Thursday, March 31, 2005

Not That There's Anything Wrong With That...

Way back in the summer of 1998, I was in Strasbourg, France walking back to the youth hostel around 3AM after a night of general revelry. As I got to the front door, a small car pulled up and the passenger side window rolled down. I naively looked over to see if the person needed something. The driver, an older bald black man in a sweatsuit, propositioned me in French. He said something to the effect of "Voulez vous un peep", which translated into either him giving me a "gift" or me giving him a "gift". Now, I love receiving presents as much as the next guy, but let's face it, we're not talking about the little red bike you asked for when you're 7 years old. So I quickly turned and started ringing the bell to the front door for them to let me in. The guy was asleep and took a minute to wake up and open it. Let me tell you, those were a few very nervous moments for me. The guy in the car just sat there staring at me while I waited, and I'm thinking, "If this guy doesn't hurry up and open this door, Big Black Baldy is gonna be on me like a hobo on a ham sandwich!".

That was the first time I'd ever really been so blatantly hit on by another dude and it was a little disconcerting. It ended up happening twice more while I was in Germany. Here are the stories...

A year or two later, I was drinking in downtown Wurzburg. I went to the John Barleycorn to listen to some live Irish music, but the band never showed up, so I decided to just hit a few different bars and see what kind of tom-foolery I could get into. So I spy another bar with a Guinness sign hanging out front and heard the angels singing so I figured I'd better go in. The night was still young and I was a bit hungry, so I ordered the obligatory pint and a bowl of Irish stew. Later on, the place is getting crowded and people are crowding the bar. A dapper looking older German fellow is standing next to me and starts making small talk. This was not an uncommon occurrence, many Germans are friendly to the Americans there (there's a base in the city). So we're chatting about the US, traveling, Germany, etc. Suddenly, after about 20 minutes, he says, "So, vould you like to go party on my boat?". I almost dropped my pint. I said "What did you say?" and he replies, "Uh...I have a boat on zee river...maybe you and me...we go to party together, ja?". I collared the bartender and yelled "Zahlen bitte!" (I'd like to pay please!), and then got the hell outta dodge.

The third time was by far the funniest one of all. There was a girl in my unit named Mary Schofield who just happened to be from the same city as me in the US (Nashua, NH). She was also pretty cute, so one night I called and asked her if she wanted to go downtown and have a drink. She said sure, let's go. So we go down to the Schwabelnest in downtown Kitzingen and I order a couple pints. We're chatting and I start telling her the stories above, how I seem to keep attracting these guys. Mary laughs, but says she thinks I'm exaggerating a little bit. I assure her I'm not, but she doesn't quite buy it. About an hour later I go to the little boy's room and when I come back out, there's some drunk slimy scumbag looking German guy standing over near Mary. He sees me come out and plops down in the stool next to me, cigarette blazing away. He's got this unbelievable stupid looking grin on his face that shows off his yellow teeth and tells me "I vas about to talk to zee girl, I didn't know she was vis you" to which I reply, "Well, good that you didn't, she's here with me". Then his cigarette smoke starts blowing right in my face so I tell him, "Could you move your cigarette?". He says "Vat's the matter, you don't smoke?". I tell him, "I do sometimes, but I don't like someone else's smoke blowing right in my face". Then it happened. Picture it: this drunk scumbag is about a foot away from me, he's starts staring at me straight in the face with his stupid grin without saying a word for - literally - about 7 or 8 seconds. I'm thinking he's about to take a swing at me, so I'm getting ready. Then he opens his mouth and tells me, "You have zee most beautiful blue eyes I've ever seen in my life...!". I turn around and look at Mary and she's cracking up, going "Oh my God, you weren't kidding! You're a magnet!".

What can I say?


Rik

6 comments:

Rik said...

That's a great story Heinekren! Here's one you'll enjoy - Many years ago I was in Fanuell Hall in Boston. I had to use the public bathroom, so I'm standing at the urinal and suddenly this guy steps up and puts his arm around me! I start freaking out, thinking I was going to get violated right in a public restroom in downtown Boston. Then he starts pointing to my jacket. I was wearing a Dutch soccer (voetball?) jacket and it turns out the guy is from Amsterdam and thought I was Dutch. That was a pretty funny situation.

Rik

Ed said...

My very heterosexual buddy and I (also very heterosexual) were heading down to Daytona to see the big race when we pulled in to a motel for the evening one Valentines Day. While my buddy was parking the car, I went in to arrange for a room. They had a Valentine's Day special going on where you could get a room with two beds for half price so I said sign me up. I went back outside, grabbed the rest of the bags and we walked through the lobby on the way to the room. I happened to look over at the desk clerk and the look he was giving me was one of sour disgust which puzzled me for a second until I realized what this looked like. I felt unclean for weeks after that.

Jo Travels said...

rik, does that mean you are popular or BETTER OFF with gays? haha, kidding!!! don't bite!

my colleague had a similar experience, in fact much worse haha. he was hanging out with a few business colleagues in a bar after the conference meet (this happened in the usa and he is dutch by the way). he hit it off with a guy, had great fun chatting with him and so on (dont know the nationality of this guy). so after several beers, my colleague decided to call it a night, he was tired. said goodbye and went up to his hotel room. after a few minutes, someone knocked on the door. he opened the door and guess who was standing there? the guy he had fun down at the bar. not only that, he went straight in his room and started hugging him. ickyyy lol! my colleague almost screamed whilst struggling to detach himself from the guy!

anyway, the gay apologized, he thought my colleague was gay and was sending him some "come on" signals down at the bar. colleague was actually puzzled by it. i told him, "no, dont be puzzled. admit it, you were drunk and you were hitting off with a gay"!!! haha

Rik said...

Ed - All you had to do was tell them you were going to a car race and you'd have been fine!

Friv - Yeah, that'd be me...

MissT - Fortunately, my Gay-dar has become much more finely tuned since I left Germany so I've been able to avoid any more unpleasant situations. When you go to cities like Amsterdam and Berlin, you'd better have your Gay-dar tuned or who knows what will happen!

Anonymous said...

I inadvertantly went into a gay bar- "The Queens Head" last time I was in Amsterdam. I ordered, and got served, a beer before I realized. Not wanting to waste a beer, I sat there and drank it as fast as I could without looking like some sort of drunken frat boy. Still, the longest beer I ever drank.
Cut me some slack. Considering the bar's name, I thought it was an Irish pub.

Rik said...

eThib - You sound like the kind of guy that would drink in a gay bar because you were afraid of getting your ass kicked in the black bar due to your dreadlocks and nose ring...

I was wondering when you'd be stopping in!