On the Death of Sammy B.L.

My first staring contest with the seventh Bin Laden son was on a wintry night in the desert in southern Jordan. Snow was occasionally falling, a rarity for those parts, and I had been loosely chatting with a taxi cab driver in Arabic. In the passenger seat was a man, dressed somewhat traditionally and in a way that suggested he was a cleric or a Muslim religious figure. I was twenty, fairly young, and had been told that despite what I had been told, I shouldn't feign a Canadian nationality abroad as it wasn't necessary. But for those ten minutes I doubted it. While trying to have a normal conversation with the driver and the strange man in the middle of a desert at 11:00 PM at night, I was staring a familiar figure. Below, in Arabic, were a list of crimes and polemic against the country I had just admitted I was from. I asked my girlfriend if she saw what I saw, and we remained on the edge of our seat.

That driver dropped us off in the hotel and stayed with us until the hotel reception clerk came and got us a room. Never saw him again. Two weeks before, at the Turkish-Syrian border, a man approached us in a jolly manner and when he found out that we were Americans; he pointed out that he was a Tunisian by the name of Osama, the first I had met in my life and not the last. The name does reek pungent to many, but a variant and uncommon word for a "lion," it is just merely a name. Who knows what its future is; the only Adolfs you'll meet nowadays are Icelanders because Germans have rejected that name and others for past connections.

His picture was occasionally viewable in some more village/rural areas of the Middle East. You'd certainly see more of Saddam Hussein's face and Yasir Arafat's, even though it was sometimes in odd kitschy ways (Saddam Hussein tire covers were big in Yemen). Yes, it was odd to see pictures of controversial figures, though not ubiquitous-Hussein's face certainly wouldn't be seen in Syria, where the second Ba'ath party still is in power. A leader's picture was everywhere in his country-and there was a certain tragicomic element to it. Bashar Al-As'ad, president of Syria, who's currently facing violent demonstrations in his own country, was enshrined in a gold-rimmed heart on top of a blue tissue box surrounded by other pink and red hearts cluttering the box. Experiments with then-developing Photoshop technology sometimes produced chaotic results...a Pizza Hut in Aden where a picture promoting the (so he claims) soon to resign president showed him standing over the Pizza Hut. Given the fact that the way the picture was put together, the (yes, famously) petite president was made a menacing 25-meter tall figure, Godzilla the Arab president attacking a random lackluster US chain restaurant.

In the past few paragraphs, I haven't really mentioned much about Bin Laden. Well, he didn't come up too often. Arab states are states fraught with problems of their own, insecurities of their own, and I think a realization of that, which should by now be fairly obvious with the various revolutions, minimalizes the impact Bin Laden has had over the past ten years. Living in the United States, he can seem monstrous, powerful, and became unfortunately representative of Arabs at least in looks, which more or less ended up in the harassment of the US Sikh populations (most civilian Arabs do not cover their heads and dress in relatively Western fashions).

Bin Laden's death is not the most unwelcome thing for the US. Positive stories have been thin over the past couple years. I feel strange as I watch over news stories showing my countrymen cheering and shouting out the famous "USA! USA! USA!" chant. A single death isn't a victory, more a placebo which tastes kind of like victory, but I suppose it isn't the worst thing. Unfortunately, when I moved to Argentina, I brought no US flags or flag shirts or flag track pants (I personally find it disrespectful to the flag to wear it on my ass, so take that, "patriots"). If anything, with regards to the psyche of the US and the Arab world, I think that when you attempt to weigh the issues of: did we help ourselves more or did we do meaningful damage to Al-Qaeda, the first is certainly true. If nothing else, we have eliminated practically every "evil" Arab that most people from the US have ever heard of, and hopefully the negative and unfair associations between Saddam Hussein, Bin Laden and others will cease. My countrymen are only left with Kim Jong-Il, so hopefully positive things can come of this, in a time when the Arab world is at its most chaotic.

I visited Wadi Do'an, the ancestral home of the Bin Ladens, and the neighboring Wadi Hadhramut, in Yemen, some four years ago. It's an unreal setting that is a place I've been fortunate to visit, given the difficulty of going to Yemen, crossing the country from west to east, and being in Yemen at a time when there isn't chaos. It's a beautiful valley of barren desert mountains and palm trees, weirdly filled with Indonesians and Malaysians (there's a religious school in one of the towns). The most bizarre thing is watching darkness fall and the choice illumination of villages that haven't changed much since the sixteenth century: kms and kms of street lights, placed very close together, on a brilliantly asphalted road. This generous donation is one of a few, including the only traffic light in the nation, that was made by Saudi families like the Bin Ladens.

Everybody will reflect on where they were during September 11th. I was in class and thought somebody was joking when they said the World Trade Center was attacked (there are a lot of tall buildings in the US, it just seemed unlikely that it happened twice). Classrooms were turned onto news channels, there were tears. But in the end, for me, for many, life went on, and it's more important where I've been since September 11 and where I will be. We remain in power over the ability to choose our own destinies, destinations, and adventures, and that in itself is a simple victory over Bin Laden and his ilk.

Winter Olympics Post

To my great surprise, today, I was reminded again of the existence of the Winter Olympics, in a roundabout way. I noticed on a website I peruse for news that there was some comment by a Bruce Arthur reacting to an ESPN article possibly denigrating Canadians by Rick Reilly. Unfortunately, this was some Canadian version of the Bruce Arthur I know. Despite the geographic proximity to where I grew up (basically a mixed drink involving several less savory parts of Washington State) of the Olympics, I really can't bring myself to devote myself to this. Oh, a Chinese team won a gold medal in pairs skating ending years of Russian domination. The Chinese domination of various obscure sports that was highlighted in Beijing really doesn't intrigue me as a storyline, because China has no satellite states that hilariously succeed in the Olympics. No hermaphroditic Vietnamese swimmer is going to win a women's swimming event in the near future, so, blah to these Olympics.

What will be and has been intriguing ever since the selection of it as host site is the 2014 host, Sochi. I can kind of guess what Sochi is like, having been to Yalta and Batumi, similar towns on the selfsame sea. My first reaction was one of great surprise from an aviation perspective...all those Ilyushin and Antonov crashes that plague Russia but the West really doesn't care about would kind of matter, wouldn't they? And geography...given the amount of drinking that I must assume takes place at the Winter Olympics, how is this Winter Olympics going to end without the Swiss hockey team randomly ending up in Chechnya or Ingushetia, some hours away by a drunken commandeering of a vacationing Russian metallurgist's Zhiguli.

I have one key suggestion for the planners of the Sochi Olympics, as it is the greatest sport in Russian history and would, I'm sure, provide huge ratings. Invading Russia is something that the Poles, Russians, French, Czechs, Germans, Americans, British, Swedes, and Japanese have all had history of doing, not to mention including defunct states like Horde, the various Baltic German crusading orders, the Genoese, Trebizond, ad infinitum. Of course, this sport would not involve actual violence, but would simply be a modern take on a similar concept. Place a group of mediocre people (preferably monolingual and obese, for the amusement of the worldwide viewing audience) in a similar situation to where their respective countries' invasions began. Put them all in a modified Volga limo with copious amounts of alcohol and see who gets to Sochi first. No directions, no instructions in the Cyrillic alphabet or in Russian. Can the American team make it all the way from Arkhangels'k? What about the Swedish team? Will they proudly cross the river at Narva only to get distracted by the temptations of the much easier to negotiate Poland and through a failed alliance with some friendly Cossacks, and have to hit the abort button in Ukraine? Or would they meet up with the Turkish team and continue forward? Throw in a team of Russian alcoholics nicknamed "The False Dmitris" and I think we've got ourselves a big hit. It works wonders for Russia, as I'm sure when the French team shows up in Moscow and decides it's pretty much already won and spends two weeks binging in a local bar, it'll highlight the ample Russian nightlife scene. Could the Georgian team surprise with a gold medal, given their geographically advantageous position and possible familiarity with Cyrillic, or will they get bogged down squatting in Abkhazia drinking chacha and furiously writing letters to the UN?

There are certainly other Sochi-specific sports that could be added to the Winter Olympics slate: competitive sanatorium navigating, competitive English instruction to Russian girls by desperate men who will loudly declare, "No, she can't form a sentence yet, but you understand what "horny" means, right, sweetcakes" (n.b. this is based on an actual quote related to me by a 70-something English man who came to Ukraine to meet a woman).

As far as the 2012 London Games go, I admit I don't have that many ideas. Competitive understanding of the game of cricket comes to mind. The British have kind of a sense of humor about these things, so I suggest a sport in which young British people lead gullible tourists on trips led with thorough misinformation (at the coast: "You see that faint object over there? Yeah, that's the Eiffel Tower." "Amazing!"), with high points being awarded for any competitors who utter the phrase, "Is there any goldurn person in this country who speaks English, Lord almighty!" Points would be awarded for post-trip slideshows in which people go, "Well, this here is York, and well this garden was started when King Arthur got a little diarrhea and couldn't find a McDonald's anywhere and had to soil the ground, and then the soil got fertilized, I reckon."

This all could seem a bit cynical and harsh, but isn't this the driving force behind American TV? Ignorant people watching other ignorant people = comedy gold. I've never watched this Jersey Shore program to which I've heard references, but it seems to be indicative of that trend. So, let's go balls out!

A Half Year Coming...Or Not

To recap my accomplishments in the time since I last posted an update: I've visited various African countries, and goldurnit, I made it to Timbuktu. I cannot tell you how much of a hassle this is, especially when your travelling, due to your own idiocy, involves travelling at a time of night in which there are no buses and you have to hitchhike at ridiculously late hours. But seventeen Malians and I will never forget that frigid night we shared the back of a pickup truck doing obscene things to the physical states of our extremities in the middle of the night from Bamako to Segou. And I won't forget sleeping from 3:00 to 6:00 AM on the ground on the road in Segou (if a car hits me, it's a hitchhiking opportunity!). There are two worse occasions when I've found myself sleeping on a floor: in the Pittsburgh Greyhound station with no blankets, and in Pristina, Kosovo, wearing about seven layers, but still frigid in -20 degree temperatures waiting for a connection to Skopje, Macedonia. I was either clever or ballsy in the latter case, as I noticed that the security guard's cubicle had a radiator and decided to park myself there. But I was prepared with my faux Serbian (I'm sure that would have opened doors in a new Albanian country to say) Ja hlodno angielsku smert (Literally: I - cold - English - death).

An interesting fact about Timbuktu is that it is a sister city to Tempe, home of the Lake Havasu City Center for Spring Break Recreational Drug Use and a money laundering scam run by the prince of the Caprivi Strip, Arizona State University. I don't mean to demean the school; I've been to Phoenix a few times and I'm about 85% willing to believe that it actually exists, but from my high school I had one person I know who dropped out with a substance abuse problem and no "friends" on Facebook. That's actually one more than random people I knew from high school who went to UC-Santa Cruz (and one's waiting patiently on my suggestion list), so it doesn't bode well. Mali was the highlight of my trip; although certainly playing on a quizbowl team (it was pub trivia night at a sports bar) in Accra, Ghana, with two Ivorian prostitutes (Yvette and some other Francophone name) was a highlight. We ended up finishing second, which meant no drinks on the house, and an abrupt end to our night, as I hadn't yet determined their "heart of gold" factor and as my life is if nothing else, a constant pursuit for Oscar glory, I didn't go for that. On that subject, I was accosted once by a gal in Dakar, but she gave up when it seemed clear I was pulling a Jackie Maggs (I kid, and I love you bro, both in the Budweiser Super Bowl commercial sense and a deviant way imagining that you are my Master of Ballantrae) was using literature to eschew interaction with a female. I shared a bed with a Gambian woman. She made rice. We didn't copulate.

I didn't have any interactions with foreigners until Ghana, really, save the German fellow who shared the long bus ride with me from Tambacounda, Senegal to Bamako, Mali. And there I was a bit cautious: both because of my presumptions, perhaps inaccurate, that they were doing something related to evangelism, and the fact that by and large they were not my crowd, save a likable Austrian guy who watched the Egypt-Algeria match with me and the subsequent French-Irish match of fame for Thierry Henry's main of Dieu with a bunch of Ghanaian park rangers, who were an enjoyable crowd. I visited the city I have been most utterly frightened of (surprisingly Kumasi, Ghana). I have a tendency to walk around cities at night because it's an important part of travel-night time is when you have the opportunity to view the world without its contingent of sane homeful (making up an adjective for homeless) people. I got threatened with death a couple of times. This didn't happen at night in Accra, Ouagadougou, or Dakar, so I'll consider Kumasi legitimately scary. Dakar had a mix of chaos in which it would have been difficult to pull off violent crime (people sleep all over the downtown streets, so attack me with a knife and I'll just walk a foot and step on somebody and cause a big hullabulloo, and tranquility along the beach.

Perhaps the most obnoxious thing about West Africa is Nollywood. Nollywood is the Nigerian film industry, and it is mind-blowingly awful. Vulgar, excessively violent, loud, your own little river cruise in Xibalba. One of the things I wish would never have been invented is the DVD player, just for the fact that the movies played in various countries are terrible burdens on my auditory senses. To wit, I have seen a low budget comedy called "Mr. Bones" three times in two different countries (Turkey and the Ukraine). It's thoroughly unenjoyable with a plot that I haven't yet understood in my three times that I've watched it. It's extraordinarily racist and awful: the two main characters are a white man, the title character, who is abandoned in the middle of Africa (a la the much better "Jungle 2 Jungle"), and a black golfer who is clearly based on a certain other black golfer pre-sex scandal who shows up in the Bophuthatswanan (I'm not supporting apartheid, I just love the names of the bantustans) resort of Sun City. And I've seen the same obscure Chuck Norris film like three times. It reminds me of how I heard the song Dragostea din Tei in several different countries (Georgia, Albania, little Russia in Tel Aviv, Romania, Turkey and Russia) and wondering what was that catchy song before realizing that it was an actual Internet phenomenon. There unfortunately is no Eastern European equivalent of anime fandom, so we can't share our stories about how the fourth viewing of Mr. Bones is kind of like when you finally appreciate the taste of alcohol for the first time. On that note, back to Nollywood. One thing that struck me was the extraordinary amount of bigotry in those films. In one film I watched, the main characters were all Nigerian gangsters; it was feud between brothers. They all lived in Western style villas with armed guards and SUV's. But, there was comic relief. To my dissatisfaction, it came in the form of anything traditionally African = comedy gold. There was a father-in-law character who was a tribal chieftain; dressed the part, etc. He did hilarious things like falling into swimming pools and changing sides pitifully based on whomever currently had a gun in his face. And then, there was the actual tribesman. Though I do not speak Yoruba or Hausa or Igbo or any of the many languages of Nigeria, it seemed clear to me this man was not talking in a real language, rather he was speaking "hilarious generic native language which is really funny because everybody else in the film speaks pretty good British English and what a putz!" He hilariously couldn't figure out how to use a rifle, and literally one of the characters said, "Can't you speak English, man?" In American cinema, this would be panned as utter racism, although I'm not sure the noble African tribesman portrayed in such classics as the Kevin Bacon vehicle "The Air Up There" is any better. At least my experience with Nollywood was slightly briefer than my awareness of the basketball career of Julius Nwosu (know your mid-90's Celtics).

Of course, any trip to Africa will make one hearken back to the days when a person named Praisegod Barebones could make a mark on history. The use of English nouns with utter disregard for their uncommonness as names is a treat. I somewhat wish the fall of the Mugabe administration just so people like Young Talkmore Nyongani (an Olympian) can get their chance to be honored guests at state dinners. Although there were many stellar examples, some documented on my Facebook account, "The Magic Finger of God Ent." was best in show (Tamale, Ghana). Certainly makes you think which finger is magic exactly. For those of you who know my typing style, you will note that I use the three-fingered system so I have five fingers of use, the two middle fingers on both hands and three others. I miss Yemen for being able to wake up every morning and stick out my middle finger to catch the bus to go to work. And one last standout thing from Africa: I Couchsurfed with two Nigerian wholesalers in a town near Rufisque, Senegal. I was amazed that despite the living conditions (two guys sharing a mattress in a single room, cold water shower for the entire building, squat toilets [which I love]), they owned an obsolete PC that had an Internet connection. And while I sit here in Tunisia in one of the richer countries in Africa, having tried to stream sports games, I have never gotten as good of quality streams as I did that night in a Dakar suburb. Go Senegalese Internet! Bring me my Brett Favre vs. Aaron Rodgers and my live World Series action (thank God it was the two most boring teams that could have faced each other save a Red Sox-Phillies matchup, otherwise I would have been sports starved).

Next up: updates on things in Tunisia. I would state my preference in this Colts-Saints matchup (all right, it's the Saints), but I know Frank Caliendo is going to show up in the Fox studio alone come Super Bowl Sunday doing his John Madden shtick telling us that Brett Favre is still an X-factor, so my loyalties are torn. Sorry, small town in rural Wisconsin which is a smaller market than Spokane, Washington. I don't feel your pain. Rather, I see you with your cheeseheads and envy the living daylights out of you. Some of us have to endure pizza with the foreign equivalent of Kraft Singles. And I'll eat a lot of things, but Kraft Singles are an abomination (I know I'm hitting you where the sun don't shine, Jonathan Magin, but it's true). So, to sum up my Super Bowl feelings: Saints 24, Colts 20. In Frank Caliendo's fantasy world: Brett Favre 138.7, Vikings 45, Colts 0. In John Madden's actual head: the 1997 Green Bay Packers 35, 1997 New England Patriots 21. Boom! Tough actin' Tinactin. I'll give it to you, Caliendo, it is kind of fun.

I Mimic Sibelius in a Desperate Attempt: Hannah Kirsch, Will You Love Me? I'll Throw in a Draft Pick.

I spent much of my free evening in Tallinn reading, not schmoozing, or picking up girls, or going to strip clubs (maybe in Riga, nos vemos). At my hostel happened to be a copy of a recent trip Paul Theroux took, the guy who wrote that Harrison Ford-River Phoenix movie in...Mexico, was it? One of them thar countries. The first part basically covered ground I had covered. Unfortunately, a 24-year-old as unconnected as I was could not meet Orhan Pamuk, but I took notice of the presentation of Romania and Hungary as uniquely depressed places. I like the former, not so much the latter (admittedly, I've only been to Budapest), but the presentation of these countries seemed very out of touch. Also, the handling of certain political questions seemed to be a little amateur.
I have not spent much time in the Baltics. I have a wireless connection on a bus (!) from Tallinn to Riga. I also have an electrical outlet, so after I get through this dreary business of writing, a world of possibilities will open up. Shall I conquer the world in my usual guise as Albania in Civilization IV? Be frustrated at the PC version of Grand Theft Auto IV? Be aroused at whatever the Internet has come up with to make the Sims 3 more sexual in the month since it's been released? I have four hours to Riga. On a video game note, I will say that I appreciate GTA IV for its focus on the Balkans, although with a name like Bellic for the main character I would have expected him to be Albanian (the name isn't possible in Serbo-Croatian but is in Albanian). Anyways, go Balkans.
My first experience round these here parts was in Warsaw. Undone by a Swissair flight on which I watched Inside Man twice (Albania!) and slept none, I ended up spending my one day kind of as a vague translator for a Russian girl named Nastya who made food for grocery stores and a dude from Schenectady, NY, who, although I didn't bring up the subject, was clearly in Poland at the displeasure of many (how so lucky). The Russian girl really only spoke French and Russian, both in which I am passable. Though I was deadset on taking the bus to Vilnius, I noticed a strange phenomenon which I've noticed other places. Being the guy who understands the girl, speaks the same language despite being from a different country, you'd think it would work, but, eh, not so much. I really don't understand what is that's alluring about being a monolingual putz, but it seems to work more than whatever it is that I do. Yeah, so, we're having lunch for three, we're speaking in a language completely unintelligble to one member of the table, and you want him? Do you think I'm also Russian? No, no! Cuban! Spanish! German! Czech! Come on, I just learned it for kicks!
I went to Lithuania next. Passed some time in Druskininkai, which has a park I remember from teenagerhood as being labeled StalinWorld. A disappointment. There were some statues, some buildings recreated to mimic Soviet life, but honestly, if you've been to many of the free parks and or cities that haven't really cared to change their outlook from Leninism/Marxism to capitalism, it was a severe disappointment. Unless you have a thing for obscure Communists from the World War I era in Lithuania. The souvenir stands themselves were even disappointing. Go to Kiev, pick up your medal signifying how you yourself occupied Kuban or the Crimea as a Nazi soldier in WWII and be happy.
One thing that time as a limiting factor has not allowed me to investigate is the possibility of souvenirs that would intrigue me. I took a ferry to Helsinki yesterday. Honestly, I think people who collect action figures are lame. If you have a figurine of Spiderman wearing the uniform of all 30 MLB teams, well, you know what should happen. But I was vaguely interested in the notion of action figures from the Kalevala, Finland's national epic. Especially in the crossover sense. I don't own a Scooby Doo action figure, but I sure would buy it, if I could set up a situation in which Scooby Doo stole the Sampo and was attacked by the forces of Pohjola. Same with Estonia, man. Where were the Aarvo Part action figures? I'm an advocate of unorthodox things, so I would have crafted myself a figurine of Aarvo Part conducting his own symphony from a Segway. But, no. You just sell matryoshka dolls, Estonia. With football players instead of babushki. And you don't even have the cunning yet to paint yourself a Brett Favre Viking matryoshka (he's totally coming back)? Man.
I should cover somewhat interactions with people. Because I am a man of limited Estonian, Latvian, Lithuanian, and limited time to go to bars, I have more interacted with the various owners of shawarma stands and doner kebabs, that is, Middle Easterners. In Poland, I was offered the treasure of going whoring with a guy who promised girls that, for 100 zlotych ($35) would do anything in an hour. Real Polish girls. Not a bad price. As I write here, I entertain notions of spending my night in a Riga strip club. I've never had a lap dance. And sure, I'm curious. No morality issues. It's my second to last night of freedom, so why not?
Riga sounds really exciting. How could a city whose main attractions are shooting ranges, strip clubs, and no less than 3 Central Asian restaurants not be? Ta'al ma'ani, nosotros vamos a descrubrir Riga esta noche.

Abstinence: My Human-Sized Condom Against Pain

On the lack of updates: I don't know why, really. But I'm back. Currently in Vilnius. Expect something on the Baltic states in a few days.

Maybe it's inappropriate, but one way I look at religion is in computer terms. I grew up an Episcopalian, baptized a Roman Catholic, and know something of most common religions. To me, Western Christianity is a PC, Orthodoxy a Mac. The latter is shiny, all about aesthetic value, but as a practical way to God, I don't know what looking at a bunch of pictures of saints I've never heard of in Greek is going to get me to Christ. Evangelism is Windows Vista, this unfortunate familiar-seeming abomination that hassles you all the time asking for administrator privileges you should already have.
I've run into evangelicals in almost every country I've been to. In Central America, one conspicuous thing is the number of menorahs painted on buildings and other explicit connections to Judaism. In the smallest towns of Guatemala, one finds Restorante Shalom, Cafe de Ahava, what have you. It's really odd. Ask the locals, to them, they're symbols of Christianity. No, dudes, they're Jewish. Pretty exclusively. Peace to us is paz, pax, never shalom. I climbed a volcano, Izalco, in El Salvador. Unfortunately, a German and I were the only solo travellers. The twenty other people were a Christian group from the University of Texas-Austin doing some do-gooder bollocks. I was among the trailers in our hiking group, and some chick fell down. Obviously, I had to stop, but this was one of the situations where I wished I could've used my Get Out of Common Decency and Chivalry Free Pass, as I had to be subjected to these people praying to Jesus for a minor sprain to be healed and for this girl to be able to make it up this volcano. Jesus is supposed to be answering my prayers about getting me laid and bringing back basketball to Seattle, you dicks with minor trifles. In Teotihuacan, there was a group of American teenage kids. American teenagers are one of those groups that you don't want to associate with, like cannibals in Irian Jaya or such, so I asked one of their Mexican "buddies" what was going on. They were a group called 24/7, and they were from Colorado Springs. That says everything.
Or maybe it doesn't to you, fair enough. They were a group shielding Christianity under the cloak of family values. How can you hate families and morality, you know? I felt really bad for the Mexicans who were getting sucked into this web of crap (evangelism is fast on the rise all over Central America). Also, Evangelical Christians: you're an embarrassment to our faith. The following is how I see you people.
"Well, Mr. Popeil, we're offering salvation for just three easy payments of 9.99." "Wow, what a deal." "And wait there's more, we're throwing in the Amazing Pasta Cooker, a $70 value, for free. And you can try, money guaranteed." "Well, you've really sold" "And we've got some knives here we're adding to the package, just like the ones used in the Battle of Sekigahara, only now you dumb suburbanites get to use them to cut pork rump!" "Terrific!"
On that matter, you really want to sell the New Testament, you've already gone so low, and you've already re-written it to a large extent in the form of heretical "editions," why don't you just take a page from your beloved mass media and re-write the whole doggone thing. There are so many ways you can take this. Does anybody care about the Gospel of Matthew, anyways? Wouldn't it be better as "CSI: Jerusalem?" And Christianity, we'd be doing ourselves a favor and our beloved Republican party one too if we just wrote new parables, "The Parable of the Fallen Ensign," "The Parable of the Appalachian Trail Hiker," to explain how Republican politicians' behavior is saved by Christ's death. I'm all for a postmodern re-interpretation where Jesus' wanderings predict future sites of the best shawarma in the Holy Land, or Isratine (tine like teen, I think it would make things more peaceful if these people's country sounded like Ovaltine) as I call it.
One time in Yemen, where apostasy and proselytzation are more serious crimes than murder, I ran across a girl. She was cute, studying Arabic, from Virginia. Seemed like there was potential. But at one point, she asked me "What team are you on?" Are you asking me if I'm gay? My favorite sports team? The Seahawks, but I kept analyzing the question. Do you mean it in the ridiculously stupid way that places like Office Depot consider their peon college student employees who clearly hate their jobs part of a team? Well, it's a stretch, but I'll tell you what company I work for. Nope, not what you mean, ese, um, Team America? "No, what missionary group are you with." And we're done. It amazed me to see these people talking relatively openly about their efforts to convert Muslims, many of which had taken years, among not necessarily friendly company.
Muslims, you're not that much better. Two particular attempts at conversion stand out in particular. One is really common. It's the "We've got Noah, Abraham, Moses, Isaac, Ishmael, Jesus, Mary, Joseph...why can't you just add Muhammad, it's just one more guy" approach. This smacks of some NBA GM trying to sneak a player into a deal who might have big implications for the team he's trading with, "Well, we're giving you all these players, just take him, you can put him at the end of the bench, not worry about him, you've still got Jesus and those other guys, still the same good team." Doesn't really work. People in Yemen didn't understand a thing which is fundamental to their society. Religion is tribal. Everybody in Yemen is a Muslim because their mother and father and tribe is. So my tribe is Christian. All of my family is Christian. They wouldn't approve of conversion. Most of the girls I've dated wouldn't. My friends wouldn't care so much, but they'd be cautious. Certainly there are employers (you know) who would care.
The second, and singular approach that I'll cover is one hilariously bestowed on me by a Sudanese born New York resident who had attended a junior college in Denver. He had come to Yemen to marry a girl from village (as one friend I had described it, the perks of dating these girls included "placing their hands over the buttons of a cell phone and teaching them how it works"). His argument was the polygamy approach. I personally have no problem with polygamy. But his argument was great. It involved this mythical city called Atlanta, Georgia. I knew of an Atlanta, Georgia, where I had dated a girl from Georgia Tech, a school which had maybe 30,000 students, 70% of which were males. So, at least 21,000 guys. And this Atlanta, I knew from statistics to have a population of 440,000 (city-approximated). So, assuming that the guys from Georgia Tech were the only guys in the whole city, roughly 420,000 to 20,000 or 21 to 1. But this guy, who had lived in America, for God's sake, told me of the problems of this Atlanta, where there were 30 females for every male. Well, by Jove, Islam, which generally allows four wives to a man, isn't doing enough! He admitted he'd only read statistics on Atlanta, but in Denver, where he had lived, it was about 8 to 1. Been there too, dude. I mean, I get it, a lot of American guys really look like chicks with their long hippy hair and nose piercings. But polygamy and me taking a couple of effete males as concubines to two real women wives isn't going to solve any problems.

Credit to Ryan Westbrook

I’ve done about a 2,000 mile day trip. Whitehorse, Yukon Territory, has all of one current operating hostels and it’s booked. Apparently, there are only buses out of this town on Monday, Wednesday, and Friday. As I have neither camping gear nor gumption to spend another night homeless, or really to just hang out around here until Monday, so with the bus I go.

The bus ride, along the Alaska Highway, is one of those scenic drives that one’s supposed to take in one’s life. I went from Dawson Creek to Whitehorse, and will subsequently go back. It was a Nazi wildlife enthusiast’s dream trip: like eight bears, ten buffalo, a couple moose including one adorably wading through a creek, some big horn sheep, zero Jews or Gypsies. Lots of Germans. My book says there’s a direct flight from the Frankfurt Flughafen. There are a fair amount of tourists here, and since this Starbucks in which I am sitting is obviously an excellent sample size from which to generalize about the population, no First Nations/Indians/whatever. That’s been one odd thing about Canada, dealing with the reality that there are still Native Americans of the kind that doesn’t embarrass itself in the World Series every twenty years or so. They’re kind of poor, some of them were harassing people in the Edmonton Greyhound station, but I guess I wasn’t that intimated since they’ve been so marginalized in caricatures like Chief Wahoo or Ike the Illini. I can’t really think of them as the vicious crime lords that my childhood taught me to think of Gypsies/Roma as. Somehow I think my favorite genre as a four-year-old reading was cautionary tales about Gypsies babynapping; although, the only titles I remember reading around that time were Hardy Boys; perhaps there was a hidden meaning.

The bus ride featured characters, though not of the frightening decaying sort that fill up the buses on U.S. Greyhound buses. The most audacious character could be described as an over-the-hill Metis (Canadian for “mestizo”) poor man’s Rashida Jones. Unfortunately, she was around 40 and well, a mentally retarded female. She lifted her arms up towards the bus ventilation system to pray to Jesus to see “the biggest grizzly bear ever,” that aside from her various shouts about this dream to people other than Christ on the bus. Any animal was met by childlike glee and perhaps her best moments were encouraging people seated next to her to use her torn, beat-up pillow, which she foisted upon the seat next to any person who would have it, followed by continuous demands that they actually use it. She had a kind of cute flirtation with this First Nations guy in the seat in front of me. He was a rugged dude, in his late forties, seemed clearly unmarried, and at first seemed miffed by her innocuous and often repetitive questions. He clearly didn’t want that ratty old pillow either. But, thing was, she wasn’t that bad for him, and as I imagined it in my head there was some dilemma in his head about the her being completely slow vs. relatively attractive for what he could get. As the bus trip progressed, he played along more with her vacuous frivolities, “let me take a picture of you…you me…me you! Yay!” “Let’s sit next to each other and talk about ponies!” But he got off at Watson Lake, and got none.

Apparently there were like some foreign girls on the bus, foreign girls traveling alone, even. This is usually something I like, but I didn’t notice anything outstanding, although I did eventually help out the bewildered Chinese tourist who didn’t seem to understand why people were going into a building that clearly stated “restaurant.” They were about my age. At 5:30 AM, I was entrenched on the couch of the lobby of this hostel (more just like a house’s living room, from which I would eventually be dismissed for lack of room at 7:00 AM), and one of the foreign (?) girls from the bus showed up outside the hostel. I could have helped, but I was pretty tired and didn’t want to go outside, and made one of those what I’m told are unfortunate decisions. Yeah, if she were hot, I’d totally go out and help her and go search for actual accommodations, but this is not the case, so screw it, I’ll take my chances on my own. There are times when you’re willing to be everybody’s hero, and there are times when you’re only willing to be the hot girl’s hero. I guess that puts me on the fringes of actually being a nice guy, but whatevs.

So, I’ll walk around Whitehorse a tad, and go back to Dawson Creek today. I have another bus possibly filled with foreign travelers. I’ll end up back in Edmonton, maybe Vancouver, heck maybe back in Saskatchewan. Could end up going to Yellowknife too. I have a 20 hour bus ride to make that decision. Since Saskatchewan has been glossed over, let me state my opinion about it and again perhaps reflect what I’m stupidly focusing energy on. I thought Winnipeg was bad, but dang, Saskatchewan is the Unfortunate Female Piercing Capital of the World. So many people my age had crappy piercings and stupid tattoos. It’s my stated belief that any piercing save the ear looks really terrible, unless it’s a cultural thing (you’re good, South Asia). And don’t overdo it on the ear, ladies. I don’t want a chip a tooth nibbling that area. It was just, every coffee bar, oh, you look cute, maybe you’re about a 0.8 on the (Anne) Hathaway scale, but what is that thing on your nose, down to 0.3. I want to go to a costume shop, gray up my hair, put on tattered clothes, and nail my old timey prospector impersonation and start making like it’s 1849 on some of these women. I learned how to pan for gold as a child, I think. Getting these piercings takes like what, three hours? Making a comparison for which I also have no idea the real time value, girls, couldn’t you have just baked a meatloaf or something? You needed the piercing? That bored in Saskatoon? Nobody’s told you about shopping?

Next post:

I get right angry about religion, so maybe something on that. I’m still traveling, interesting things may happen. Who knows.

The Old Nightstick in the Balls Trick

Ukraine's most disturbing problem is its laughable collection of Beagle Boys impersonators and hapless beer-seeking criminals known by the peculiar Russian word of "politseiskiy." Go out to a cafe with your dark-skinned Arab friends and faster than you can say hick Shoney's in the middle of Florida, they'll be outside of that cafe, with their demands for dokumentiy and pivo ready. Well, yeah, sure that's a valid visa, but well, um, everybody knows that that one chick guard, what's her name, bro, like Alexandra Sergeyevna, she totally stuffs passports down her pants, and well, I don't smell her. Yeah, brat', that distinct flavor of rhubarb and allergy medicine does not reek from this passport. You must have snuck in illegally.

I walk around. Pace about. Lollygag, even. Don't ever do this in Ukraine. Earlier this same day, I had been bounced from a bookstore. By a seventy-year-old woman. I was browsing, just looking. They didn't understand the concept, and saw that my Russian was faltering. I knew the two or three able-bodied menfolk in the city were being at that moment called to remove me to the leper's colony or local Pale of Settlement; "you don't know Russian, how can you read?"

Um, you have, like, some books in English? I walk around, and the babushka Cheka is on me. For ten minutes our game of walking speedily through aisles continue as I hope one of them passes out and I can actually leisurely browse the book shop. But, alas, they win. Really, you get paid to do this? You bounce people at a goldurn bookstore? Or is this just a pregame for a highly competitive night of the Soviet equivalent of bingo?

At the bus station in N(M)ikolae(yi)v, I buy a ticket for a bus departing soon. I want a soda, but nothing's open. So I am committing the aforementioned crime of walking without committing to a destination. A guy who could partake in a furry convention as Hooch from Turner and Hooch without even getting into costume comes up to me. He's "oxrana," or security, which means he holds a job which doesn't even have a Paul Blart figure to rally around. He yells at me loudly, convinced that I speak awesome Russian. I don't. He gets more mad. What am I doing out of the Pale of Non-Russian Speakers? Did the Tsarevich give me a permit? Oh, let's go in my beat up Lada to settle this.

This fifty-something man has a rape-crazy face. He's so pissed, anything could go. Could he in some sort of messianic way turn the local (Southern) Bug River into urine and drown me in it. At 11:30 PM in a surreal outremonde, I'm not ruling it out. Stranger danger. Oh, you want to go behind that bus, do you, sir? I've committed a crime, I don't know what it is, but I'm sure not going to fall for various invitations to date rape. I'm being pretty uppity, I guess. This is why within five seconds this dude's night stick whacks the heck out of my testicles. Shit's getting serious. For a few seconds, I stand there stunned at what has happened, before losing any sense of speaking Russian and going on a long cursing spree brought to a climax by me putting two middle fingers within inches of his eyeballs. The nightstick made a dramatic return, this time positioned to club my head. The people who are with my bus company with whom I purchased tickets are like "Get on the bus, get on the bus." I agree and do so. I spent the night alert, paranoid about the possibility that this guy had radioed ahead. At 1:00 AM, we stop as a policeman pulls our driver off the bus. Oh shit, I think. I look at the unmarked over-the-counter sleep medication I have in my bag, it's as good as opium here. After this false alarm, I took some of the sleep medication, and dispensed the rest in an outhouse in a place called Yuzhno-Ukrains'k.

I am a victim of awkward pacing-related bus cop brutality. Tizkorni, b'vakasha.