just across the street from a large residential neighborhood (just south of Rice University). This fact isn't really necessary for my story but for some reason I think it adds perspective.

So, I am peering down to the street from my 14th floor hotel room when out of the tree-lined neighborhood street directly across from the hotel I see a cop car pull out with its lights on. Nothing all that unusual for a large city, but that cop car was followed by two large stretch limousines and about 4 large black Chevy Suburbans and at the tail end of the convoy another cop car with lights on.

The cop cars were weaving back and forth on the road, blocking all traffic (not much traffic because it is a semi-residential neighborhood). Then, to my surprise, the cop cars stop right in front of the hotel. I have a moment of panic as bullet-proof vest clad officers jumped out of their cars and ran towards the hotel lobby. "Am I safe in here?" I asked myself. Then I reasoned that if it was something to worry about the cops wouldn't show up with an entourage of limos and SUVs.

Perhaps they are escorting some Saudi prince, I am in Houston for a large Oil and Gas show so it wouldn't have been outside of the realm of possibilities that some bigwig oil-rich prince would be escorted to his hotel, but this theory quickly vanished when out of one of the SUVs I saw two small bald headed gentleman exit the vehicle. They were in bright maroon and gold robes. I recognized the robes and bald heads as the traditional look of a Buddhist monk.

I quickly turned around, typed a few keywords into Google and discovered that the Dalai Lama was scheduled to speak at Rice University the following day. I confirmed with hotel staff later that day that the Dalai Lama was indeed in the same hotel as me... during the Oil and Gas... show over Arbor Day. Not sure how to process all of that information. But I did request that the gift shop in the lobby sell tee-shirts reading "I slept with the Dalai Lama" - they had no comment.