"Adventures of King Prawn"
Travelogue of Bali, Malaysia, Thailand, Laos, Vietnam and Mexico

May/96

5/11/96

  I’ve been here about ten days. I’m beginning to get into the flow of the local lifestyle; something I tend to do when traveling. This involves lots of relaxation, meditation, walks (I love walking, and find that I rarely do it when in the States), interaction with other travelers and natives, and delicious local cuisine.

  One thing has been occupying my mind a lot lately, and that’s my preoccupation with thinking. I’m tired of it and find it none too appealing, or beneficial to my growth. I’ve spent the first half of my life in a very male mode; that is, pushing, trying to make things happen. Last year, I decided that I would simply stop this dysfunctional behavior (easier said than done) and began my jaunt around Asia. I figure that I’ve planted enough of my seeds (creative works) into the universe and that if they are truly important, that they should sprout without the constant mothering and attention I’ve been giving them. So, no more dumping of funds into making the works grow. Let them be. I’ve adopted the same tack on my life. I’m way past tired doing this, in expectation of that. So, what does this all mean? It means that I’m in the process of non-doing, and expect to be in that place for a while. As my head is a constant flow of thoughts (mostly neurotic, frustration oriented topics associated with reality versus expectations), I’ve begun meditating twice a day, from twenty to forty minutes a pop. What has revealed itself through this process is how difficult it is for me to stop the thoughts, to get beyond the ego, to find the space (the quiet) in between the thoughts. When I began meditating, some twenty years ago, I found it much easier to focus on breath and mantra and would rapidly dissolve into a deep, trance-like state. But not unlike one attempting to shed pounds, it gets more difficult with time and age. In a forty minute meditation, I may be graced with a total of fifteen to thirty seconds of tranquillity. Shit! But I’m just starting meditating again, and I’m hopeful that practice will bring me better results.

  When I was in Asia, I wrote what I felt to be good lyrics and melodies for a new album. But upon returning to Sedona, and attempting to make even rough demos of the songs, I found myself constantly second guessing myself. The result was confusion, questions, and nothing to show from the sporadic moments I spent in the studio. So I packed up the house, put the studio in storage and bought a little keyboard with which I could compose while traveling. So, here I am, on the beach, away from all I wanted to escape from. But I feel little interest in composing. As you can see in these paragraphs, my confusion is still a dominating force. On one hand, I’m extolling the virtues of non-doing, while on the other I bemoan the fact that I’m not doing anything. This is partly do to my ego finding it difficult to give up the idea of being an artist. It has such as ring to it, doesn’t it? Artist? “Meditation guy” doesn’t sound as impressive. “Do nothing. Passive, non-creative, nonproductive, slab of humanity.” Damn, I hate the ego. (Then again, perhaps I’m simply suffering from a classic case of writer’s block.) Okay, now, breathe in. Breathe out. I feel better now. Its not all that bad. I’m grateful that I have the health and resources to even be posing these thoughts to myself. After all, I could be stuck in a traffic jam, downing my fifth monster gulp coffee en route to a fluorescent lighted office building. No doubt, that would be worse. No, that would suck! Instead, the wind is singing through the palms. The waves caressing the shore.

  One thing that pushed me to move from the States was that the aspects of life which I value could be found elsewhere, at a fraction of the cost. It’s not that I had money to worry about, I didn’t, but I felt stupid shelling out countless dollars insulating myself from myself. When you get right down to it, how much is enough?


5/15/96

  Salsa (the appetizer served with chips, not the musical style) is also known as la bandera (the flag) of Mexico. This is because the colors of the ingredients (red: tomatoes, green: cilantro & jalapenos, white: onion) are the same as that of the flag.

  A man named Juan is big, burly. He is handsome and could be mistaken for American, or Canadian. He comes from a very well-to-do Mexican family of producers whose one noteworthy production was the musical “Hair”. When the show was put on, back in the sixties, the nudity was considered offensive and branded the family as producers of lurid material. One day, Juan and his friends were driving to the border of the United States, so that they could go to a rock concert. They had about an ounce of marijuana with them. As they neared the border, they noticed that the military was stopping every vehicle and searching the passengers for contraband. Juan coolly put the marijuana in the back of his underwear, got out of the car, and proceeded to the bathroom. Once there, he flushed the contents down the toilet. As he exited the toilet, a soldier, mistaking him for a tourist, stopped him, and in English, asked, “How long have you been here, amigo?” In Spanish, Jose answered, “All my life, asshole!” Recognizing him, the soldier said, “So, are you still in the porno business?” When Juan told him to go screw himself, the soldier began searching him. Unfortunately, Juan had forgotten to discard the small vial of cocaine in his shirt pocket. Smiling when he made the discovery, the soldier said, “You’re mine now, fucker!” Juan composed himself and facing the soldier, said, “Listen here, you have two choices: I have ten thousand pesos in my pocket. I’ll give you eight, because I need two to get to where I’m going. That’s your first choice. Your second choice is to kill me, because I won’t let you take me to prison alive. I’ll fight you to the death.” Juan has lived to tell this story.

  Surprised when her twelve year old maid didn’t show up to work, an American woman went to the girl’s house to find out what was wrong. She assumed the girl, a fully developed female who looked to be in her late teens, had overslept as a result of the fiesta in the plaza the night before. The parents answered the door and displaying no emotion said, matter of factly, that their daughter had been robbed.

  “Robbed? Kidnapped?” The American was incredulous. Why didn’t they go to the police? Weren’t they going to do something? She later found out that the girl had caught the eye of one of the local ranchers. A macho male in his late thirties, he came to the fiesta on his horse and left with the girl. She was soon pregnant. It seems this occurs frequently and is not considered the crime it might be elsewhere. The man took the girl to be his, like a Cro-Magnon dragging a female back to his cave. End of story.

  Most of the Mexicans I’ve met come from of families of five to nine children. I assume this is the result of the strong influence of Catholicism, which seems to turn ordinary folks into human fruit flies, or rabbits. If religion is not to blame, then perhaps someone should do a study on the diet here. Fertility clinics around the world could begin prescribing beans and enchiladas as opposed to wild yam extract and estrogen shots.


5/18/96

  Perhaps, as the Greeks say, it is written. Fate. Destiny. Determinism. How else could I explain the chain of events that have unfolded of late? Events that all my planning, anxiety and worry could never have brought about. I’d always felt a certain kinship to the idea that if one stopped trying to make things happen, that they would eventually unfold of their own. Though it had never been a reality for me, it resonated on a deeper level. (My tenure in Sedona polluted that belief. Surrounded by metaphysical spouting types who never walked their talk, I began to fear that the concept of flow was merely one used by people incapable of getting off their asses. Allowing things to be was their euphemism for laziness.) But enough explanation.

  Jose Luna, the person I was introduced to by an acquaintance, and at whose house I stayed upon arriving in Mexico, asked me if I wanted to join him on a short trip to Mexico City and then to San Miguel de Allende. I was busy (in Mexico!) trying to find my express mail packet (documents and statements from the U.S.) two weeks after it had been sent from Sedona. I was worried about late payments, and bills, and checks for deposit. In the past, I would have stuck around, making postal workers suffer my wrath. But I decided to just get on a plane and go. (More on Mexico city later.) To make a long story short, Jose owns many restaurants in Mexico, the one in Allende being the premier place for musicians to perform. His daughter-in-law (with whom we had a wonderful evening) is a concert promoter who brought Yanni (Yawn-ee) to Mexico. So, in two days, I made more connections than I would have thought possible. Without any effort or thought. There is more information to this part of the story, but I’ll spare you the unnecessary details.

  Within ten minutes of driving from the Mexico City airport, I was dizzy, with a headache. (The pollution is as bad as can be imagined.) There are more than twenty million people in the city. More than twenty million!

  I went to the anthropological museum and saw aspects of the Mayan, Aztec, and Toltec cultures. Where the history of Greece (statues, art, etc.) is breathtaking and awe-inspiring, the ancient culture of Mexico struck me as extraterrestrial, in a primitive way. It’s hard to explain, but the figures and architecture are interesting, but very foreign. I also visited the house, which is now a museum, of Diego Rivera and Frida Kahlo. Interesting...
We stayed in a moderately priced hotel in the pink zone of Mexico City. Nothing special. No air conditioning, but at least there was a refrigerator and television, on which I watched plenty of Mexican music videos. (In the evenings, before sleeping, it was “Bewitched,” “I Dream Of Genie,” and “My Favorite Martian”.) Cities are cities. They are all common in that there is an anxious energy surrounding the activities of the people inhabiting them.

  Two days later, still having made no plans as to how we’d get to Allende, some friends of Jose dropped by to say they were driving to Allende, and would we like to come along. Again, no effort! We drove slowly, taking our time, and stopped at the ancient cathedral of San Fransisco. It was ornate and beautiful in a manner that revealed countless hours of labor and reverence. Housed in the courtyard of the cathedral was a restaurant at which we had lunch. I was treated to a seasonal delicacy of red ant eggs (larvae?) which were the size of pine nuts. The aftertaste, for me, was similar to paint thinner. Consequently, I was the only one to have a single taste.

  The drive to Allende was enjoyable as we discussed (in Spanish) politics, the pervading economic crisis, and art. We also listened to classic Argentinean tangos. One had memorable lyrics. It was called “Victoria,” which in this case roughly translated as “Hallelujah!” Here’s a sample of one of the verses, with which most Latin based men find some humor:
  “Victoria, Victoria, my wife has left me”
  “A chance to see my friends again,”
  “And to move back in with mom.”

(Maybe you had to be there.)

  San Miguel de Allende is a 450 year old town in the mountains. Elevation: a little over 5,000 feet. Population: 65,000. (This last statistic is staggering to me, as the town feels like a quaint, under populated pueblo.) It is beautiful, in that way the old towns teeming with history can be. Cathedrals. The clanging of church bells. Mariachis (complete bands, lots of them) standing on street corners waiting to be hired. They’re not expensive, and anything qualifies as reason to hire mariachis. A spontaneous fiesta. A lover sending a gift of music to his object of desire. A group of drunks seeking the comfort and nostalgia of old favorite songs.

  Mama Mia, Jose’s restaurant/club, is amazing. Like almost all the houses in Allende, one enters a very large antique wooden door and finds oneself in a large garden courtyard. In Mama Mia, this courtyard is full of people from morning to early morning. As one dines, music is heard from the stage. Musicians play from one to two sets before another band arrives. The music varies (in the dining area) from classical guitar, to Mexican folk songs, to Huichol (native Mexican Indians), to Peruvian. As one walks to another part of the restaurant another large room unfolds, in which there is a salsa band performing. Everyone is dancing. Grace. Sexuality. Rhythm. Climbing a spiraling staircase to the roof, one finds a jazz/pop band playing under the starry night. This place is a hotbed of musical activity. Quality music. There isn’t one stinker band in the house. The rest of Allende is the same. Every bar or restaurant has very high caliber musicians performing. In my two nights there, I heard almost every musical idiom I’ve ever heard (Mexican punk, rock, merengue, salsa, etc.). There are art schools (sculpture, weaving, pottery, oils, acrylics...) music schools, and a steady flow of international tourists (writers, film directors, movie stars) constantly moving through the clubs and streets. I will probably return to stay in Allende for at least a month. If I like it, I will open up a recording studio. It is a wonderful place for one to spend the summer months, which tend to be stifling and humid around beach towns. I checked around some places and found apartments for about $250-$600 a month; some with telephones.


5/22/96

  Expats and locals discuss ailments they are suffering, such as hepatitis, cholera, and salmonella, with a frequency and calm that one would find around common sicknesses such as the flu and colds. It is frightening to hear how many people are ill with these diseases. I continue to ingest supplements, oxygen, and the like, hoping that I can keep myself relatively clean.

  I’ve been repeatedly told by the expats to stay away from Mexican women, that they’re only trouble, that the cultural chasm is too wide to cross. Expat women say it about the Mexican men. Expat men say it about the Mexican women. It seems everyone has suffered some heart or headache in this regard. (Of course, one also has to consider the source of this sage wisdom which, more often than not, is offered without request. One man, after warning me to steer clear of the local females, indelicately began to woo a woman by saying he wanted to give her a “hot meat injection”. I placed his advice in the appropriate mental receptacle.)

  Who are those people who are herded into “Hard Rock Cafe” restaurants by the hundreds? Is there really a faction of individuals in this world who find that a pleasant way to spend their vacations abroad?

  On that note, time for me to go do something else.

  Till next time...El Rey Langostino


5/29/96

  Many of the bars and clubs catering to tourists have a singular method of dispensing shots of tequila. Young, sexy women clad in skin-tight hot pants (remember those?), display one-fourth of their ass cheeks to the penis-laden clientele. (Why aren’t there Chippendale type dudes serving the women?) They wear short blouses that don’t blouse. They adhere. Navels, like periscopes, hunt for targets. Over their shoulders is a bullet belt. Are they called bandoleros? In place of bullet cartridges are shot glasses. In a large gun holster-strategically placed, so as not to obstruct one’s view of what’s really being sold-is a large bottle filled with tequila. The liquid is pink. I don’t drink pink drinks. But plenty others do. With a whistle in their mouths, the girls circulate, smile suggestively and ask (read: forcefully suggest) people to give their wares a try. When someone agrees, the girl pulls the bottle from the holster, fills a shot glass, pounds it on a table, and delivers it to the mouth of the client. All the while, the whistle is blowing. Loudly. The girl takes the person’s (it’s usually men) head in her hands, whistle still blowing, and shakes it around to insure that the person feels something. A friend recently told me that some bars in Bangkok have initiated this practice, as well. (Could it be that the collective unconscious has been reduced to this?)

  I’m conditional with my acceptance of astrological forecasting. I believe what is said or written on the condition that it’s a good forecast. But despite my less than wholehearted embrace of this metaphysical odds game, there’s one part of astrology that I’ve found to be consistent every single time. Mercury retrograde. (That’s what it’s called...Don’t expect me to describe what it means in astronomic terms.) In any case, during that period (usually about three or four weeks) it’s purported that mechanical things break down, mail and delivery items are lost, people from our past (old lovers, etc.) try to connect with us, and so on and so forth. During this time, one is warned against negotiating contracts, or looking for resolution in matters requiring resolution. You get the idea...this is generally a fucked up time when it’s probably better to stay at home, cerveza in hand, hammock swaying. I arrived in Mexico the day the period began (March 4th) and Mercury “went direct” (the term used to describe the moment the shit stops) on the 28th. Anyway, here’s how the most recent period of Mercury retrograde affected me: My guaranteed, three day express mail package took thirteen days to get to me. My pro-walkman would not work. (It would rewind and fast forward, but would not go into play, or record.) People owing me money had no funds till early June. All attempts at organizing myself and my thoughts yielded no results. You get the idea. Hell month. Yesterday, the 28th of May, “direct time”, I took my walkman to an electronics repair shop. It was then that I discovered the pause button had been depressed, and that there was never anything wrong with the unit! I had planned to buy a truck from a woman during Mercury retrograde. The deal was to go through on the 28th of May. On that date, I went to town to have the truck checked out. I was told it was overpriced by at least one-thousand dollars. After the 28th, money started to come in gain. I was able to make decisions. These are just a few of the examples of how I’ve found this astrological period to be a consistent nuisance. Fantasy or fact? You decide. Either way, next time Mercury retrograde comes around, I’ll be properly prepared. By that, I mean hammock and cerveza.
 

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