The Beautiful People

Blind Thai

Bangkok, January, 1992. We're crossing a pedestrian overpass in the middle of the steaming, fumey city. Everywhere is grey concrete dotted with golden peaks of temples and tuk-tuks amongst old dusty Japanese cars, gridlocked for as far as you can see. We trudge slowly in the oil-thick humidity as if we're walking through a pit of quicksand. Each step an effort. The sidewalks below us are covered with old junky street vendors selling fake everything. Rolexes, pirated tapes, Chanel t-shirts and Gucci purses. The only thing real for sale on these streets are the 14 karat gold ear/nose pickers with intricate stain designs on them. We've covered the side of the street behind us; we're going to the other side to see what new deals we can find. As we turn a curve in the spiral down ramp, we come across a shocking sight. A woman leaned up against the concrete rail of the overpass, her eyes are sewn shut and she's missing a leg. A boy no more than 3 is curled up in her lap with a largely overblown stomach, the type you see on sponsor-a-kid commercials. They're both wrapped in white cloths and are struggling to stay out of the sun. The woman moves her head in each direction and says stuff in Thai. There's an old men's hat turned upside down by the child's feet with little more than two or three coins in it. Beside her is a bag that says "duty free" stuffed with linens and one rotting mango. Overcome with emotion, I throw some bills in the hat and move the hat closer to her so she knows I've put something in there. Frantically, she feels around for the hat, grabs it and slips her hand inside and big, rotting teeth emerge from between her lips as she repeats one word over and over again which I assume is thank you, as she repeatedly bows her head. The child begins to cry and she is distracted, cradling him, unable to give him a nurturing glance she strokes his face gently and he falls silent once again. A moment they need to share alone, I turn into the sludgy air and make my way down the ramp.

Sultry Sax

Sitting on the dock, groggily, having been roused distastefully early this morning. The tide is out, the crossing to Shady Island has emerged from below the water surface. A crane is wandering in the exposed mud, sticking it's beak into it every now and then. The gentle creak of old wood in the warm wind is calming. I lie down on my back on the wood and feel it shift beneath me. I close my eyes, thinking wonderful things and slowly drift off. Just as I'm at the tempting threshold of much needed sleep, I hear a child's taunting sing-song voice. "I can't wear your shorts, 'cause you have a big bum! Big bum, big bum, big big bum." I giggle a little and open my eyes. A kid about 8 years old is pointing at another boy, looks like his brother, and sticking out his tongue. He wanders to the rail of the dock and puts his hands on it. Then he suddenly lifts them and looks at his palms and shreiks, sing-songy again, "Let go! Let go! Ow, ow, owie. Ow, ow, owie." I wonder what could possibly be going through his miniature head. He is silent after this and my eyes drift shut again. And again, as I get to that point of dozing where reality and subconscious nuts and bolts are confused, I hear the haunting sound of a saxaphone in the distance somewhere. Unsure of whether or not I imagined it, I jumped to my feet, startled. A year ago in the same place, I was on the lower deck of the dock writing and back on the bank a man about my age sat on a bench and played the saxophone. I had watched him, interest peaked, and he had glanced at me a few times. After a while, he had gotten up and walked down the end of the dock, upper level where he played some more, looking down at me steadily. I turned for a moment as something distracted me and when I turned back he was gone. No footsteps on the dock, nothing. Just vanished. So now, hearing this saxophone in the same place was a bit startling. I stood on the dock, looking everywhere for him. The child who said everything in song, sang "he's on Shady Island" to me and I asked "how did he get over there with a sax?". The kid shrugged. Sure enough, the sound was coming from within the thick greens of the tiny island. I struggled to catch a glimpse of him but all I was allowed were a few flashes of the sun reflecting off what I assume was his saxophone. I gave up and lay back down on the dock, daydreams drifting through my head to the mystic sound of a hidden saxophone.

The Future

I went down to the dyke today, bought a brand new notebook and pencil, sat with 'em on a picnic table lookin' out over the water. There was no one around really, not close anyway. I sat cross-legged with my notebook open on my lap. I'd taped a rather beautiful picture I printed up last night to the inside cover. I was gazing at it and writing, gazing and writing. The sun was so hot, licking my skin and reflecting off the water. Surreal. I'd see a sillouette in the distance. Someone walking, running or riding their bike. They'd get closer, look at me and pass. Cars would appear out of nowhere, zip around a corner and park or zip off. I saw a dog in the distance, a black lab. His coat was shining. I saw his owner come around the corner behind him, about a kilometer off. They walked slowly, slowly toward me. The owner was a man about my age, sunglasses, bouncy step. He grinned as he passed. A few minutes later he passed coming back and asked if I was enjoying the sun. "Yes", I said. He smiled and bounced away. As he disappeared back around the corner, a station wagon appeared. It creeped slowly down the road and pulled into the gravel lane where I had parked. The woman inside was about 60. She rolled down her window, propped her elbow up on the door frame, seemed to sigh and leaned her head in her hand. Her eyes were sad as she sat there for 40 minutes, completely still looking out at the water. I wondered, for those 40 minutes, what she might be thinking of. The vast time and space that had been her life prior to this moment must have had a few glorious minutes of utter joy. She looked as though she were about to cry for the loss of it. As I packed up to leave, she started her car and backed out and I kissed my hand and held it up to her disappearing car.

Airborne Burger bag

This afternoon I was standing outside having a smoke with several people, sort of drifting off 'cause they all have the same class except for me and were talking about an upcoming test. I start spinning my Binaca canister in my hand and hold it up against different backgrounds, totally zoned. I'm startled when one of the girls jumps up from the bench she's sitting on, points to the sky above the road and exclaims "Look! a McDonald's bag in the air!". I turned and looked and sure enough one of those brown, red and yellow bacteria farms is soaring above the treetops in the wind. The girl starts a running stream of curiosities. "I don't know how it even got there in the first place! Sorry! How did it get up there? Wow! Sorry! I just... well, how did it do that?" and so on. After the bag drifts to the ground, she slowly sits back down, takes a puff of her smoke, stares at the concrete. We're all very silent until she says very quietly, "anyways...".

Dinner

Bali, January, 1992. We're waiting in the long stretched-out driveway of our 5-star hotel for a tour van to pick us up and take us into the heart of Bali. A rusty volkswagen pulls up and we hop in. The Indonesian man driving greets us with a huge white smile and a choppy "hello!". We all say hi and tell him to take us everywhere. We pull away from the hotel and drive forever. We pass through villages and rice steps in the lush, green mountains. We stop at a monkey farm and feed a few primates, buy some wooden monkey carvings. We stop at a Buddhist temple decorated lovingly with ribbons on 20 foot tall bamboo poles and golden Buddhas and flowers and incense burners. At the top of the mountain we stop for lunch. The cafe overlooks the entire Island, a mass of green, moist rice steps. We get our picture taken with the haunting band playing out front and we take off again. Down the other side of the mountain, we pass a tiny village with one jade shop and thousands of chickens roaming everywhere. As we drive through, a half dozen chickens find themselves in front of us crossing the road. The driver makes no effort to slow down and we hear a series of thumps and there are feathers everywhere. He turns back, flashes the same white smile and says "dinner!" and chuckles.

Young-a-Lady

Sitting in the Lansdowne mall parking lot. About 4:50pm, been here an hour or so. I'm reading Another Roadside Attraction by the man, Mr. Tom Robbins. The sun is warm, a gentle breeze cools me. People keep passing by in the midst of their busy city lives, going to and from buses, carrying shopping bags from every limb, walking quickly so as to fit as much madness into their day as possible. An endless stream of cars pass by and all I can smell is exhaust. So I figure I'll light up a smoke to smell something else. I take a puff, exhale. An old woman to my left is hobbling slowly, painfully towards me with about 6 grocery bags in her fragile hands. She's all bundled up in a sweater as if it weren't hot out. Her giant white purse dangles from her elbow. Slowly she approaches me and, staring through monstrous antique sunglasses, says "Young-a-lady?" in an Italian accent. "Yes?" I reply.
"I don't-a-want you to take this the wrong-a-way, young-a-lady, but you should try to stop that-a-bad-a-habit. My-a-son, he was-a-45 years old and he passed away." She points to her chest. "Lung-a-cancer."
I nod and say I'm sorry to hear that.
"Please, young-a-lady, just have a candy or something. Please try-a-young-a-lady." and she saunters off, turning back every few minutes until I put my smoke out.

Toys in Motion

Sometime during our monstrous wander around the city today, we ended up in a toy store. Toys in Motion is what the sign said. Some old, run down building with the name painted on it by hand. The windows were dirty and there was a garage sale sign in it, trying to entice people to buy their merchandise by claiming it was some sort of personal yard sale. Naturally, I was curious. Looked more like the outside of some dirty old club junkies might frequent lookin' for dealers than a toy store. We went in. There was no one around so we just wandered through the aisles. You know those toys they sell in the tiny toy section of a super market? Like bouncy balls and brightly colored suction-dart guns that don't work. That's what this store was filled with, only everything was dusty and broken. The shelves were complete chaos, no order to them whatsoever. I had to watch where I walked so my backpack didn't knock shit over. We kept wandering, picking the odd toy up, plastic cell phones that don't even make sounds, little Hello Kitty purses with broken straps. About 5 minutes into this, an old middle eastern man wanders in from the back, spots us, flashes us a giant white smile and gallops over to the service desk, passing a garbage can. He steps on the can's pedal and the lid flips open and silly midi music comes pouring into the room. He starts to snap his fingers, still smiling at us, wiggling to the music. We smile back and keep wandering. He disappears into the back again and I immerse myself in the wonder that is this store. I find one of those old nerf swords with the flippy things and swing it around in the aisle. The man comes wandering back in and smiles all over again, repeats his garbage can routine as though we were entirely different poeple and we hadn't seen the abilities of the garbage can yet. He wiggles and snaps and smiles and we chuckle and say thank you and slip out to the street.