Fruit fly

I had quit my job and come to Indonesia to figure out what the next phase of my life was going to be.  I had been introspective for nearly two weeks and although I had found by boiled-down-to-basics, base-person-without-lipstick, no-longer-identifies-self-by-profession person, it was time.  To party!

Hey people!  Jen Keys is in the house!  Get out the glitter and the house music and the disco ball, but turn off the lights at 11 because I can’t stay up much later than that.   Correction, Jen Keys is in the house until the nightly news comes on!  Yeah!  Me and Tom Brokaw are gonna shut it down (at 11:30!)  Anyway, it was time to go out.

Or at least grab a cocktail and start talking to some interesting people, most likely from Australia.  Australians are quickly becoming some of my favorite people in the world.  They are friendly, unpretentious, great conversationalists and really helpful to fellow travelers.  The only people I like more are gay.  So who do you think the tri-fucking-fecta of the world’s most fun people are?  That is right.  A table of gay Australian men to my right who were into their 14^th drink of the day and were carting around a small stuffed koala bear.  I know that tri implies three and I have only identified two of their awesome characteristics, so I am going to go out on a limb and say that ANYONE that walks around with a stuffed koala bear is automatically interesting.

The first person’s voice I heard was Tony’s.  Tony is The Gay Ambassador.  It is true, he gave me his card.  He has written books, does consulting on LGBT issues and just turned 60 (looking fabulous, Tony!).  His closest friends and his daughter had come to celebrate his birthday in style.  I knew he was cool. 

I had been sitting next to them for a while trying to work up the courage to beg them to adopt me and let me be their official Fruit Fly.   It would be awesome – we would travel the world sipping cocktails, looking fabulous and they would send all the cute heterosexuals my way and I would entertain them and get into bar fights and extricate them from compromising situations.  I am really good at that.  People call me at weird hours all the time.  “Hey Jen, I think I am in Ballard, but I don’t have my pants.”  “Hey Jen, sorry to call so late, but I can’t find my car and I left my boyfriend in it”.   “Hey Jen, is it SUPER illegal to give weed to a cop?  He was cute.”  No worries.  I get up at 4 a.m. anyway, so it isn’t like they are troubling me.    

One of the guys caught my attention by taking the koala (Kenny – I originally thought they said Teddy but explained that Teddy was the OTHER bear then knew) on a photo shoot by the pool.  He put him above a floor light so the adorable little koala actually looked sinister and creepy.  I sensed my chance to join the party.   “Let me take a shot of you and the bear,” I said.  Bear, capital B Bear jokes ensued and I was in.  They explained to me that Kenny had just come out of rehab for drug and sex addiction and they were helping him break his vows.  I fashioned a little pair of tighty whiteys out of a napkin for him and put them on.  There are two glaring exception to my previously stated no thongs rule – gay men and Brazilian women are exempt.  And stuffed koalas that look like Ashton Kutcher.

They invited me out to the drag and go-go boys show at one of the gay bars in Seminyak, and I agreed to meet them there.  I had a few hours to kill, so I went to a swanky hotel bar called Cocoon.  This place was so not my scene, but it was across from the beach, the chairs were chaise lounges lined along an infinity pool that changed color every few seconds, there was a live DJ playing decent music and I ordered a Mango Madness. 

I know.  I am getting tossed out of the Trotsky club as we speak.  They had a special meeting and even called Frieda and Diego in a séance, but, damn, when “I feel love” came on as I was drinking my yummy smoothie, looking at the beach with my feet out on the chaise, I thought it might be worth it.  I heard the Sparkly Che Guevara club might have an opening anyway.

I wound up getting into a very long conversation with the waitress about immigration to the US.  Back when I wasn’t an unemployed slacker, I did a lot of immigration work, so know a little about the different options.  She was beautiful and 20 and hell bent on getting out of Indonesia.  I grew up in a tourist town and understand that often, there are few options other than being a waitress with a PhD unless you leave to make your fortune elsewhere.  It sucked.    

It started to rain really hard around 9:30 and I knew I was going to bail on the Indonesian Lady Gaga impersonators (remember when we just had Madonna and Cher?), so I headed for the impromptu cheapo taksi stand.  Around the corner was a used book shop and I picked up a few more pieces of crack.  White Tiger, Bel Canto, Girl with the Dragon Tattoo, the Color of God, Jakarta Undercover, the Second To the Last Woman in England – have all been devoured in two weeks and I needed more literary sustenance.  I tried watching tv here, but it is all “Biggest Looser Asia” and stuff I don’t understand other than there is a religious guy and the sun is rising behind him and they are playing nice music and people look beatific. 

The kid on the bike taksi was in need of a serious shower.  He smelled like teenage boy, probably because he was a teenaged boy.  You know that unwashed hair, clothing and cigarettes odor that left to fester smells like the room of a teenager who plays too much D&D?  That was what I cuddled around headed 40 mph through Seminyak to avoid the downpour.  

I headed back to finish reading and listen to the rain. 

This morning, I woke up unbelievably early, even for me, finished my book and waited for the internet café to open.  It is about a half mile away and my only source of wifi nearby. 

I had breakfast (I am so sick of fish sauce, I think they threw some on my eggs or cooked in the same pan, so I couldn’t eat anything by the coffee and juice) and plugged away at my computer.  I have to arrange some interviews for my unemployed self while I am traveling, so attempted to do that with three different organizations.  It is hard when you are traveling – I am on an 18 hour time difference, across the international date line, with no cell service and spotty internet service.  Hopefully the Skype calls will be more reliable from Australia.  Plus, they are having rolling blackouts, so power just randomly goes away.  I wound up talking to a few couples next to me like a real live human being instead of a Gen X stereotype.

Patrick and Madonna invited me to their table.  Patrick was rocking his own tube of vegemite (made my Kraft!).  At first I thought it was sunblock, but a sticky brown paste came out and he squished it all over his bread before offering me some.   Well, I had tried durian, this couldn’t be much worse.  Plus, Madonna said, it is a great source of vitamin B!  Ok, I bit.  I chewed.  I swallowed.  Better than durian, I am sorry to say.  Patrick told me how he had convinced some Israelis that it was like Nutella.  I explained li hing mui and we all gagged in mutual disgust (me of the vegemite, not li hing). 

They invited me to meet them for dinner and give me a primer on “all that is Australia” later tonight in prep for my random trip to Perth.  I found a used Lonely Planet for Australia and have been reading up on Perth, but then I realized the book is from 1992.  I was still in undergrad then; things must have changed in the last 18 years, right?  They (Patrick and Madonna) are here building a children’s play area for kids in Lombok at the school where they volunteer teach.  Their whole family is coming out to help.  Aussies are rad – almost every one of them I have me here are doing some kind of charity work on their holidays. Not the ones on the beach in the Bintang t-shirts………they are just Midwesterners with better accents and tans. 

I met Pat and Madonna for drinks at this amazing hotel bar in Legian.  It had an infinity pool dropping four stories to the beach below.  More importantly, they had the most fantastic guitar player.  His name was Tariq and he was from Jordan by way of Australia.  He played with a foot operated mixer and an electric violinist and they did a mix of classical, flamenco and hip hop guitar with Celtic fiddle and spoken word.  It was like a musical smoothie of things that ought not to make sense (I’m talking Jamba Juice, people) but was actually quite lovely.  We just sat and listened and watched the sun go down over the beach.  Here I am, all getting sucked in to tourist land.  Before you know it, I will be driving a scooter to my press on nail appointment. 

The neighbors are getting used to me walking everywhere.  I think I am like their personal chia pet at this point.  They have even stopped screaming “taksi!” and now simply say “selamat pagi” or good morning when I pass by on my way to town or the beach.  I love the part of a trip when you start to blend, a bit.  You become part of the background and can just sit back and watch – no pressure to perform.  Which is good, as I tend to fall down a lot.  I only fall down when I am sober for some reason – randomly come crashing to the street on my bike, feet, heels, etc.  As I am sober way more than I am not, so I have lots of scars on my knees and palms.  Indonesia is no exception.  I eat it on these streets on a near daily basis.  The combo of gaping holes in the sidewalk, slime covered everything, randomly honking cars, crappy flip flops and me guiding the two things I tend to rely on for walking ensures I will be face down, ass up, at least 5% of the time.  Today was no exception.  Fell in some mud, skated along the street for a good half block, flopped onto my back foot like I was trying to recreate Ice Castles or something.  Terimah kasih!

Pat and Madonna and I had a great dinner full of political debate.  They are both biologists, and I love scientists.  How could a people be so whip smart and irreverent and creative and interesting and fun?  I wish I could do math.  I would be one of them.  I can actually do math, but if an algorithm comes up to me on a darkened street, I am going to spray it with Raid.  As Barbie says, “Math class is hard!”  True that, sister.  Can I borrow your pointy shoes?