Reflections from Phoenix Trip

So I recently got back from a 5 day trip to Phoenix for work.  I've never been anywhere in the southwest of the US so it was really interesting to see what it's like out there.  From the plane, the city looked kind of lame.  Large squares filled with rows of houses that reminded me of suburban Detroit.  The downtown area was rather small and split into 2 centers.  There looked like about 15 tall buildings for each center.  Mainly the city looked like a huge sprawl of 1-story houses in the southwest/Mexican pueblo style.  My first impressions after getting out of the airport were "Wow.  This is so much nicer than crappy Michigan weather."  It was amazing to see palm trees and all of the desert wildlife that is totally foreign to me.  No clouds, low 90s, and blazing sun weren't too bad either.  Phoenix is for old people.  That was pretty obvious after spending 10 minutes driving around.  There are tons of walled retirement communities with identical houses that would normally seem like the worst thing in the world, but they didn't look half bad.  Nice houses in the same style, golf courses in the backyard, golfcarts to drive everywhere, in a different life I could see myself there.  After spending some time in the city and surrounding areas, however, I determined that it's just a nice place to visit.  I could not live there.  Everything was just "nice."  It didn't have the same culture (or any culture) as Detroit or the East coast.  Everything was quiet, even on the main roads, and no one seemed to have any personality.  Where were the loud black people?  Where were the bums freestylin' for money to spend on hookers?  Where was anyone who cared about sports?  Where was anyone who cared about anything?  There were too many old, quiet, white people.  I didn't get to spend any time downtown, but it didn't seem like there was much going on.  We visited Sedona, AZ (the 2nd, 4th, and 5th pictures below) which is about 2 hours from Phoenix and that reminded me of Ann Arbor.  It was a cool hippie town that definitely had more personality than Phoenix.  So I enjoyed the trip for the most part, it was just strange.  They're whole outlook on life is different.  It's slow, easy-going, without a care in the world.  Not for me (at least at the moment), but a nice place to take a break.             

- Matt