THE CHRONICLES OF TROY
Originally Published as True Stories.
Trust me. It’s paradise.
This is where the hungry come to feed.
For mine is a generation that circles
the globe in search of something we haven’t tried before.
So, never refuse an invitation.
Never resist the unfamiliar.
Never fail to be polite.
And never outstay your welcome.
Just keep your mind open and suck in the experience.
And if it hurts, you know what?
It’s probably working.
You hope and you dream but you never
believe that something’s going to happen to you.
Not like it does in the movies.
When it actually does, you expect it to feel different…
more visceral…more real…
I was waiting for it to hit me.
Part One
European Vacation: On The Auto.
Over the incline of the road, I could see the taillights of another car on the right and a set of headlights quickly approaching us from the rear. “Am I driving too slow?” asking as I shifted gears passing 145 mph on the dial and the car on the right. There was enough time to turn and see a Mercedes fly by on the left. “No. It’s the way traffic is on the Auto,” Michaella replied turning up the music—German. We were on our way to Dusseldorf, Germany from Amsterdam with her friend Simone. As we continued racing down the roadway gaining on the Mercedes, pictures of the Mexican vacation on which I met the girls came to mind. In the background of my mind, despite the loud hip-hop playing, Sting’s Stolen Car plays.
It wasn’t my first trip to the Netherlands or Europe for that matter. Traveling by the seat of my pants came naturally to me. And when money and time allowed, I would make my way to world stage of adventure. I made friends easily and often found myself in their homeland visiting. The Germans were the perfect example of it.
Two months earlier, around March 23, 2002, I had gotten a couple of $100 round-trip tickets into Cancun, Mexico. A Swedish guy I knew from Chemistry class decided to buy the extra ticket and join me on the trip. I usually travel alone, but I decided traveling with a Swede might be fun. We ended up in a beach town about 40 minutes south of Cancun. Populated with Europeans, Playa del Carmen or “Playa” is a rustic town that serves as a get-away from most Mexican tourist traps. Having been to the Mayan Riviera a number of times and wanting to stay away from the Spring Break groups, Playa became the best solution for the trip. It offered all the benefits of European culture and really nice beaches without the eight-hour plane ride. It was here that I met the Germans at a Blue Parrot beach party. Like few things in life, you could count on the Blue Parrot Party being lit with torches, 2 for 1-beer prices, good dance music and the occasional loss of clothing.
On our first night just after midnight, the spotlights started to shine onto a few of the tabletops where the local girls would attempt to dance in some sort of synchronized fashion. Local citizens making a few dollars to support their families, their shopping habits or maybe a ticket to some other place—short of being pulled into prostitution, making the scene dressed like a Robert-Palmer video girl probably sounded good and paid better than selling fruit in one of those tri-pod bicycle hoppers. There’s a lot of money to be made at these types of vacation spots—you have only to play the right role and make people believe you like them. Anything short of looking perfect with a language deficiency doomed you to a ten-hour workday at least six days a week and then some depending on the season. I’ve seen it before in other countries with similar conditions; it was all too real and familiar. As the girls started to dance, the beach flooded with people from other bars trying to get in on the groove. I decided it was time to polish off my beer and join in on the action.
The crowd was unison in movement to the rhythm of the music. It was like a rave—hot and crazy. Before long, I ended up on one of the tables jamming having noticed the dancing girls really needed lessons. Not really paying attention and probably with a good beer buzz, I missed noticing the crowd that had started to form just below me. As I became self-conscious, I jumped off the table and join the rest of people below.
As I hit the sand, I noticed the spotlight operator followed me off the table with the light. Yeah. I wasn’t sure what to do losing my rhythm. Fortunately, the music started to change into some trans/disco tune and my having lost the music’s beat went unnoticed. Like in a music video, I made my way closer to the water. At this point, there was a definite group of people imitating my movements as if I knew what I was doing. Now feeling like Rickie Martin, I was lost in the moment and went on dancing until the music changed. It was time for a soda or something—wiping my head clear of the sweat I had managed to work up.
“Nice moves!” yelled a voice over the crowd from behind the bar. I looked around to see which member of the bartending team (On Monday’s the Blue Parrot ’s hosts the ‘hottest bartender in Cancun contest’) was yapping at me. The bar owner stepped over to introduce himself. “Carolina thinks I should offer you a job,” he said handing me a beer. I laughed inquiring what the job and pay might entail and who Carolina was (hoping she was from some exotic country). With a handshake and a planned lunch for the following day to discuss the job issue at greater length, I left to find my Swedish friend Kim working out a few beer issues. While I was out dancing, he had met a couple of Dutch people and the Germans. Putting more water and a couple of beers down, we walked the girls back to their hotel during which they invited us to join them the following day to tan. I left and went to the beach to catch the sunrise as Kim jetted off with the Dutch couple to some after-party.
I wrote in my journal (now missing):
March 26, 2002: Tukan Beach, Playa del Carmen, Mexico
The sun is starting to rise, and as it does, the early morning twilight is giving
way to a warm reddish glow. I’m on the beach again. I’m a little tired and still
a little buzzed. It’s Tuesday the second day of another trip to Playa—nice. This
is the first time I’ve managed to stay awake to see the sunrise. Amazing. Off to find my Swedish friend Kim…I think he’s going to get lost. Coffee sounds really good right now.
I found him later that morning having breakfast on the deck. I was right; he had gotten lost on his way back to the pension.
“Which exit am I …,” as Michaella pints to the sign on the road realizing it probably didn’t make sense to me. I laughed and told her about the first time I had tried to find them on the beach in Playa. The beaches in Mexico tend to be topless and then some on underdeveloped stretches down the coast. Contrary to popular belief, there are rules that need to be followed in such environments. On such rule is to be invited to tan with a person or a group of people while they’re in the near ‘buff’. This brings us to another dilemma; if you get invited to tan with someone, you better show up with them because looking around for a friend on a topless beach is like being blind looking around randomly for a person that look a lot different with less clothing. Not to mention the general lack in appreciation for looking –passer-bys. It just doesn’t work. She laughed also having gotten the same explanation in Mexico and brought up the kayaking trip asking about my shoulder. “It still gets a little numb now and then,” I said down shifting to slow the car for the turn-off. I remember that incident well. I thought my time was up and was going to be fish food.
It was Friday the last day of our vacation, and after a couple of days of scuba diving through some of the underwater caves followed by more tanning and a volleyball tournament, it was time for a near twenty-mile ocean kayak tour. We were due back to the CUN airport by early evening. As chance would have it, I was wiped out of my kayak by a wave put out by a passing ocean cruiser. I turned into the waves a little too late and ended going through one holding on to my paddle, which went with the wave hyper-extending my shoulder to the point of dislocation. I was now a noticeable distance from the other people and really couldn’t see them as I bobbed up and down in the waves. I was a little over a half mile away from the nearest shoreline. It might as well have been 10 miles as my arm was useless. I straddled my kayak and made my way to shore. As I arrived, I noticed the Swede followed in behind me. Without thinking about it or explaining to him what had happened, I had him hold my arm as I yanked my body away from him painfully snapping my shoulder back into place. It was still functional but starting to swell. Now it was a matter of getting back to the other side of the bay before my shoulder became too stiff to use.
It must have taken us enough extra time to get back as there was a boat on the way out to find us having thought some tragedy had occurred. (I suppose it was tragic, as I would never play competitive volleyball again without fear of my shoulder popping out of place.) After getting to shore, my shoulder had pretty much gone stiff with swelling and needed some medical attention. The girls were both nurses and happened to have some anti-inflammatory in their gear. It was they who had expressed a level of concern to the tour guide operator. She was an Italian friend of mine that figured it was either my time or I was putting on a show to get a sympathy beer from them that gave in and came out to meet us.
We had dinner and went through the normal ‘farewell’ rituals knowing that they’re exactly that—rituals. Well normally. I knew I would be in Europe sooner or later and expressed an interest in seeing what German life was like and more importantly what their lives were like to which they extended the offer to show me around should I make the scene.
As we pulled into Dusseldorf, “Hey, there’s a few people we’re meeting for dinner that want to meet you. I told them you write and have an interesting style of expressing things,” Michaella mentioned as we pulled into the place I would be staying. It was an awesome time. There it is.
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