BACKHANDING THE LOCALS

SINGING

I don't remember which episode of South Park had it but they spent the show making fun of some tone deaf bint who did the most awful singing ever.

Worse is going on outside and has been all fucking day.

Asian music is bad enough when professionals do it.  When tone deaf people do karaoke of it, it is indescribable.   When I first heard it, I thought people were being ritualistically tortured to music.  Later, I discovered I was the one being tortured.

All this is going on due to some boat races that went on somewhere earlier in the day.  The town now has license to party and the locals are doing so...badly.

Fortunately, I'd been warned of the unofficial holiday ahead of time and despite wanting to leave the small town I'm in decided to put off travel for a couple days.  Never travel during local holidays.



PARANOIA

You know, there are times when my paranoia just flares up.

Like when a pretty girl sits down next to me and wants to rub up and down against me.

Since I look (and weigh) as I do, the first thing I think it 'prostitute'.

And I've not been let down in that assumption yet.

My charm can take decades to work on a lady.  Decades.

So I'm at a bar with a new friend (hi Christian!) and we're having a quiet drink outside away from the overly loud music when some random scrumpet (from Lao) sits down next to me and wants to get all chatty.

Immediately, my arm goes over and stays over my bag.  Pickpockets are not unheard of.

Fortunately, Christian is a German so we share this language.  I tell him (in German) 'she wants to have sex for money'.  He agrees.

She tells a lot of vague lies (most people are not trained in lying) about how she's been to the country Christian is from.  Her lies were pretty transparent.

She wanted us to go to another club with her where no doubt she would get a kickback from the various drinks we were to buy her.  Or we'd just get mugged.  Switching clubs is never a good idea.

In German, I urge him to finish his drink.  It is late enough that things can go 'pear shaped' very quickly.   We managed to extricate ourselves from the young(ish) lady quickly and depart.

For those who wish to loudly bitch 'can't a young(ish) lady have a drink with other people' and 'women should be allowed to dress as they wish' I can only respond "Have you seen me?"  It would take a woman being really blind drunk to think I am physically attractive.  While women might like my mind or perhaps even charisma, there is simply not enough alcohol in the world for anyone to think of my body as some sort of 'sex object'.   It's not like I'm Robert Downey Junior.

"Wait - how did I get sucked into this asshole's blog?"

For people not accustomed to this type of treatment, I must hasten to point out that the way you extricate yourself from this situation is very important.  Fortunately, my friend had the right angle - "We have to get up early in the morning for a bus."  You want them to think you are too busy and possibly self involved to get together with them.  It is never appropriate to backhand them and yell "Begone ye harlot!"

Note, there may be many countries in which backhanding the locals is appropriate but it doesn't strike me as a good way to 'win friends and influence people'.



COSTS

Two vodka drinks with t-shirt, 50,000 kip.  Only available at one bar 'saguro' or some such.

How To Pick Up Prostitutes

HOW TO PICK UP PROSTITUTES

Found this little gem on youtube. It contains some very good information for people who are clueless. It's good stuff.

It is shocking to me just how many countries allow this. I wish I'd had researched this for the blog post 'How Much Do Prostitutes Cost In Your Country?'

Gosh, this blog is more fun than burying a hooker in the desert!

It's important to be nice to women, unless you are going to be tying them to a table later! [Or if you are Matt and need more storage space for more dead hookers...]



GERMANY

Apparently we have some readers in Germany. In their honor, we present 'the Hoff'.



MIDDLE EAST

Can you say 'powder keg'? It appears that the rioting in Egypt is spreading. The 'green movement' as it's now getting called. It's really looking as though the US is happy for the chaos as well. Did they destabilize the governments? Only time will tell.

The funny thing is that everyone says it is an uprising against corruption. Kind of. From here, quote: "Workers stood in front of the Bank Misr and shouted: "We want more money! We want more money!" Now, I'm not a political science major but I'm thinking that money was at least the spark to all of this uprising going on. It's always about the money. Corruption seems ultimately to be about money.



HOME REMEDIES

So, I managed to put a small slice into my finger while doing up some onions. It bled like a stuck pig. I consulted with a friend of mine who reassured me that hands and head wounds bleed a lot in order to freak you out. Travis is correct. We can call him Dr. Travis - he seems better than many of the doctors I've seen.

It is especially ironic as I've trained in knife fighting. Apparently, I should have trained in cooking instead.

Anyway, after running cold water onto it to clean it out, I applied a 'hick bandage' (paper towels wrapped with any kind of tape/rope around) and had to change it once. Later, I decided to apply what I call a 'Bert band-aid' to it. This involves using super glue to help seal the wound. Now, a lot of people don't know this but super glue on skin is amazingly slow to dry. I'm not sure if it ever does. So, here's a tip - clear plastic. Hopefully it will come off later. If it doesn't, well... I'm not sure. I disinfected it with alcohol then stuck it to the finger. Covered it with a band-aid. I'll let you know how it works out.

On a slightly different note, this did help to tell me that my medic kit is woefully stocked. Sadly, I just can't get more shit into my bag - it's pretty full as it is. Maybe after some of the other stuff works its way out (or I get tougher) maybe I'll get a real medic kit someday.