maike

The plan for lunch sounded interesting, so I enthusiastically agreed; a seaside restaurant on a sunny September day. Maybe a place with a broad veranda with white wicker chairs facing the bubbling waves, like Reading Reef outside Montego Bay. Terns and gulls diving and drifting in the wind. The colors of the sky balanced with the deep green water. Children running on the sand, carefree and laughing. Some stunning vista with sailing ships beating to windward, waiting to be captured in tempera or poetry.

I forgot where I am. All the birds have been eaten, the water is the color of dirt, and the waves just deposit more trash on the beach. The view from the restaurant, if one moves to certain windows, is mostly of an old freighter port. The wharves are forlorn and forbidding, with tall orange cranes skewed at random angles. Old trucks are scattered and broken and left behind for dead.. The hulls of mammoth ships are scarred with rust, and their old boilers have mottled their superstructures with random streaks of black.

1255 (12:55 PM to some). We sit at a round table in the center of a large room, the solitary customers, and the theater begins; we assume the roles of a former American and a Chinese bureaucrat, a few drivers, and a pregnant woman who knows enough of both languages to let all of us laugh at the situation. My old friend Mr. Liu shows up unexpectedly, and he obviously has had a few drinks. Someone has tipped him that I would be there, and I scold everyone, because Mr. Liu is trouble. The place reeks of dead shellfish, and the flies outnumber the customers. A parade of people drift in and out the front door. Women who need a mirror. Men who need smokes and beer and a place to piss. The docks are a hard place, for hard people, those who drift to the edge of the land because they cannot exist in lush valleys and ordered rows of crops.

Their drink of choice is bai jiu. Bai means white, and my interpretation of "jiu" is lighting. Corn liquor fermented at least a week to yield 50% alcohol, and it's not served in wussy shot glasses. Mr. Liu loves it. He is either old, or young with 20 years of hard time. He has big hands branded by the sun and eyes that look like they have been carved out and boiled in fish soup before being injected back into his skull. I know him because he owns one of my favorite restaurants in another part of town. He doesn't give a fuck if I eat vegetables, as long as I drink with him. I never know if he is going to punch my face or hug me, and that's the appeal. After all, this is the docks.

A few more people show up to our table, along with a seemingly endless array of food, and lunch becomes 6 or 7, maybe because it is Friday and there is nothing else to do. The owner of the restaurant hovers, watching the waitresses perfectly arrange the dishes. The owner is Ms. He, which in some other situation would be humorous, but not today. At least 3 bottles of bai jiu are opened, and that is just to begin the meal. Mr. Liu wants all of us to share his drunken haze. Everyone is silly and giddy, and the sunlight flooding the restaurant even makes me relax and forget working for a while.

Ms. He's sister shows up, and both of them join the table. This is bad. They have a mission: escape the docks and enter the afterlife, all gardenias and sweet lilies. Mr. Liu wants all of us in hell. He spits on the concrete floor.

Ms. He takes a seat next to me. It is much easier to inflict pain when close. Her eyes are sharp and intense, and I feel helpless. She drinks a 250 ml glass of bai jiu in one swift motion, then holds it upside down in my face. I switch to beer and do the same, but the simple acceptance of challenge means I must continue. First Ms. He and then Mr. Liu. Somebody puts a second glass in front of me.

1406. I don't care what is in my glass or glasses.

1456. Application of Rule 302: if one can walk away from the table after drinking with the owner and their evil friends, then lunch is free. We get down the steps and into the cars. We promise to do it again, sometime. Everyone waves as we drive away. The autumn sky is blue and amber and lovely.

1512. I realize I'm fucked.

1528. I want everything in my stomach to leave my body. There is partial compliance.

1542, approximately. I stop. There can be different levels of stop, but this one is "respiration only".

1620, approximately. I hate it when I need one big guy on each side of me to give the illusion that I am walking through the lobby of the hotel.

1622, exactly. I enter a sensory depravation chamber, primarily formed by a large white duvet.

Next Day 0118. I realize that I can remove my clothes, unassisted, and return to the chamber.

Next Day 0640. The sun rises. Someone ignites firecrackers outside my window for a wedding ceremony later in the morning. I open an ice cold bottle of Pepsi. I love the beach.