re: #177 Jack Burton

Ah, Prometheus. Can someone explain what the opening scene is about, where the alien guy drinks from the bowl and then disintegrates into the river? Why is he drinking from the bowl and why did he die? And who or what was in the spaceship hovering nearby? I never got the connection between the opening scene and the rest of the movie, other than there was a similar alien-type guy at the end who had been hibernating in some sort of ship.