Travel Wrong: After Dark, or: A Little Too Loosey-Goosey/BORACAY

Our plane lands in Caticlan, from where we take a trike to the port, as in where the boats be. After a ridiculous exercise in ticket buying involving three different windows, an environmental fee AND a port tax, Jordan and I are ready for Boracay.

Don't fuck me on this, Charon

The boat does its boat thing transporting us across water to our destination, and we then immediately head to White Beach, where Jordan has a friend waiting for him. First we find a nice guesthouse called La Bella Casa, and I find out that Jordan is a fucking mad dog haggler. He busts out the well-honed tactic of loudly and angrily comparing everything to cheaper rooms in Palawan, and has no problem quickly talking the proprietor down from 1000 pesos to 700. That's for a decent room with a TV, aircon, hot water, and laughable yet existent wifi. Even towels and shampoo! I'm struck by what a novice I've been.

We walk to find his friend, but stop on the way for Jonah's Shakes, which I remember seeing lauded on Wikitravel. You know how new parents are always going on about how having a kid is the greatest thing in the world, and their lives in retrospect now seemed so empty and pointless? Those idiots have never had one of these avocado banana shakes. Move over, miracle of life.

It's as cathartically satisfying as...having all three starter pokemon (have I finally found you, core audience?)

Ubiquitous touts mill about the beach eager to bother you about scuba/snorkel/sail trips, but in a strange twist many of these guys don't even speak English. Still, the island is immediately identifiable as an international vacation destination.

It isn't shit.

Sure, Boracay has beaches of perfect white sand being gently molested by clear, emerald waters, just as all those business execs are gently molesting their mistresses on top of that lovely, lovely sand. However, what all those tourist photos take great pains to leave out are the hotels and concrete boardwalk that start maybe ten feet away from the surf. In fact, most of the beach we're staying on (the popular one, I'm later told but can instantly surmise) is literally walled off by tents along the boardwalk, housing expensive beach-side bars and restaurants and Filipino cover bands. After all, what better way to enjoy your expensive beach vacation than by seeing the beach through a layer of dark, insect-and-tout-repelling fabric?

Just a few feet behind me from here, actually.

We locate Jordan's friend Ian at the Astoria Resort, because Ian has infinite quantities of money and intends to spend it. Staying with him is his girlfriend who has never traveled outside of Australia, and both of them are immensely impressed when they find out that I actually eat street food while traveling. Makes me wish it was 100 years ago, where by virtue of simply having traveled a bit I could get invited to rich peoples' dinner parties as a guest of honor. I could also wear a safari hat unironically, which is somehow desirable to me.

Jordan tells his friend about my less-than-stellar experience in Perth and resulting view of Australia, and Ian is simply appalled. They vow to rectify my view of Aussies and by extension redeem their homeland. Then we eat some bolognese at the Astoria restaurant and drink beer. They both say "Out of control!" a lot, but they really are lovely people.

Ian begins the festivities by buying a bucket of beer on the boardwalk, which seems to be the hip thing to do, and we sit down to watch some live music at a bar called Bom Bom.

Despite my general stance on jam bands and their collective stain on the human experience, I must say the Bom Bom folk are good fun. They even have me on stage to sing and drum a little with them, which I suppose was a cunning way of making me part of the problem. Once we're a good few beers deep, one of us starts chatting up some Russian girls sitting close by. By chance, this is the day I'm wearing my one shirt with a nonsensical joke in Cyrillic on it, which turns out to be a crackerjack icebreaker.

The singer from the band invites us all to to come back tomorrow night to continue jamming, to which everyone seems amenable. Around this point Ian leaves with his girlfriend, and Jordan and I in turn leave with our new Russian friends, Jenny and Anya. Jenny speaks great English and is naturally the more talkative of the two, while Anya's English is about on the same level as my Russian. It's a step up from my French, but not by much. However, I'm more far more taken with Anya, enticed by her big adorably chubby cheeks and enticingly impish smile, whereas Jenny sports more stereotypical hard, Slavic features, and eyes that whisper "If this party were to somehow devolve into a bleak fight for survival, you will lose to me." My shallowness is mightily satisfied that Jordan takes the interest in Jenny, and that Anya actually seems to find me attractive, if not interesting. It's possible she is nodding along and laughing at my jokes in a "pretending you are invested in a conversation in French spoken by French people" kind of way, but Sister, I invented that game. It don't bother me none: see previous sentence, esp. with regards to "attraction", i.e. hers in this guy (author gestures to himself).

After a spell of walking along the beach, we lose track of Jordan and Jenny, which Anya and I use as a convenient excuse to more or less collapse where we're standing onto the sand and make out. I attempt to use my mastery of the Russian language to sweet talk her (sweet talking being a thing I've seen in films and understand to be what a normal man does in these situations), but the words for "beautiful" and "red" are kind of similar, and I have a tendency to mix them up. In hindsight, I almost certainly said "You are red, you are red" over and over while getting sand in her hair. Regardless, she rolls with it, due either to my amazing Russian skills, politeness, or some very specific Cold War fetish.

Unfortunately, I can't remember how to get back to my guesthouse, and Anya says Jenny has her key. By now I've drank approximately one thousand beers, so you may be less shocked and appalled that my response is to mentally shrug and sort of wonder if we can't just do it in the sand. Turns out, the popular beach is still quite popular at nighttime, and accidental perverts keep walking by with flashlights and gawking. After my mouth has sufficiently filled with sand and I'm spitting out grit, I make up my mind to find the goddamn Bella Guesthouse, I can't actually remember the name of the guesthouse at this point, but I refuse to let that deter me. I do remember Jonah's, the shake shack beyond mortal description, and I know it's somewhere close by.

I WILL FIND YOU

Through some sort of sexy miracle, and because this island just isn't that big, I succeed in finding Bella. I knock, since Jordan has the key, and I'm answered by him in a towel and Jenny further inside, also in a towel. He looks ashamed, and Jenny looks...like a stoic Russian. Visible emotional range isn't a strong aspect of their culture. Oh I totally forgot to mention! Jordan has a girlfriend. That probably has something to do with the shame. Bummer for him. Jenny gives Anya their room key, and we are on our way to Sexylvania, Population: Hopefully Me and This Girl That Is Real.

We settle in on the bed, and she turns on the TV. Awww yeah. It's some international MTV station, and Lady Gaga plays followed by some Korean music videos. Not ideal, but I'll go with it. It's definitely time for business. I begin kissing her on her lips and face, and she responds in kind. Yeahhh, you know what I'm talking 'bout. Without getting too crass and making this blog unsuitable for younger readers, it's lucky she has condoms, and it turns out language barriers are no match for a girl who knows what she wants, doing it-wise. She is as applaudable as she is terrifying. After a couple of turns at bat that get a little darker than I generally prefer my lovemaking, especially when soundtracked by an unending cacophony of way-too-cheerful K-Pop, I'm spent both physically and emotionally. I stay the night. She hogs the only sheet.

The morning is a little awkward, as I try to be a gentleman and invite Anya to breakfast, but she doesn't understand. She does say she'll be at Bom Bom tonight, so I tell her I'll see her then. Once I exit, I feel like the cock of the damn walk, happier than a poor kid with a Lunchables. As I briefly mentioned before, I had read on an awful travel-themed pick-up artist blog that you are virtually guaranteed to get laid in Boracay, so sleazy credit where sleazy credit is due. I'm sorry my blog doesn't have any international pick-up tips that you might find in someone else's travel guide, but I can guarantee far fewer typos.

After half-strutting, half-staggering back to Bella Casa, I'm a little surprised to find that Jenny is still in the room with Jordan, but she leaves while I shower. Jordan informs me that last night she started giving him a blowjob, but he had her stop when he felt too guilty. He really is a lovely guy. He makes me promise not to tell Ian, which hadn't even occurred to me. At least he's broken up about it, which is why I changed everyone's names, although it occurs to me that anyone looking on this blog for cheating clues now knows as well. My bad.

After his wits have been gathered, Jordan and I walk down to Casa del Sol in D*Mall. Not a small island stretch of tiny family-owned shops like you'd think, but a spotless hive of upper-class stores and restaurants criss-crossed with paved cement streets. Picture lots of old bald men sucking on shrimp tails, forever. I enjoy a big hearty American breakfast that does my stomach no favors. We can't find Ian, so we swim in the ocean for a stretch, because I haven't been sunburnt in awhile and am way past overdue.

Who needs skin, really

When Ian still hasn't shown up, we head to the Astoria ourselves, but he isn't in his room and the desk doesn't know anything. We decide to swim in his hotel's pool while we wait. It's the least we can do.

We are good friends.

After a break for lunch at a nearby sigis joint, and Ian still yet to appear, Jordan and I exeunt back to our room and have us a little siesta.

Nothing like boiling hot, salty meat to stay cool on a warm tropical day.

blah blah running caramel flan joke i really like it OK

I mostly catch up on TV shows on my netbook waiting for Jordan to wake up, before drifting off myself. When I come to, I snatch my watch from the nightstand, hoping it isn't already past 8. Not quite: according to the watch, 2 in the freaking morning. Whoops.

Jordan's still sleeping, and I feel awful about wasting a night and not seeing anyone, so I decide to go out for some drinks. Maybe the girls will still be around, who knows. I walk the length of the beach while enjoying a few beers, and by the time I've strolled back it's now 4 am and everything is closed. Still, those 6.9% Red Horse beers have already done their job, and during my drunken meandering I'm struck with the bitter realization that my trip is almost over. Despite, well, everything that's happened to me, I would like nothing more than to spend another week or two here and get drunk with nice people and even have uncomfortably violent sex with strangers. Stupid finite amount of money. Stupid good friend getting married. Stupid life!

Once I've got back into town I'm immediately propositioned by a multitudinous horde of ladyboy hustlers, which eases the pain of having to leave somewhat. With nothing else to do and no one but pushy hookers to talk to, I lie by the beach and just listen to music. Turns out mosquitoes don't give two shits about existential crises, and my feet end up covered in angry, whine-silencing bites.

One bite for every tired platitude.

Jordan wakes up shortly after I go to bed, close to 6 am. I sleep for about 4 hours, and when I awake I can't see any of his things, and am forced to assume he simply ditched me in the night. So much for that Aussie hospitality. But wait! He comes back at 10:30, whereupon seeing me still in bed gives ME shit about sleeping too much. He tells me that he and Ian will be at Cafe del Sol in an hour, and if anything goes wrong we can still rendezvous there at 1 pm. Relieved that I'm not completely alone in this world, I shower and get to D*Mall at 11:40. I'm only ten minutes late, but neither Jordan nor Ian are there. Still, we have the rendezvous! I wait until 1:30 pm. They never show.

I read Murakami for awhile in a morose funk, drink more than a few rum and cokes at a happy hour somewhere, and generally wonder how the fuck I'm supposed to feel about Australians now.

You're making it hard to enjoy a good funk, Boracay.

Sunset hits while I'm nursing a beer and some Travel Lasagna, which is what I've decided to call the Italian cuisine that is everywhere in Southeast Asia and almost never any good, yet you eat it fortnightly because traveling sometimes demands that lizard brain dopamine injection that Italian food dutifully provides. Sunsets here will seriously put a damper on any attempts to feel sorry for yourself. I mean for fuck's sake, I just got laid and here I am pouting like a dummy. Time to go be a dude that is fun-lovin' rather than mope-lovin' again.

FINE, I guess I'll go and explore the night's limitless possibilities and enjoy the wonder of being young and alive. GOD.

On my nighttime stroll back through town, I'm joined by a couple of local coquettes who I assume to be on the clock, as it were. Lucky for them, I popped a couple Xanax with my drinks so I'm feeling loosey-goosey, and much more amenable to answering their questions and participating in this little farce. Yes, I'm American, thank you for thinking that I am a Handsome Man, however I must inform you that I am also a Poor Man, with nary a cent of your land's currency to my name. To which one of the girls curiously replies that it'll be free, whatever "it" is. Interesting.

I say I don't believe her; she insists Really, free. She isn't offended that I brought up money, and I'm pretty sure I didn't misread the situation because what the hell else could this be, so I have to ask..."Why?" After all, I'm just a poor boy, I need no sympathy. She says that she had an American boyfriend once, and she likes me. She's known me for a couple of minutes now, so it's very possible. Damn my animal charisma. She hands me her cell phone as some sort of collateral, which you don't tend to hear about in love at first sight-type situations. I feel like even with her friend playing backup, she should be more wary of me; after all, prostitutes are like beads- you have to string them along if you want to make jewelry out of their bodies.

Still curious about exactly what the fuck is going on, I follow her down an alley, the other girl behind me. I am getting increasingly ready to fight off a pack of Filipino thieves should they emerge from the darkness, but instead our fearless leader stops to have a conversation with her friend in Tagalog, probably about just how hard it is to get laid these days; you can't even give your pink pita pocket (TM) away to some assholes. Hell, you even give them your cell phone and they still don't trust you!

Her friend breaks off from their huddle to report to me that my paramour's place is very far, but we can get a room at the hotel in this alley. I had previously told them I didn't have a room of my own, which could be why that option isn't brought up. Damn my keen survival instincts. Sensing my hesitation, my would-be lover starts kissing and licking my neck, while I stand there kind of awkwardly and wonder about the possibility of neck-transmitted STDs. Sorry lady, I'm not falling for your game, if indeed there is one oh god I hope I'm not being dumb. I try to leave the alley, but she won't let go of my hand, so I'm forced to drag her behind me like a sexy anchor. I knew it! These two had some friends waiting in that hotel and they were totally going to rob me or worse!

Then I realize that I still have her phone, and that's probably why she's latched on, and instantly feel bad about the whole thing. I sheepishly hand it back, and book it out of there back to Bom Bom and comfortable familiarity.

Trying to repeat a fun night always works, right? Pretty sure that's what people say.

After watching for a bit and remembering that I still hate tourist-pandering cover bands, I move on, and almost immediately run into the Russians. I apologize for not seeing them last night, but Anya doesn't understand and Jenny doesn't care. The atmosphere has definitely cooled since our separate nights of passion and light adultery.

They're heading back to Bom Bom, and since I don't have any better ideas I figure fuck it, I can suffer through Bob Marley covers for at least a few minutes. The band actually recognizes me and invites me on stage again for a song. I struggle unpracticed through a couple acoustic guitar covers which seem to impress the girls. Once the band's wrapped up, the bassist (who I immediately assume is cool because he plays Mario riffs when bored) suggests we all go somewhere. By now I've had a few more drinks plus a couple Jager bombs with the girls, but I'm not feeling too drunk. That lasagna might have had supernatural properties. Unfortunately, feeling far more sober than everyone else is putting me off my rhythm, or rather confronting me with the fact that I've never had rhythm, and am stepping unrhythmically further away from ever having it.

We go to a club and dance, but the bassist is somehow making a play for both girls, until he's joined by a friend who immediately zeroes in on Anya. Even worse, she's either into him, or beyond the point of discrimination. I've never been the aggressive "that's my woman!" type, so I switch gears and dance for a bit with Jenny. Anya keeps disappearing for reasons which would probably hurt my ego were I to dwell on them too much, and now this damn bassist has cut in between Jenny and me and jumps right into a well-rehearsed move routine. I thought you were cool, man. Mario would never do this to Luigi. He does this oh-so-annoying bit where he takes a looong drag of her cigarette and kisses her, which come to think of it might not be a "bit" so much as just having the confidence of a semi-professional musician and choosing to kiss her. I hate him, and am starting to hate the whole concept of sex and courtship. Still, it's my last night, I'm alone, and I've got nothing else to do. It probably wouldn't hurt for me to practice a little of my own confidence, and roll with some competition. I promise myself that good or bad, I'm going to see this through. I'm really gonna give this pick-up thing a shot.

Jenny starts to legitimately worry about Anya's absence, until we finally find her down at the beach. Elated, Jenny suggests we go swimming, so the five of us strip down to our underwear, leave our shit on the beach, and run into the surf. The water is full of phosphorescence, even more luminous than Maya Bay. The bassist's friend takes off, which provides the bassist himself the opportunity to start intertwining with Anya further out under the waves. Urgh. Still, that leaves me and Jenny by ourselves, floating in this balmy, magically lit current. I probably won't get a better chance than this to try my luck. Seizing the moment, I lean in for the kiss. Round One, FIGHT.

And...Cheek block! FATALITY.

Maybe she didn't notice I was making a move? And turning her head at just the right time was an accident? And then she didn't say or do anything afterwards because despite her white-hot lust, society won't let her express her sexuality? Clearly drunker than I know, I remain embarrassingly optimistic as we get out of the water and march on together to another bar. Anya continues to make out with the bassist, which doesn't make me feel great and inspires unkind thoughts, but then some of us were being lampreyed by a maybe-hooker just a couple hours ago. Stones and glass houses. A pretty Filipina smiles at me from across the bar, but I abstain from changing my course. I told myself I was going to see this thing through, and I am a man of conviction, even when it's for a wrongheaded, inconsequential drunken idea I only shared with myself. Perhaps even moreso in that case. Of course I'm making a mistake, but that seems to be my pick-up style: Foolish and riddled with catastrophe.

As the bar closes Anya leaves with the bassist as was written, while Jenny and I find a spot further down the beach to watch a disappointing, cloudy sunrise. Still, a sunrise is a sunrise, right? After some gentle conversation, I try to kiss her one last time. Once again I receive The Cheek. "Just friends," she says, turning away.

I ask why. She replies, "Because you fuck my friend." Well, I had to ask. I sit there in silence on my cold rock, feeling more uncomfortable than when the tip of your manhood brushes the inside of a toilet bowl. I succeeded in following the night through, and this seems about right for what I could expect. She's right. I fucked her friend, and consequently became insane with power, such that I delusionally thought finishing out the pair would be smooth sailing.

I bet they actually have very smooth sailing around here.

Perhaps to lighten the mood, she starts going on about how she doesn't "normally act like this", and "what happens on vacation stays on vacation"; a sentiment which my typing now seems to heavily disagree with. You might think this would be the time to throw in the towel and call it a night, or hours and hours ago when common sense dictated. Instead, instead!, glutton for punishment that I am and still drunk, I try my luck one last time with a few compliments, and the admission that I'm leaving today, so you know, last chance and all. Though it must have taken stupendous willpower, she remains unfazed and uninterested. Yeah, I don't think I would've convinced me, either.

I walk her back to her place, where we hug goodbye. Once safely in bed at Bella Casa, I treat myself to a moment of reflection. Tonight was not a good look for me, and should time travel become an option I would elect to not repeat it. Once you've tested the waters and found them cold, stop testing the goddamn waters. Especially don't then keep coming on to the waters like the world's saddest sack, unless you're going to write about it later for some weird form of catharsis. End of reflection.

Things Get Weird/BRUNEI

While in the air to Brunei, I notice my passport is running dangerously low on stamp space. Still, I fancy myself a problem-solver: There's exactly enough room for the stamp on one page, and if I can get the immigration officer to put it right there then I'll have enough blank pages for the remaining countries. Easy. I'm kind of the best at Tetris.

The immigration guy is an asshole. He glares at me offended when I dare suggest where he should place his holy mark, and instead turns to one of the last fresh pages and lays his stamp smack in the middle. Now I'm going to have to find the American embassy and get more pages put in, which I'm sure costs at least a hundred billion dollars.

I can't find the bus from the airport, so I just start walking in the direction of the city. Brunei, or rather "The Nation of Brunei, The Abode of Peace," is pretty much one big city with a tangle of jungle and oil derricks on the outskirts. I'm pretty sure I remember reading an article somewhere that said hitchhiking here is easy, and worst comes to worst I can just hail a taxi. Or walk the whole distance, and be one of those kind of guys. Luckily, I'm barely walking twenty minutes before a sedan pulls over and picks me up.

The driver is Nelson, a local Bruneian of Malay heritage. He's very friendly, as you can imagine, and has one of those soft, "kind" faces. The kind of guy who pulls over and gives disheveled white boys a ride. In the passenger seat is a young boy, either teenage or early 20s, who doesn't talk the entire time and I just assume is Nelson's son.

I tell Nelson my story, and he mentions that hitchhiking is actually not that common. I'm a lucky duck! He goes on to offer to show me what he calls the King's Mosque, which is on the way. Hey, I've got nowhere to be. Let's reverently and respectfully tear that bitch up.

It's a gorgeous mosque in a country that I am sure is full of gorgeous mosques. It's got the four tower/pillar things around it that seem pretty integral to a mosque's mosqueocity, and the inside is all a stunning white, with beautiful stained glass filling the central dome.

The attendants make me wear what looks like a judge's robes before I can see the top floor, which seems like a quirky rule. Up there, they have a prayer room covered in ornate marble and glasswork. It's the sort of thing that makes you wish you were spiritual, so you could really kick things up a notch in the ol' veneration department. They don't allow photography, so you'll have to take my word for it. Or, like, go there. I'm not the boss of you.

After seeing the mosque, Nelson drops me off at Pusat Belia, Brunei's lone hostel. Before leaving, he mentions that he owns a spa, and offers me a job as a masseuse. I of course reply that I have no idea how to give a professional massage, and he says it won't matter, that weird Bruneian guys will pay extra just to have the exotic fingers of a white person clumsily rub them down. He also mentions that if the Pusat Belia is full, I can stay at his house, which has plenty of extra bedrooms. Apparently the silent enigma in the passenger seat is currently one of his guests.

Yes, Nelson could possibly be a sexual predator, picking up helpless backpackers and having them turn out handie-jays in his spa of horrors, but I am running pretty low on funds here. No one's perfect, right? He did show me that mosque, and he's behaved very respectfully towards me this entire time. Maybe his spa is legit, and the boy in the front seat isn't his catamite toyboy. As Nelson explained, Brunei is Muslim, so it makes sense that all his clients are male, as only male masseurs are allowed to massage men. Really, I'm probably just being disrespectful by having misgivings. I would like that money. Nelson says he'll come by at 7 tonight and show me how to give a massage, then drives off leaving me with his business card. It's probably fine. Hell, I could just blow him off if the bad vibes get to be too much, or I forget.

Pusat Belia, Brunei's lone hostel, is full. They tell me it never happens, but it's a holiday and students are on a trip, which comes as small comfort since the next cheapest place around here is a $30 a night hotel. Maybe I will definitely meet Nelson. I wonder if I could give a handjob for money? You know, totally hypothetically. Just...a thought problem.

Something to think about while staring wistfully into the distance. We've all thought about it, right?

There's not a whole lot to see or do around Bandar Seri Bagawan, Brunei's capital that I was smack dab in the middle of. There are a number of really nice mosques, a mall-flavored mall, and your usual streets full of modern but drab shops. It's clear the city has a lot of money and infrastructure, but not a lot of interest in impressing sightseers or tourists.

This is the most scenic photo of the city, sans-mosque, that I was able to get. There is one sculpture, and it is dull as hell.

My options are stay around my hostel, wasting what little funds I have in overpriced cafes, or...fuck it. I won't let my tombstone read "Here Lies Jamie, He Was Too Scared of Possibly Having to Give a Handjibber to Make Some Quick Cash and That Somehow Led to his Untimely Death." I walk over to Pusat Belia and sure enough, right at 7 there's Nelson's car. Something that never gets said enough for creepy dudes: their punctuality.

If this is some tawdry seduction attempt, he does a good job of hiding it. First, Nelson takes me to eat dinner at a Chinese restaurant his friend works at. The three of us chat and have a good time, and then Nelson covers the bill, which could go either way.

Next, he shows me some sights, but none of them match up to the mosque from earlier. There's an amusement park I can just about see over its fence, some royal palace, and then this giant sculpture installation that a member of the royal family built to symbolize his engagement.

Nelson says the diamond is real. Adorable.

Honestly, the most incredible sight I see is what gas costs in an oil state:

Trying to think in litres (sp!) is still half-witchcraft to me, but those numbers definitely don't seem as high as they should be.

Finally, he takes me to his spa. It's business time. Like for real business, because his spa is totally a legit spa. There are certificates all over the walls, and a general "kinda cheap but probably real" mise-en-scene.

It's definitely not a sex dungeon, but that could be my cultural bias talking.

Regardless of whatever happens here, at least I can rest easy knowing it's halal.

Nelson keeps hugging me, but that's probably nothing. Maybe he's just a really grateful employer. This whole halal business, dudes only allowed on dudes, it's still possible everything is totally normal to him. Like skinship in Korea, where guys are all about friendly touching and caressing. I just need to respect his culture. Nelson leads me into the massage room, and asks me to undress. I make a point to keep my underwear on, and I look for any sign of disappointment. No reaction. Alright.

There I am, face down and clad only in my skivvies, and Nelson starts to massage me. I'm not a big massage man personally, but I can tell that he's a professional, and the entire time he's giving me instructions. Where to start, which directions to go, how hard to push, important spots to hit, the whole works. It's very informative, and I found myself immensely relieved, embarrassed, and wishing I had taken notes. This could be a real skill! I just life-hacked my way into some free job training! Traveling, baby, I'm doing it right.

His hands are steadily working their way down from my shoulders to my lower back, and finally to my butt. Nelson sighs. "You will have to take this off. Is it okay?"

I know what you're thinking. I was thinking the same thing. Sometimes masseurs have gotta massage the butt. Now I don't get too many massages, but I imagine you can't do a real, proper butt massage with cloth in the way. It makes sense. With some hesitance, I drop my drawers. Now we're in flavor country.

He gives my buttocks a good working-over, but doesn't overstay his welcome and soon moves onto my legs and feet. I knew there was nothing to worry about. Just think of all that sweet cash I'm gonna be making taking advantage of weird racist Bruneians. Maybe I'll never have to go home, and instead travel the world as a wandering masseur. Back in reality, Nelson tells me to flip over. No problem.

Feeling reassured but still antsy, I repeat over and over in my mind: You will not get hard. You will not get hard. I don't care where you land on the Kinsey scale, you are not going to have an erection at this moment in time for any reasons whatsoever.

There isn't a lot to massage on the front side of your typical human, and after kneading my arms and hands a bit, Nelson arrives at my Fun Zone. The Pleasure Palace. The Vault of Secrets. And he dives right in.

His fingernails trace designs over my cock like it's the hennaed hand of a Hindu bride. He does it so matter-of-factly, and with such practiced skill, that it must still be part of the massage. It has to be, and I'm...I'm just really learning a lot about Muslim massage today.

I won't lie to you. It doesn't feel un-great. Regardless, my hetero leanings win out, and I remain as flaccid as Elton John watching a sex tape of Gloria Steinem. Heaven be praised. no difficult soul-searching and huge life decisions for me today! Nelson, on the other hand, is not so content.

"I know you are not gay," he says, looking me in the eye, "But I am." Oh no. "Would you like me to continue?"

Let's all take a moment and recognize: COULD'VE BEEN WORSE. What that in mind, I still need to keep things upbeat and friendly between attempted-handjober and handjobee. Hell, I know for a fact my dick looks great in this humidity, and in some respects old Nelson here is just another victim to its splendor. I didn't mention this earlier for narrative reasons, but Brunei doesn't really have public transportation, on account of everyone having a car 'cause oil state. I don't have a phone either, with which one could call a taxi service. Basically if I stormed out into the night, I'd be kind of fucked. Meaning, ultimately, I need this guy to give me a ride home.

I need to be Zenmaster Flash here. Do I want him to continue, he asked? "No, I'm okay." Your move, amigo. Hope it's friendly and boundary-respecting.

There's a lot of disappointment in those gay Bruneian eyes. Nelson's a stand-up weirdo though, and he drives me back to the hostel. Let me tell you about long, awkward car rides. You don't know shit about long, awkward car rides. That isn't to say we didn't have some interesting conversation, though. I'm curious about what it's like to be gay in an entirely Muslim country, and Nelson informs me there are plenty of gay Bruneians. "They hang out in cafes," he says. "You can smell them." Shine on, you creepy diamond.

I'm also curious about the pricing/ what I'm giving up by not being a halal sex worker. He says if I truly was still interested, I could get up to the princely sum of...50 dollars an hour. That doesn't even sound like a good deal for a person who isn't as white as a Fleet Foxes concert in a snow storm! My alabaster handjobs are worth more than your peanuts. Good day, sir.

After Nelson has dropped me off back in town, I get coffee at a nearby cafe and check the internet. I had previously sent out some feelers on Couchsurfing for a place to stay in Brunei, with no response. As it turns out, one of those hosts, a Zimbabwean expat named Prosper, replied and had been waiting for me all night. I send a message back that I'll meet him tomorrow. Have I got a great excuse for why I got held up!

And it wasn't because I went late-night mosque-sighting! (Sorry, but I have to break up these walls of text somehow. It's also the only way I can get people to look at my vacation photos. Sucker.)

I spend one uneventful night in the spartan (yet pricey) KH Soon Resthouse, where once again ordering a room for myself yields two beds, as an unending reminder of my own loneliness.

At least I get to keep up with a lot more TV shows.

But that's why I'm on Couchsurfing. Today, I'm meeting a local Bruneian named Chan who's going to show me the jungle on the edge of town, and hopefully nothing else besides that. He finds me at the Yayasan mall, which is mainly notable for their horrifying mannequins.

Chan turns out to be a lovely, heavy-set guy with a passion for introducing people to Brunei. He drives me in his car over to what I come to learn is actually a rainforest. Geographically, Brunei is located on the island of Borneo, the largest island in Asia, which it also shares with Indonesia and Malaysia. I bet they get up to some wacky sitcom hijinks! Borneo is also home to the Borneo rainforest, one of the oldest in the world.

The Borneo rainforest also happens to be the world's sole habitat of the proboscis monkey, which Chan says we'll find today if we're lucky. It's a monkey that has a ridiculously large nose to the point of obscenity. It's really something, and if you're ever in Brunei, you'll see its dumb face featured on a lot of marketing for cafes and such.

Alright, enough tension. It's not like the monkeys are making a play for my junk or anything. We see some in the trees, because sometimes things are nice and the rainforest will share its treasures with you. Chan and I celebrate our enjoyable time with some refreshing coconut water.

By "see," I mean we spot some vague shapes in the foliage that might possibly be in the monkey family.

Chan drops me off at the embassy, where I go through the most numerous and thorough security checks of my life for the privilege of paying $82 for new passport pages. The knowledge of a truly sweet zombie defense spot doesn't make me feel a lot better about that.

Prosper meets me at DeRoyalle cafe, where I've just been watching episodes of Luther on my netbook and drinking unremarkable and overpriced coffee. He takes me back to his house, which is a nice suburban 2-story that he receives (in addition to his car) as part of his job in network administration. Like many other people here I've met, including Nelson and Chan, he gives me a spiel about how great the jobs are here, and how much they pay and all the amenities they provide, but I'm just not sure if a dry country is for me.

Normally an expat can only bring two bottles of liquor and a case of beer into the country per month, but Prosper has a black market guy who keeps him well-stocked. Before long, the party train is pulling into good-times station. I'm introduced to Prosper's Polish girlfriend, Kate, and we sit down to eat a dinner he's cooked and drink wine. The food is delicious, and we start listening to music and talking about our jobs, our travels, and Brunei. Nelson comes up, and Prosper gets steaming mad. He wants details, and weirdly, I don't want to give them. I really was asking for it, in a way. I was playing Gay Chicken with a man who was actually gay. Or maybe I just have more empathy after my breakthrough experience. Mushrooms, ladies and gentlemen.

In the morning, I find another Couchsurfing request waiting for me, but this one is just an invitation to grab some food. After I pick up my passport from the embassy, I return to Yayasan to meet Puspita, an Indonesian flight attendant who uses Couchsurfing to kill time and meet people between flights. She's from Jakarta, and recommends I go. Alrighty. She also pays for dinner, which is just such a class move, especially because your boy is a stone cold poor person. Puspita has a car, but since she's a girl and can't get her cooties all over the nice Muslim steering wheel, she's got her own driver to go with, who has a really tough time trying to find Prosper's. We say our pleasant goodbyes, respecting the nonsexual purity of our internet meeting, and then I get drunk again with Prosper on honey whiskey. He plays a bunch of Zimbabwean music and gets nostalgic, which I find sweet and also educational. I play him a bunch of white boy backpack rap, which he seems to enjoy in return. They always do.

On account of Bandar having next-to-nothing of interest for an international rogue like myself, I find myself the next day hanging out yet again in a Coffee Bean while Prosper and Kate see X-Men: First Class.

I also hit up a McDonald's, where I find them trying to out-America America. The MEGA Mac would make a bald eagle weep tears of pride.

Prosper mentions something that does manage to tickle this scalawag's ears: according to him, there is in fact a club in town, but only expats are allowed entrance. It's the only place in town that one can procure booze, save for getting traditional liquor from the indigenous natives, which seems like a whole to-do.

Unfortunately, Prosper doesn't get any of my Skype calls, so he's unable to pick me up, and I have to take a van home. You can call it a private taxi if you want, but for my $15 it's a freaking van. No club tonight, and tomorrow I fly out. Whomp whomp.

Prosper, stand-up guy that he is, even drives me to the airport. He says: "If you're ever in Zimbabwe, let me know and even if I'm not there, I'll have my friends take care of you. They'll show you the best time of your life." Hot damn, now I just need to get to Zimbabwe!That's the one regularly used in jokes to refer to how close it is to everything, right?

I stop in KL for a layover before enjoying a longer, overnight layover in Bali. My destination this time: the newest country in the world, East Timor. I have done literally zero research into this mysterious nation other than to confirm that it is indeed a Southeast Asian country, and therefore I must see it.

Bali is a cinch this time. I immediately tell off the touts who try to carry my bags, and find some guys to share a cab with to Kuta. There, I'm able to get a bike taxi to Poppies Lane, where I find a cheap $10 hostel and schedule the driver for a pick-up to the airport tomorrow. Once he leaves, I wander around looking for food, liquor, and wifi.

Instead I found my spiritual awakening. Buy my book, please.

I take a break to grab some things from my room, and upon exiting I meet a group of Koreans staying in the room adjacent. Instead of eating dinner, I spend the night with them drinking beer, soju, and beer mixed with soju in a delightful concoction known as somek. Because I am smart and thrifty, and by now you should know this about me. I'm gonna crush East Timor.

Fire Water Burn/KO PHA NGAN

I take my first night in Ko Pha Ngan to set my bearings and acquaint myself with the neighbors.  There's a German couple in the bungalow next to me, whom I have a nice conversation with and then never see again.  In the lobby/restaurant/computer area I meet a British girl watching Napoleon Dynamite, with her leg wrapped in gauze and propped up on a stack of pillows.  She says a bottle fell on her foot and slashed it open the first day of her stay, leaving her effectively disabled for the rest of her vacation.  I know the feeling.  I know it so hard.

Back in my room I discover a hose attachment in the bathroom at about calf-level that does get water pressure.  Unfortunately, I find out it also doesn't shut off, leaving me with a shower head that doesn't get enough water, and a water spigot above the floor that is now spraying water all the time.  My home for the next week had no shortage of character, but it did cost 10 bucks a night.  Would it be petty to complain?  Probably.  Would writing in a professional manner take way more effort?  Fuck that one hundred thousand times.

So, the shower sucks, there's a spigot that won't shut off, the door won't lock, the wifi doesn't work, there's no AC, and my growing headache isn't psyched about the fact that the noise from the party beach reaches all the way up into these hills and inside my room.  Also, ants.  It was going to take every fiber of my being to enjoy this tropical paradise.

Before turning in for the night, I make a circuit of all the money exchange places in the area, looking for the best rate for my 500 dollars in Chinese yuan.  The general consensus I get is the exchange rates are pretty terrible on the island, and I'd be better off waiting till I get back to the mainland before changing the money, which is still drying out on my desk.  I take a couple Xanax to counteract the noise from the beach and go to bed early, so I can be nice and fresh for my 9 o'clock scuba lesson.

What a terrible fucking idea.  Thanks to the Xanax, I wake up late and feeling groggier than a pirate's hip flask.  On the way to meet the instructor I stop for a banana pancake, which makes me even later, but also makes my mouth and belly so very happy.

Ben10 is actually our country's biggest export, after child obesity.

My scuba instructor is an overweight, middle-aged Swiss man named Alex  He has a crazed energy when he talks, but that could just be his kooky accent.  At his shop I can see his Thai wife using the internet in the back, and his son playing computer games in the front.  I can sense an atmosphere coming on, where I'm late and he resents me for it, but I'm paying him and feel weird about being made to feel bad.  He takes me to a pool for the first lesson of my Open Water License.

There are worse places to learn.

This was my first time scuba diving, but I wasn't too bad.  Alex commented that my "hovering" (trying to float in place underwater) was excellent, and I discovered that the fingernails I had neglected to trim worked like tiny little flippers.  Alex and I chat for a bit, mostly about Steam sales and buying too many computer games, but he also mentions that Song Kran, or Happy Water Torture Festival, lasts up to four days in the North.  Christ.  We make arrangements to meet the next day for our first dive, and part ways.

As night fell I felt some regret about having signed up for the scuba course so quickly, as it meant I was going to have to hold off on the nightlife for the next few days.  In particular, I notice this:

SOLD.

But I'll return to that.

I finish my Open Water License over the next two days, doing a dive each morning at Sail Rock, a popular scuba spot about an hour's boat ride from Ko Pha Ngan.

Armed with our spearguns, the hunt for Ariel begins.

Sail Rock, supposedly the premiere dive site in the Gulf of Thailand, is a pinnacle that goes down 35 meters to the sea floor.  Before signing up for the scuba lessons, I had worried that diving would be overrated and an expensive, boring waste of time.  I was wrong, on every level (except the expensive part; holy freaking moly it is expensive).  Maybe it was just the crystal-clear blue waters talking, or the wondrously dense schools of fish rushing past like so many incandescent clouds, but scuba diving is kind of the shit.

Everything becomes the greatest thing in existence.  The slimy barnacled rocks around the pinnacle become an exotic alien landscape, full of mystery and life.  Some colorful nudibranches all of a sudden seem like evidence of a kind and loving God.  One enormous school of trevally swimming by was like that same God giving me a handjob, and it was the most kind and loving handjibber there ever was.  The most famous feature of Sail Rock is its natural vertical swimthrough, which is basically like a 12 meter chimney you can drop down through the pinnacle.  Swimming through that...if you could take the opposite of racism, that's what it felt like.  It was the anti-Hitler.  Every fish I saw was a perfect ball of magic in a universe ruled by love and Studio Ghibli movies.  Every tuna or mackerel or barracuda passing by was a little hug from underwater Totoro.

My instructor, however, was not as super psyched about these things as I was.  Instead of all the pretty fishies, when we got back to the boat he wanted to talk about the oil crisis.  And corrupt Western governments, in particular mine, but also those of everyone else on the boat.  That accent could only do so much to kooky-up diatribes about corporate greed delivered with a thousand-yard stare (although, to be fair, everyone gets a thousand-yard stare in the middle of the ocean; there are, like, literally thousands of yards out there to stare at).  This brought me down for a little while, but then someone caught a seahorse in a bucket and we were right back to Totoro hugs:

THIS BUCKET IS THE MOST IMPORTANT OBJECT IN ALL OF SPACE-TIME.

And just like that, three people on the boat turned into Star Childs.

Meanwhile, Alex rants about Wal-Mart, and gives an in-depth treatise on how to cross international borders illegally, which...okay actually I was pretty into that last one.  You never know when stuff will come in handy.

Now that my dives are over and my Open Water License complete, Alex gives me some sage advice for the  Haad Rin beach parties.  According to him, on some nights a massive jump rope will be taken out, doused in kerosene, and lit on fire for any inebriated soul to jump through.  He warns me to stay away from such activities, as too many drunk tourists get horribly injured.  "I'll be safe," I promise.

I take the rest of the day to eat, rest, pick up laundry, and gather strength.  Somehow, I had managed to get myself sunburned yet again.  Not a hospital-worthy burn this time, but it definitely gave my skin that shade of Naked Mole Rat Pink that I had begun to miss.

At least it's even.

One thing I've learned about Southeast Asia is no matter where you go, laundry always costs about a buck-fifty per kilogram.  Across every country and exchange rate, it's stayed the same.  It's nice to know no matter how sideways things can get, at least I have one constant to hold onto.

Haad Rin as a town is about halfway between Vang Vieng and more upscale tourist destinations, like Kuta or Ubud.  The buildings are sturdy brick and concrete instead of wood and aluminum siding (and even the occasional glass storefront!), but there would still be almost-daily power outages from the heat.  I became used to going into a restaurant with my netbook to eat and use the internet, only to have the power fail and wait for the restaurant's backup generator to kick in.

Who am I kidding.  I was going to the Friends bars.  Could I be any more lonely?

Having been to several spots around Thailand before, I was surprised by the absence of open prostitution.  Nowhere did I see 24-hour massage parlors with girls of varying age lying around calling to the tourists at night.  There are, however, plenty of reggae bars:

Pictured: The most Jah shit you will ever see.

While I eat dinner at one Friends bar, a car passes by a few times with a speaker system in the back, playing "The Final Countdown" announcing a Muay Thai event happening later in the night.  I love Muay Thai, the ticket includes a free taxi ride to the stadium, and I get a pleasant reminder of Arrested Development.  I'm in.

I share a tuk-tuk with a gaggle of Chads, and once at the arena order a bucket of Sang Som Whiskey and Coke.  The stadium is actually pretty huge for such a small island.  While the fighters are getting warmed up, I have a chance to look over the match-ups.  They have 8 or so fights lined up, with the usual main event of Westerners, but I'm a little disappointed they don't have any girlfights.  In my experience, girls fight each other harder and longer, and generally make for a much better show.

The first match out of the gate is, per usual, a pair of younger boys.  They fight well, with good spirit and other such Bukowskian observations, and it marks the first time I've seen a couple of young Muay Thai fighters go at it and not end with one of them hit so hard that they collapse and foam at the mouth.

So, good on them!

As much as I love going to Muay Thai matches, I have to admit I've never seen any fights on the mainland.  I've heard that the bouts on the islands are played up for the audiences and aren't as serious, and if that's true, then someone forgot to tell this guy:

Because Chris Tucker is about to materialize in front of his face any second now.

Of course, it's also probably true that the guy drives a tuk-tuk for a living and only does Muay Thai fights for tourists as a side income, hence the belly and the whole getting-his-ass-beat thing.  So not as serious, but also sadder and more worthy of a Russell Crowe vehicle.

The next fight was between a local in red shorts and a challenger from the mainland in silver.  And, in another first for me, I bet on the fight.  Red Shorts was favored as the local, but I could see Silver Shorts had some amazing abs.  I decided to go with my gut (get it?).  Surely such hardcore training and conditioning would trump the local advantage.  And just like that, I lost 200 baht as Red trounced Silver.

I wondered if I should take my old guidance counselor's advice, and stop  making all my decisions so ab-centric.

The fight between Westerners was supposed to be a Czech fighter versus an Israeli, but it gets canceled after the Israeli is reported sick.  As a replacement, a fight is added between a giant Canadian and an old Thai man who probably invented the word "underdog".

That isn't a trick of perspective, the Canadian fighter really is 8 feet taller than his opponent.

I decide to bet once more, and this time I know I'm going to win.  Then they tell me they're not accepting bets on the Canadian, and I reconsider.  I look at the Thai's record: 70 wins and 30 losses, compared to the Canadian's 11 wins and 4 losses.  I put down 200 baht on the Thai.  Maybe...maybe experience will give him the edge?

Noooope.  

The next few fights lend credence to the idea that island fighting isn't as serious.  The judges aren't impartial in the slightest, as they openly side with some fighters and even cheer them on, and another fight gets decided by audience decision (and was suspiciously filled with Superman punches and crazy spinning kicks).

Also, there's the matter of the free drink ticket that came with the Muay Thai ticket, that is cross-promoting for a pool party at a hotel called Coral Bungalows.  I don't know how many times I've said it: More marketing synergy needs to involve free drinks.  Once the fights are over, I meet a couple guys in the audience who happen to be staying at the same resort as me, and together we pile in a taxi for the Coral Bungalows.

The pool party is packed (predictably).  We redeem our drink coupons at a punch stand where a promoter is ladling out extra-strong Vodka Red Bulls, and we talk.  One of the guys says he hates the band The Killers.  Looks like I have some new best friends!  

The pool party is very confident in its own identity.

However, I don't have anything to swim in, I'm carrying a backpack, and I'm still sober enough to be scared to talk to girls (I heard they don't like backpacks??).  Interestingly enough, all the other men at the party seem to be in the same situation, as they're all crowded into a room inside the bar watching something called a "Man You" and a "Man See" play "Phut-Bawl".  They seem excited by whatever it is.  The "Man See" wins.

I usually justify not talking to girls by watching HBO dramas, but whatever works for you guys.

My new best friends, who are British and very angry about what just happened on the TV, ask if I want to head to the beach, and I agree.  We hitch a ride on the bed of a truck back to Haad Rin Nok, the party beach (and therefore, the biggest pool party), with a stop at an open-air fast food joint called Same Same Burger.  Once at the beach, I stop by my room at Venus to drop off valuables, and on the way talk to a couple girls who ask me what I think about football (I'm assuming the one I just watched).  I say I hate it, which turns out to be the correct answer, and for a while we chat about how sports are dumb and awful.  Out of the infinite combinations of brilliant repartee and body language, there must be one that led to me having a threesome with these two girls.  I didn't find it.  And if I had known what was good for me, I would've stayed in my room and pondered that.

But I didn't know what was good for me.  Really, I wanted the opposite.  I had it up to here with going to bed early, waking up early, and being constantly on the move.  I wanted to get some blood in my teeth.  Some grit in my bones.  In a trip already marked by irresponsible hedonism, I was going to really cut loose.

I leave my flip flops and wallet behind, taking with me only cash and the bottle of Xanax.  Remember that I am 22 years old, and a relatively common sedative still seems like a cool, subversive thing to have on my person. Returning to the beach I can't find my new best friends, but on the plus side, there's a foam cannon going, and that's never not fun.  I won't see my ex-new best friends again.  Still, foam cannon.

The beach is maybe a quarter mile long, with bars at regular intervals each hosting their own separate parties on the sand.  Like the riverside bars in Vang Vieng, each provides a slightly different selection of music and drunken activities.  The foam cannon is blasting away around the most popular bars, where the usual soundtrack of Top 40 Dance is playing (before I leave Ko Pha Ngan, I'll have heard "Empire State of Mind" far more than human ears were meant to handle).  Also like Vang Vieng, everyone seems to be wearing Tubing Vang Vieng wife beaters, but something about foam makes it so hard to judge.  Trillions of bubbles had me loving my fellow man, be he douchebag or no.

After wading around for a bit and realizing how hard it is to dance in the vile quicksand that foam turns beach into, I rest on a foam-adjacent picnic bench with a 3 dollar bucket drink and pop a couple Xanax for fun.  The whiskey in the bucket is lethally strong and tastes similarly I imagine to xenomorph acid blood, but for 3 dollars you just can't beat that value.  As I sit and murder my liver, a little Thai girl marches over to me, and thrusts a travel-size Connect Four board in my face.

"You play me!  One hundred baht!" she demands, with a vicious sneer.  She couldn't have been older than twelve.

Not to brag, but I'm pretty great at Connect Four.  When I worked in Korea I used to play a Connect Four app on a friend's iPhone in between rounds of darts, and I got fairly good.  Good enough to beat some punk little girl, and win back some of that boxing money I foolishly gambled away.

We play, and it's over with the speed of a car crash.  The little girl slaughters me.  But that's to be expected. I'm getting drunk, I haven't played in awhile.  She challenges me again, and it's my turn to smile.  I clear my mind, focus my chi, and gather my wits.  I'm ready for her.

She ruins me like an insane warlord cruelly ignoring the Hague Conventions.  I give the little girl her blood money, not quite understanding what just happened.  She gloats, the sadistic mini-harpy, and challenges me yet again, but I wave her off.  As the pre-teen Connect Four shark leaves to find a new victim, an older Thai woman approaches me.

This mysterious new stranger is pretty in a gentle, relaxed way, and her age could be anywhere from late 20s to early 40s on account of her trim body and fair skin.  She stands next to me on the bench to keep foam away from her dress.  I think we have a conversation, but at this point the Xanax is kicking in, making a peaty stew of my thoughts.  The gist I got was she thought I was very cute, and wanted to know if I lived nearby.  I gesture towards the Venus, and she grabs my hand, leading me along the beach.

I was fucked up, but come on.  Of course I knew she was a prostitute.  But, I kind of wanted to see how things would play out.  Plus, the Xanax had me thinking about making snow angels in soft sheets, and everything felt pretty good.  After we had walked about half the beach, I tipped my hand.

"Yeah, I wish I had some money, but I'm broke," I slip seamlessly (probably) into our conversation.  Then, with somewhat less subtlety, I bark: "Broke!  No money!"

She stops walking and drops my hand.  "You have no money?" she asks, incredulously.

"Nope!"  I give her my best golly-gee-shucks face.  Your move.

She laughs and shakes her head, suddenly looking much older.  Her blue dress whirls a 180 and she walks back to the party.  I wonder what I expected.  That, really.  The Xanax keeps my spirits bobbing along, and I move on to another party.

I'll never forget you, headless Thai beach-ho

The night speeds up as I guzzle more doomsday whiskey and dance in the sand.  I find myself handing out Xanax to a small group, wondering if I can convince them it's something cooler.  Unfortunately, one girl (impressively) recognizes it for what it is, and with that my bottle of friend-makers is rendered useless.  In hindsight there's some moral grayness about handing out unidentified pills, but then they were only being taken by people who had no interest in knowing what it was.  No harm (probably), no foul (right?).

The foam cannon stops, but only to make room for something greater.  Something jaw-dropping.  Something I had specifically been warned against.

YES.

Fire rope-jumping.

A couple local boys unraveled a 20-foot length of tightly-wound cloth, poured out a couple gallons of kerosene from a couple battered aluminum buckets, and, taking posts on some raised wooden platforms opposite each other, lit the sucker.

They started swinging the rope, slowly, in half-time with the music, and invited participants.  Anyone could join.  I watched as the first few jumpers ran in.  Most ran out almost immediately, but some tried to keep with it.  The boys swinging the rope would sadistically increase the pace, until the jumper gave up and dived out, or fucked up and got nailed by the rope.  Which, if you've forgotten, is on goddamn fire.

But other than that, pretty safe.

You can only drink and watch that sort of thing before the bug gets into you, under your skin, pulling you like just such a freaking moth.  I was a drummer once, you might think.  My sense of rhythm is impeccable.  I'm practically a human metronome.  You just might think those things, and jump in.  I did.

And it was fine.  At first I do the weenie thing of jumping and jumping right back out, but then I stay for a few swings, getting used to it, or as used as you can get to being inside a flaming tornado in front of an audience.  Then they start to increase the pace, and it isn't so fine.  The weight of all that whiskey and Xanax is dragging down my limbs, and they can't keep up.  I feel a horrible sting across my ankle as the rope slaps into it at full speed.  My legs tripping over themselves, I sprawl onto the sand, as the swingers quickly pull the rope taught and off of me.

I scramble to my feet and dash out of the danger zone, where the rope is swinging again and people are already jumping back in for more.  Normally, when the rope hits you, it bounces off too quickly to do any actual damage, thus preventing most serious injuries.  I check my feet, and to my relief they're fine, with just a few singed hairs that smell fantastic.

The sun rises.  As I watch, I'm approached by a partying Thai girl, young, between 18 and 20.  I'm a little wary this time, but she seems innocent enough.  She just wants to keep partying.  My veins are still pumping heavy waves of adrenaline, so I'm inclined to agree.  Sure, she's a local, but to assume that she has ulterior motives would be pretty darn prejudiced.  I'm just not that kind of guy.

The girl calls a friend over, a boy about the same age, and the two of them suggest we go somewhere.  As I look around for any place that might still be open, I look down at my stomach: I have a 3-inch burn splashed across the left side of my abdomen, right above my belly button.  As it turns out, while you might not get burned if the rope bounces off, the same is not true if it bounces off and then lands on your stomach while you're still dazed on the ground.

I can't do anything but laugh and point at the blisters forming across the surface of the ruby-red streak.  Before I say anything, the boy reaches a hand out to my stomach and pops the largest blister with his extra-long fingernails.

For the first time, I feel the searing pain of the burn explode under my skin.  The boy laughs as I think hateful thoughts about him and his nasty fingernails that only a gross jerk would grow out and the multitudes of hellish bacteria that no doubt live therein.  He and the girl give me some of their bucket drink.  I exist to forgive.

They buy a water, and offer it to me.  I can't remember the last time I drank something that didn't taste like Red Bull and battery acid, and take a couple grateful glugs.  Then the two of them ask if we can all go back to my place.  God dammit.  Maybe there's something to be said for profiling.  Even if I had wanted to try the no-money gambit again, and I wasn't starting to crash hard from the adrenaline and the Xanax and the booze O! the booze, there was still the matter of this extra guy.  I give a vague answer about "some place on the beach," and hand back the water bottle, preparing to walk off.  The girl picks up on my disinterest, and exits.

However, the boy keeps up with me, pressing me for details about where I'm staying.  My body is weak, exhausted, at the brink, and the boy dances around me like a demon, goading me about some awful "party".  My brain fumbles and spills through thoughts like a hobo rummaging a dumpster for cans.  Where did the girl go?  Why is the boy still here?  When you have a boy and a girl trying to pick you up for sex, removing the girl is the worst possible solution.  Then the boy strikes like a sexual viper and grabs my crotch, cutting suddenly through my mind-fog.  It occurs to me that everything about this is terrible.

I can't let him know where I'm staying, and if I tried to fight him off, or do anything more strenuous than keep walking slowly in a more-or-less straight line, all my joints would cease to be and I would collapse onto the ground in a dead pile of useless limbs.  I try to tell him off, but either he ignores me, or more likely the language center of my brain has finally dissolved, drooling out a monotone of word soup.  Desperate, I look for an escape.

We pass a hotel complex with an open pool, and I make my move.  "This is...it," I slur.  "You wait...here.  Yes..."

If there's a pool, there must be a nearby bathroom.  I find it, and lock the door behind me.  I drop to the floor, and start waiting the gigolo out.  A janitor bangs on the door, telling me to leave.  I keep waiting.  It's all I can do.

Time passes, maybe five minutes, maybe twenty.  I emerge from hiding to an angry janitor and no one else.  I'm free.

It's past 7 a.m. and it's with great relief and the very last of my energy that I make the rest of the walk to Venus, and pass out immediately on hitting my bed, maybe even before.

Morning comes, like a bitch.  By the time I finally muster and get out of bed, it's 5 p.m.  Stumbling to the bathroom, I survey the damage.

In my pockets, I can't find the bottle of Xanax, or any cash left.  Probably the boy-whore stole it, I figure.  Maybe those weren't totally innocent crotch grabs.  In my defense, it's hard to notice anything else when a relentless catamite has his talons around your shaft.  I remember starting the night with about 50 bucks in cash, but I feel worse about the Xanax, it being a gift and all.

I do find one of my bet receipts from the fight.  A handy reminder of the general consistency of decisions I made last night.

You are NOT my boy, Blue.

Outside on the steps, I see a huge dead cicada being eaten by a swarm of ants.  I can identify.

That's the feeling.

Tomorrow's the Full Moon Party.  Christ.