Friday Night, Out On The Town (Part 1)

So...I've got a couple posts written that need to go up, so I'm throwing them up here even though it throws my story progression out of order. I hate to do it, because I have flashes of OCD about things, but I've had so much on my mind that its been impossible to keep things in order. And without further ado...

You ever just have one of those nights where things just keeping happening over and over again? Not necessarily the same thing, but you move from one spot to another & the story of the evening just builds and builds on top of itself? That was how my friday night was last week.

So, I got back from the Wicklow mountains (gorgeous; more on it in an upcoming post) & made general plans with my friend Bryan to try out a new pub that evening. I arrive home not knowing what to expect because my roommate Mattieu has his girlfriend in town for the weekend. Matt is a French student studying at the European Business School, and also a recluse who doesn't speak English very well (even though he's taken it for 10 years he says, go figure). With this picture painted for you, I think you can understand why I had no idea what to expect from his lady. Turns out, of course, that she seems pleasant. She doesn't speak English at all, or at least didn't attempt to, and had this innocent, playful energy to her (even though I never had a clue what her & Matt were talking about). It was really nice to see them together though, cause he doesn't seem to have any friends here (he never goes out, he's on his computer 10 hours a day!), and they seem like a cute, really-in-love couple. Now, Matt is a very perculiar fellow as well. His diet is very simple, consisting of only Hamburgers, White Bread, Chocolate Muffins, Orange Juice, & occasionally Baked Beans. I'm dead serious too, I couldn't make this stuff up. So of course when him & his lady wanna make dinner, what's on the menu? Burgers & OJ! I was in the common area, eating my own dinner at the time (steak & pasta, I gets it in! lol), so this would explain why I know all the business. You gotta keep track of what goes on in your apartment. Getting back to the story, let me add in that Matt doesn't seem to like to use the dishwasher. We've shown him how, he's seen us do it, but he prefers to wash all his dishes by hand (when he gets to them). When he was cleaning up, I put my dishes in the dishwasher & his girlfriend, who was sitting by the counter, made one of those "oh shit" faces. Now, once again I can't decipher what she said, but her inflection and body language was quite universal when she started questioning Matt. Even my ig'nant ass could tell that she was like "You have a dishwasher? Why the hell are you wasting all this time scrubbing them plates?" After we've eaten seperate dinners, I'm watching TV & chillin in the common area & they return to the room. I'm waiting for Bryan to hit me up, so we can see what this new pub is like, so I decide to get dressed & ready. I go to the bathroom & lo-and-behold, here are Matt & girlfriend (I don't remember her name, its hard to remember people you can't have a conversation with) in the bathroom just chillin. Needless to say, this was akward as hell, but they weren't doing anything sexual. It looked like was showing her his razors & shaving gel, but still "WTF, Charles?" Then, about 15 minutes later, I go to the room to pick up my shoes & I happen to walk in on an intimate moment. Once again, nothing scandalous, but this time she was under the covers & I heard a certain giggle as I entered the room. Another universal sign; no matter what the language barrier, I knew Matt was fittin' ta get him sum. At this point, I'm like I gotta leave, I don't want to really get in the way, so I ain't waiting for a phone call no more. Its 8:20 something pm & I'm out the door, in search of a watering hole (pause, no red card).

Since Bryan hasn't called me yet & I didn't have his number due to a mix up, I decided to go to Brogan's Bar. Brogan's is a favorite of the Gaiety students because its right around the corner from school & they look out for you there. I knew the Gaiety students, plus some of my IES friends, would be there, so I was looking forward to it. There I met up with some people, a mix of my friends plus 1st & 2nd year acting students at Gaiety, grabbed a pint of Guinness and nudged my way into some conversations. I had a great talk with a guy named Mark, talking about the US & Ireland. He had some questions about comedic differences between Whites & Blacks, I had some questions about Irish pride & culture, so all in all I'd like to believe that it was mutually beneficial. After talking for awhile (I couldn't tell ya how long, ya know time flies when you let me gab on, especially about race in America), Mark got up to go smoke a cigarette. While I'm drinking my pint, eavesdropping on the conversation next to me, this guy sitting across from me starts up a conversation. (Side note: one of the things I really like about Ireland is that in the pub, anyone can strike up a conversation with you. You don't see people all akward & lonely too often.) He starts off the conversation asking me about the election (the easiest icebreaker ever for foreign relations; its almost as cliche as "what's your sign?" to me, thats how often i get asked about it), then he switches into saying that I look like Kanye West (haven't heard that one in awhile) and sharing his love for Kanye and his dislike of 50 Cent. He starts telling me how he can relate to rap music & how Kanye is inspirational to him, he loves how Kanye came from nothing (not true actually, but I let him talk) and made himself into somebody, and yada-yada-ya. Its always funny to me to hear people abroad talking about how they relate to Hip-Hop. Its never somebody with a Hip-Hop consciousness who I get in these conversations with, they're all casual voyers of the culture, who probably are more U2 and Oasis fans than Jay-Z fans. I know struggle is universal & that's why Hip-Hop crosses all borders, but hearing someone talk about it without the knowledge of its African-American context makes for a interesting listen.

So this guy, Derrick, is talking to me about how he relates to the struggle & then somehow segueways into informing me of this huge drug bust in southern Ireland the day before. About 1 billion euros worth of cocaine was sezied by the Irish Navy, so I'm told, and he informs me that cocaine is the main drug in Ireland. Useful information, I know. I start to tell him with my run in with a cokehead at a pub called the Bleeding Horse (once again, I can't make this stuff up), which was hosting a party for Optometry students, and how I unintentionally befriended the cokehead by mentioning that I was a Kanye West fan (see how it all comes full circle?). He's not too interested in my story though, as he wants to explain the drug trade to me. He breaks it down for me by telling me that you can sell 1.25g of cocaine for 100 euros. Now, I don't know how much 1.25g of coke is; I never done coke, nor seen it in person, only in the movies & TV. Hell, I still don't get the metric system, so this info is really going over my head. Anyway, he's excited & animated while he's telling me this, so I'm playing along like I'm impressed. Then he tells me that extacy (is that how you spell it?) pills are huge also; he says he could get 1,000 pills for 1,000 euros, than sell them for 5 euro a pop. Now this was a lil easier to understand, buy it for 1 & flip it for 5, simple math on that one. Still though, why is this guy giving me a beginners course in the Irish drug trade? He goes on to mention that he sells drugs, which would explain his 2008 Miami Vice look, and that you do what you gotta do to make money. Ahh, the simple rational of a criminal. It is so refreshing to the law-abiding citizens ear. But wait, there's more. Next, he proceed to reflect on how he held up a convience store, Menace II Society style, by sticking the place up with a .38 snub nose....at 14 years old! Gangstas make the world go 'round, y'all. He claimed to ran off with 5,000 Irish pounds (this was obviously before the Euro was created), which was so much money that he couldn't even hide it in his home. He said he was just leaving money all over the place in the house. Coming from the Black tradition, I'm used to hearing tall tales. Shoot, I do my fair share of telling them too. One of the many things that the Black and Irish cultures share is a love for exaggerated storytelling, and when some is giving you the run around by telling a tall tale, they call it slagging. While I'm listening to this ridiculous story, I'm thinking to myself "Aww great, here I am being the naieve American. He's got to be slagging me," so I start laughing and doing the whole "Come on, really? You'se a funny guy" routine. When I say that to him, he looks me dead in eye & tells me that he swears he's telling the truth. He licks his forefinger and draws a cross across his adams apple; this guy has officially creeped me out for the evening. He finishes his story by telling me that he has this tiny little bedroom in his apartment, no bigger than the corner everybody was sitting, but that he was getting so much dough that he bought himself a 52 inch plasma screen TV to put in there (officially a Negro please worthy statement). His mother started asking a lot of questions as to how he was getting all this money (he had told me earlier that he was a stagehand & once worked a Kanye concert, which played into why he was a fan), so he bought her a 42 inch plasma screen for her living room & told her to stop asking questions.

Derrick, after chatting me up for awhile, decides its time for him to take a smoke break. Being the awfully polite drug dealer that he is, he asks if I'd like to smoke as well. Thanks but no thanks, I'll just finish my pint. He steps outside & I decide to make my move to leave. Before I left though, I felt compelled to tell my friend Tara to stay away from him & text me when she left, even though I knew she still was with at least six people who we knew very well & would get her home safely. I noticed earlier, pre-confession, that Derrick was quite fond of her, putting his arm around her & buying her a pint (even though she said she didn't want one & was a lil tipsy after her 1st pint). Seeing how he characterized himself as a real go-getter & one not to get caught up on morality and ethical decision making, I felt slightly bad leaving her in the same vicinity of him, but it ain't like I was leaving her alone at all. I was off to the next pub to see what more fun could be had.

Part 2 coming up next...