GLUTTONY DIGEST, SUMMER 2003 -10-
GLUTTONY DIGEST, SUMMER 2003 -11-
convinced that Oishi’s wrath was channeling through Oishi’s gluttony. It was not: Oishi’s rage was a dark and primal coal inside of him whose heat he buried in women and drink. Gluttony was a mask he wore, and when Kira looked upon it and was satisfied, Oishi struck mercilessly. He snuck his men into Kira’s mansion and using the wakizashi his fallen Daimyo had used on himself after being manipulated by Kira into a forced Seppuku, he sliced off Kira’s head. Thus, beware of drunken hitmen in backwater towns.
should find an A.T.M.,18 a man had led them to the skankiest A.T.M. in all of Tijuana. At that point, Ryan was unwilling to insert his card into the slot, as it spit-out only pesos, and its fees were indeterminable. Back in the strip club/bordello, “El Tigre”, the girl with whom I’d been conversing - we will call her “Cochiti” - laughs when the stripper who’s bouncing on top of Dirty asks me to translate her proposition.19 I am instructed to explain that my friend is a cheap bastard who won’t withdraw the funds necessary to complete the transaction. She is nonplussed and good-natured, making sure I let him know that they are open until six a.m. and, grabbing the crotch of his pants for further emphasis, that she’ll be waiting to take care of him.
p. 21, “TRAVELS WITH NED”; Travels with Josh: Gluttony and Lust
“Mwhen sheT asked”: what I Ithought of the place asinmyTijuana three E HACE
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friends enjoyed lap dances and were cajoled into considering sex-acts. Her eyes were covered by blue-grey contact lenses reminiscent of the milky eyes of the blind.14 I immediately regretted my choice of words, but she understood – the streets of Tijuana are teeming with young children hocking Chiclets, juggling poorly, there like everyone else to dip into the deep pockets of gringo tourists flirting with third-world desperation.15 The argument to pay for sex16 had begun to persuade SkullDuggs and Dirty17 and within moments of wondering aloud whether they
14
Teiresias, the blind seer. Also, the scantily clad priestesses of Delphi, the Pythia, who’d inhale large quantities of intoxicating fumes and writhe halfnaked as dutiful men wrote down their ravings to set policy that could see nations to go to war. (See, e.g.: http://www.aroundparnassos.com/history/) The holiest part of Delphi was the Omphalos Stone, believed to be the center of the world. The navel: gateway to intoxication and mystery; drug-scented flesh draped about, over, and through it. 15 Over the concrete bridge from what remains of California into Tijuana, the sense of leaving law behind you is palpable. Underneath, where one expects some sort of majestic Rio Grande dividing order from chaos is essentially a trash filled ditch. Small half-naked men are running through the muck, their destinations and motives a mystery, as a tall teenaged boy of the American Abercrombie genus passes by with a babbling girl flung over his shoulder. 16 A compelling combination of Corona buckets and genital massage. 17 While these pseudonyms are used in part to conceal the identity of relevant parties, in truth they routinely go by them and their reputations are already sullied. See, e.g., Dirty’s website, www.dirtydirty.com.
At that moment we are all great friends. We are all so affable and cheerful. When Cochiti asks, we learn that I share my name with her two-year old son. When she asks me why I do not have children, I tell her that it isn’t that I don’t like children, but that I’m simply not ready for children.20 She tells me that a single child is really no work at all, but when you have two like her it’s more difficult. She is nineteen and has no family. She seems full of strength and happiness as the older stripper next to her switches to a reverse cow-girl position. I ask Cochiti if she has friends who she works with. “Amigas? Aquí, no hay amigas.” We talk more of America,21 of her children, and of Guadalajara22 and Mexico. Tijuana is an ugly place, she tells me. Mexico is a 18
We all had purposefully left our wallets at Pete’s place in San Diego, but SkullDuggs had accidentally brought his A.T.M. card along. 19 $20.00 for a room; $40.00 for a blowjob; $60.00 for intercourse. 20 I didn’t say this exactly, but I might as well have; I feel like an asshole. 21 She does not believe America should fight wars for oil, does not believe it can solve the world’s or Mexico’s problems.