yuzu peel, like the peel of lemons from frontyards in los angeles and various crispers ive become familiar with
just like lemons from home but stronger,
they were given to me by a student, with a bottle of local sake made by her friend, wrapped in newspaper.
i cut it on the old wood board in our kitchen in small one inch - no centimeter its centimeter liter gram here- strips, dropped into the teapot with shaking hands -
fuck, i need to get some toyu (read: kerosene) for that damn heater yet, damn i need some kerosene damn i need some heat
damn i need some
damn i need some
need some what ?
did i come all the way over here for -
for that?
as usual - where the fuck am i? this isnt the middle east. this still isnt the middle east.
i look up. wood walls. abandoned house. greaseboard with various american and japanese idioms scrawled on it.
--
Here we are again - again, the numbers adding up every day in some kind of off order. The Thai girl in New York trying to get me to sell her plastic coasters from her bangkok factory to the Japanese equivalent of the Pottery Barn, since I am up and running there soon. Her name is Nantanee, she has a daughter and a failed marriage and an MBA and yet shes working as a waitress and her Visa is dying and shes sitting across from me in Bryant Park and she is saying to me -
"Cem, this is life, dont have to ask why you are going to Japan, just go."
--
Ride the trains. Ride the trains - watch the boys and girls - eyes locked onto their mobile phones - sway to the shape of the tracks. They are so quiet. See the boys dressed in the Prussian uniforms that their great grandfather thought would encourage discipline; the girls in their impossibly appealing sailor outfits; the salarymen flipping through comics with schoolgirls on the cover and school girls tied inside; watch the impossibly beautiful women, graceful and ashen and polished and so well put together - watch them stand in twos; listen:
"Oogaki. Oogaki des."
Ride the trains. This is life. Just go.
23.12.04
21.12.04
8.11.04
a letter to my old friend kristen, who stated interest in what im doing - which is teaching engrish in japan btw -
-
"
good god,
before you get a ticket or a plan or an idea in your head, please wait for me to ride this one out like the eager little lab rat that i am - and please let me advise you bruised and broke from the other end -
because -
it could be bad.
you see
i decided, somehow, that leaving the intimate security of my twin shared apartment in the Lower East Side for a 1950s japanese 2 level house with no insulation or central heat with winter coming located in a small sattelite city of a major japanese city would be fun - especially if the house was stocked with people i dont know well, but i do know that they read semiology and make art and make their own clothes and just graduated from the usually annoying charlottesville pudhouse school of bohemia and
and that working for a man named mark who was a european baskteball league pro who moved to japan and whose ex wife killed their son in a legendary local tragedy that unfolded publicly - working for him would be ok
wait -
wait and see
watch as i
watch as i dance though visa complications, break yearlong contracts, shudder through psychotic company meetings that start with a moment of silence and each employee stating what he/she is thankful for, eye rooms full of silent and shy japanese housewives expecting you to teach them conversational english, eccentric japanese dentists named names like "Dr. No-no" who want you to teach them to curse under their original Warhols
just wait a sec kristen
please just
just dont jump?into anything
quite yet.
love, and vending machines,
for chrissakes,
cem
"
-
"
good god,
before you get a ticket or a plan or an idea in your head, please wait for me to ride this one out like the eager little lab rat that i am - and please let me advise you bruised and broke from the other end -
because -
it could be bad.
you see
i decided, somehow, that leaving the intimate security of my twin shared apartment in the Lower East Side for a 1950s japanese 2 level house with no insulation or central heat with winter coming located in a small sattelite city of a major japanese city would be fun - especially if the house was stocked with people i dont know well, but i do know that they read semiology and make art and make their own clothes and just graduated from the usually annoying charlottesville pudhouse school of bohemia and
and that working for a man named mark who was a european baskteball league pro who moved to japan and whose ex wife killed their son in a legendary local tragedy that unfolded publicly - working for him would be ok
wait -
wait and see
watch as i
watch as i dance though visa complications, break yearlong contracts, shudder through psychotic company meetings that start with a moment of silence and each employee stating what he/she is thankful for, eye rooms full of silent and shy japanese housewives expecting you to teach them conversational english, eccentric japanese dentists named names like "Dr. No-no" who want you to teach them to curse under their original Warhols
just wait a sec kristen
please just
just dont jump?into anything
quite yet.
love, and vending machines,
for chrissakes,
cem
"
6.11.04
theres a cough
and a wheeze
and the bell of a bike, the bell of a bi-cy-cle - 1140 in the evening, no wait, right, its 2340, oh god im - im here again, im back again, im back off course.
--
i remember, i remember - not a week ago i ate a meal of raw meat with a good friend after a few glasses of some polish vodka, and before a few glasses more. i remember him stirring the raw egg and the capers and the onions into the wet red mix before we spooned it onto torn peices of nearly stale baguettes - it looked so damned civilized. i remember the doll-like northeast asian girl - certainly of japanese or korean descent - who served us our wine - her dark eyes and elegant affectation - the kind of look local only to lower manhattan. which was where we happened to be sitting. there, i thought to myself as i looked at the gentle line of her shoulders and back and the whip of her hair -- there is where i am going.
--
2342, and the coughing is closer now. loud, shameless hacking and coughing, i gutteral and bellowing - so loud that i thought i could hear the yellow of the offending globs, the spit flying the -
a man, 60ish, in full business suit is swerving insanely on his bicycle, left and write and left and - a jagged etch-a-sketch line - a glistening red slick of vomit running down the front of his suit he rings his bell at me, his northeast asian features stretched by the alcohol .. and for a moment im back in new york.
TBC
and a wheeze
and the bell of a bike, the bell of a bi-cy-cle - 1140 in the evening, no wait, right, its 2340, oh god im - im here again, im back again, im back off course.
--
i remember, i remember - not a week ago i ate a meal of raw meat with a good friend after a few glasses of some polish vodka, and before a few glasses more. i remember him stirring the raw egg and the capers and the onions into the wet red mix before we spooned it onto torn peices of nearly stale baguettes - it looked so damned civilized. i remember the doll-like northeast asian girl - certainly of japanese or korean descent - who served us our wine - her dark eyes and elegant affectation - the kind of look local only to lower manhattan. which was where we happened to be sitting. there, i thought to myself as i looked at the gentle line of her shoulders and back and the whip of her hair -- there is where i am going.
--
2342, and the coughing is closer now. loud, shameless hacking and coughing, i gutteral and bellowing - so loud that i thought i could hear the yellow of the offending globs, the spit flying the -
a man, 60ish, in full business suit is swerving insanely on his bicycle, left and write and left and - a jagged etch-a-sketch line - a glistening red slick of vomit running down the front of his suit he rings his bell at me, his northeast asian features stretched by the alcohol .. and for a moment im back in new york.
TBC
15.9.04
sweating bourboun, 3rd night in a row and im to keep going, keep pouring it in making small jokes and small movements to the beat, 3rd night in a row -
today was spent in bed from 5AM to 10AM, alcohol sleep with the TV on low flickering over me. im up but not awake at 10 still kind of drunk. i can remember the bartender from Knitting Factory and the line cooks and myself staggering down the street to the next place, its called Patriot, and thus theres just country on the Juke and vomit on the walls of the bathroom and a 19 year old bartendress with an Abercrombie sweatshirt on and a definite role in some upcoming low budget porn where shell be held down and fucked by the 40 year old guy to my left from the Knitting Factory with the alcohol problem and porkchop side burns and cheaply dyed black hair, smudge tattoos
"it'll be brutal"
say to myself and wonder thereafter -
how'd i get so twisted..
but im up and not awake at 10AM and im off to the Brooklyn bound F train, through the dead air of the subway below and next to the freakish Hasids grinding through the dark to an inner brooklyn teeming with mexican dishwashers sleeping 5 to a room and hipsters worse than i sleeping 1 to an apartment and i press my head against the window and try to nod off.
--
stumbling towards work -
"energy" will be the flavor of vitamin water today - why the fuck not - with new york priorities, ive started believeing in the magical properties of vitamin water, the marketing becomes reality, and shit, ive even met its inventor, he tipped us with 4 bottles or "endurance" flavor at the restuarant, fucking genius, help me now i -
theres something about a bourbon hangover that allows you to feel every single hair of the stubble on your face, pushing through pale, swollen skin like weeds weeds though concrete, i -
i cant believe this is happening -
im slouched and dehydrated, surrounded by a swarm of children, ages 10-13, in the store that i am running -
McSweeny's Brooklyn Superhero Supply Co. - kids are testing capes, looking through jars labeled "robot shavings" "Dried Villian Bile" "Mutant Slug" "Insect Man, Pieces Of" jars of "matter" and "unrefined matter" and "flight enhancement powder" .. 4 hours to go screaming and chirping.
--
Back home for sleep - 5PM to 8PM.
they all come over at 10, just like last week, with tattoos and bandannas and private vocabulary, they call them early adapters in some book, and we drink vodka and rum and sake toll 130AM.
from then till 430, its a packed nearby club called Happy Ending, after a Vice Fashion Party - its models and bandit hipsters, pirate hipsters, dirty hipsters, handlebar mustaches hipsters, 80s hipsters, wrestling boot hipsters, and the rest of us all squeezed in, looking, talking small and making small movements to the beat.
today was spent in bed from 5AM to 10AM, alcohol sleep with the TV on low flickering over me. im up but not awake at 10 still kind of drunk. i can remember the bartender from Knitting Factory and the line cooks and myself staggering down the street to the next place, its called Patriot, and thus theres just country on the Juke and vomit on the walls of the bathroom and a 19 year old bartendress with an Abercrombie sweatshirt on and a definite role in some upcoming low budget porn where shell be held down and fucked by the 40 year old guy to my left from the Knitting Factory with the alcohol problem and porkchop side burns and cheaply dyed black hair, smudge tattoos
"it'll be brutal"
say to myself and wonder thereafter -
how'd i get so twisted..
but im up and not awake at 10AM and im off to the Brooklyn bound F train, through the dead air of the subway below and next to the freakish Hasids grinding through the dark to an inner brooklyn teeming with mexican dishwashers sleeping 5 to a room and hipsters worse than i sleeping 1 to an apartment and i press my head against the window and try to nod off.
--
stumbling towards work -
"energy" will be the flavor of vitamin water today - why the fuck not - with new york priorities, ive started believeing in the magical properties of vitamin water, the marketing becomes reality, and shit, ive even met its inventor, he tipped us with 4 bottles or "endurance" flavor at the restuarant, fucking genius, help me now i -
theres something about a bourbon hangover that allows you to feel every single hair of the stubble on your face, pushing through pale, swollen skin like weeds weeds though concrete, i -
i cant believe this is happening -
im slouched and dehydrated, surrounded by a swarm of children, ages 10-13, in the store that i am running -
McSweeny's Brooklyn Superhero Supply Co. - kids are testing capes, looking through jars labeled "robot shavings" "Dried Villian Bile" "Mutant Slug" "Insect Man, Pieces Of" jars of "matter" and "unrefined matter" and "flight enhancement powder" .. 4 hours to go screaming and chirping.
--
Back home for sleep - 5PM to 8PM.
they all come over at 10, just like last week, with tattoos and bandannas and private vocabulary, they call them early adapters in some book, and we drink vodka and rum and sake toll 130AM.
from then till 430, its a packed nearby club called Happy Ending, after a Vice Fashion Party - its models and bandit hipsters, pirate hipsters, dirty hipsters, handlebar mustaches hipsters, 80s hipsters, wrestling boot hipsters, and the rest of us all squeezed in, looking, talking small and making small movements to the beat.
23.8.04
11.8.04
"tomorrow, i could be a different man"
i said to myself. then aloud:
"please bring me another drink"
summer on delancy street
and the puertarricannas insist on wearing that bright tight polyester
even past their third kid.
fat squeezing up out of the jeans
aces of diamonds on their nails
they thumb through the mushy yuca and oranges outside their dim delis
while the kids - in shirts down to their knees
and oversize hats have
far more style than ill ever have -
they buy generic cola and wonderbread
and slowly walk the pavement.
its summer on delancy
the women walk by endlessly,
in excruciating variety
exacerbating my dependancy
on the city i should be leaving now
with shoes and baubles and hair like - ...
libido is a panting dog
have to have them all, it says
and in my mind,
smiling weakly, slowly undressed
shuddering and crying out
with shoes and baubles and hair like - ...
naked in some dark corner
tied down somewhere darker
in my mind i have them all
in summer on delancy
big city, please stop,
but for now, its all so -
its all so
"
- Anonymous
from "Open Late: Best of American Urban Writing 2004"
i said to myself. then aloud:
"please bring me another drink"
summer on delancy street
and the puertarricannas insist on wearing that bright tight polyester
even past their third kid.
fat squeezing up out of the jeans
aces of diamonds on their nails
they thumb through the mushy yuca and oranges outside their dim delis
while the kids - in shirts down to their knees
and oversize hats have
far more style than ill ever have -
they buy generic cola and wonderbread
and slowly walk the pavement.
its summer on delancy
the women walk by endlessly,
in excruciating variety
exacerbating my dependancy
on the city i should be leaving now
with shoes and baubles and hair like - ...
libido is a panting dog
have to have them all, it says
and in my mind,
smiling weakly, slowly undressed
shuddering and crying out
with shoes and baubles and hair like - ...
naked in some dark corner
tied down somewhere darker
in my mind i have them all
in summer on delancy
big city, please stop,
but for now, its all so -
its all so
"
- Anonymous
from "Open Late: Best of American Urban Writing 2004"
11.7.04
After youve been together for the first time,
without the advantage or disadvantage of any prior
acquaintance,
the other party very often says to you,
Tell me about yourself, I want to know all about you,
whats your story? And you think maybe they really and
truly do
sincerely want to know your life story, and so you ligght up
a cigarette and begin to tell it to them, the two of you
lyeing together in completely relaxed positions
like a pair of rag dolls a bored child dropped on a bed.
You tell them your story, or as much of your story
as time or a fair dgree of prudence allows, and they say
Oh, oh, oh, oh,
each time a little more faintly until the oh
is just an audible breath and then of course
theres some interruption. Slow room service comes up
with a bowl of melting ice cubes, or one of you rises to pee
and gaze at himself with mild astonishment in the bathroom
mirror.
And then, the first thing you know before youve had time
to pick up where you left off with your enthralling life story,
theyre telling you their life story, exactly as theyd intended
to all along,
and youre saying, Oh, oh, oh,oh,
each time a little more faintly, the vowel at last becoming
no more than an audible sigh,
as the elevator, halfway down the corridor and a turn to
the left,
draws one last long, deep breath of exhaustion
and stops breathig forever. Then?
Well, one of you falls asleep
and the other one does likewise with a lighted cigarette
in his mouth,
and thats how people burn to death in hotel rooms.
-Tennessee Williams, from "In the Winter of Cities"
without the advantage or disadvantage of any prior
acquaintance,
the other party very often says to you,
Tell me about yourself, I want to know all about you,
whats your story? And you think maybe they really and
truly do
sincerely want to know your life story, and so you ligght up
a cigarette and begin to tell it to them, the two of you
lyeing together in completely relaxed positions
like a pair of rag dolls a bored child dropped on a bed.
You tell them your story, or as much of your story
as time or a fair dgree of prudence allows, and they say
Oh, oh, oh, oh,
each time a little more faintly until the oh
is just an audible breath and then of course
theres some interruption. Slow room service comes up
with a bowl of melting ice cubes, or one of you rises to pee
and gaze at himself with mild astonishment in the bathroom
mirror.
And then, the first thing you know before youve had time
to pick up where you left off with your enthralling life story,
theyre telling you their life story, exactly as theyd intended
to all along,
and youre saying, Oh, oh, oh,oh,
each time a little more faintly, the vowel at last becoming
no more than an audible sigh,
as the elevator, halfway down the corridor and a turn to
the left,
draws one last long, deep breath of exhaustion
and stops breathig forever. Then?
Well, one of you falls asleep
and the other one does likewise with a lighted cigarette
in his mouth,
and thats how people burn to death in hotel rooms.
-Tennessee Williams, from "In the Winter of Cities"
15.6.04
"i dont mind you coming here.. and wasting all my time. . .
talking in your sleep.. . i think youre just what i needed . ."
girl left at noon. im free to watch hbo in my underwear. instead, i walk down the street to my favorite bar.
--
girl with the thick arms and east african features flexes her arm, pressing the meat of her arm into the backrest of her chair, spreading the muscle, spreading the standard india ink tattoo - pulliong on a cigarette. wait -- shes the bouncer tonight? but who the fuck could she intimidate - who would she keep in line, what self respecting thug would stand down to-
oh.
ladies, im surrounded by ladies.
oh, and -theeese ladies- im surrounded by lesbians.. and the beefy Ms. Somalia 1997 is here to keep them in check.
here i am for lesbian night at my favorite local bar, all cock and balls. last one of these i went to wasa fundraiser for some girl to have her breasts removed
curly, greasy, hip haircuts; no make-up and all slouches - new lesbians, in uniform.
its cindi lauper then cat power covering oasis and then morrisey and the new pj harvey on the turntables
"...so i pull out the only condom in my bag, the one thats been in there for like 5 years and i give it to him.." shes says pointing to her one lispy male friend with the painfully tight shirt and the affected hairdo "and andrew and his boyfriend took care of the rest. that was the last condom i ever had".
andrew smiles coyly at his fellow homosexuals. gay guys and lesbians getting along perfectly. gotta love the east village.
wait wait -
i recognize this beat.
"shake it, shake, shake -shake it, shake, shakeshake it like a polaroid picture.. "
but - this isnt outcast..
it sounds like le tigre.. or maybe a .
oh my god, its lesbians covering "hey ya!" with guitars.
a fat little butchie starts jumping around.
i pack up for a new bar.
--
im fumbling around the east side for food. smell of urine and fish, dead air, puddles - the beginnings of Chinatown.
its hard to resist the 8.00 a plate bargains around here (duck soups, XO sauce noodle, Hong Kong jellyfish salad) and , but i want to end the day within my budget. this leaves me almost 3 dollars, which im pretty sure means i am going to the 20 cent a dumpling dumpling joint.
great aunt of Girl-From-Work lives around here somewhere. Im sure shes acting all old and Chinese right now, and i shouldnt disturb her while shes concentrating on breathing and sitting up and staring at the wall- but I could really go for some Old Chinese Woman cookin' right now. but.
--
"you whan wha?"
i point my finger towards #3 on the greasy laminated menu that sits on the linoleam counter that seperates the woks and toiling skinny Chinese cooks from the throngs of broke assholes like me.
"I WANT 2 ORDER PORK STEAM DUMPLING PLEASE"
i am now holding the Rosetta Stone/menu printed in Chinese and English in his face.
the cook stares at me , exhausted.
"2 ORDER! THANKYOU"
grammar changes among the Chinese.
the place is tiny, the place is dirty. to emphasize the total fucking brokeassness of the clientele, an older black man walks in, presumably from some apartment above, with a large aluminium foil wad shaped like a tub, filled with half frozen chicken wings.
"Just gonna be a second!" he announces. He pauses and looks around. I wonder what he means.
"No problem.." he says, and then grabs the soy and chili sauce condiments off of the main table and starts pouring them into his makeshift tub.
"just makin some wings, no problem."
my cook shakes his head and looks at me.
"you whan wha?"
talking in your sleep.. . i think youre just what i needed . ."
girl left at noon. im free to watch hbo in my underwear. instead, i walk down the street to my favorite bar.
--
girl with the thick arms and east african features flexes her arm, pressing the meat of her arm into the backrest of her chair, spreading the muscle, spreading the standard india ink tattoo - pulliong on a cigarette. wait -- shes the bouncer tonight? but who the fuck could she intimidate - who would she keep in line, what self respecting thug would stand down to-
oh.
ladies, im surrounded by ladies.
oh, and -theeese ladies- im surrounded by lesbians.. and the beefy Ms. Somalia 1997 is here to keep them in check.
here i am for lesbian night at my favorite local bar, all cock and balls. last one of these i went to wasa fundraiser for some girl to have her breasts removed
curly, greasy, hip haircuts; no make-up and all slouches - new lesbians, in uniform.
its cindi lauper then cat power covering oasis and then morrisey and the new pj harvey on the turntables
"...so i pull out the only condom in my bag, the one thats been in there for like 5 years and i give it to him.." shes says pointing to her one lispy male friend with the painfully tight shirt and the affected hairdo "and andrew and his boyfriend took care of the rest. that was the last condom i ever had".
andrew smiles coyly at his fellow homosexuals. gay guys and lesbians getting along perfectly. gotta love the east village.
wait wait -
i recognize this beat.
"shake it, shake, shake -shake it, shake, shakeshake it like a polaroid picture.. "
but - this isnt outcast..
it sounds like le tigre.. or maybe a .
oh my god, its lesbians covering "hey ya!" with guitars.
a fat little butchie starts jumping around.
i pack up for a new bar.
--
im fumbling around the east side for food. smell of urine and fish, dead air, puddles - the beginnings of Chinatown.
its hard to resist the 8.00 a plate bargains around here (duck soups, XO sauce noodle, Hong Kong jellyfish salad) and , but i want to end the day within my budget. this leaves me almost 3 dollars, which im pretty sure means i am going to the 20 cent a dumpling dumpling joint.
great aunt of Girl-From-Work lives around here somewhere. Im sure shes acting all old and Chinese right now, and i shouldnt disturb her while shes concentrating on breathing and sitting up and staring at the wall- but I could really go for some Old Chinese Woman cookin' right now. but.
--
"you whan wha?"
i point my finger towards #3 on the greasy laminated menu that sits on the linoleam counter that seperates the woks and toiling skinny Chinese cooks from the throngs of broke assholes like me.
"I WANT 2 ORDER PORK STEAM DUMPLING PLEASE"
i am now holding the Rosetta Stone/menu printed in Chinese and English in his face.
the cook stares at me , exhausted.
"2 ORDER! THANKYOU"
grammar changes among the Chinese.
the place is tiny, the place is dirty. to emphasize the total fucking brokeassness of the clientele, an older black man walks in, presumably from some apartment above, with a large aluminium foil wad shaped like a tub, filled with half frozen chicken wings.
"Just gonna be a second!" he announces. He pauses and looks around. I wonder what he means.
"No problem.." he says, and then grabs the soy and chili sauce condiments off of the main table and starts pouring them into his makeshift tub.
"just makin some wings, no problem."
my cook shakes his head and looks at me.
"you whan wha?"
23.5.04
"there is nothing more beautiful than za sparks from ricochet bullets when you are in a k-hole."
god hes wierd. i cant tell if hes being honest or not.
"there is nothing that you can do, ees like you are .. you you .. are totally helpless - becausze of za drug. you can just hear your commanding officer screaming, its like he is far away and all you can hear is the 'ting -ting -t-ting' and everything is so beautiful but- "
hes not smart enough to make up this kind of thing. or.. or is he? you never know.. the fucking isrealis.. semitic thinking is so hard to figure out, there is a different standard for truth - .
"-you are feeling.. . so fucked up when it happens."
he touches the wide scar that runs from his chin down to his collar bone. I imagine the pinkish flaps fo skin, the thick blood, the exposed musculature, his dusty Isreali Defense Force uniform as he is dragged away by his friends.
does the isreali army really issue ketamine to combat units? i know it was originally used as a vetrinary anesthetic, i know it. i know the drug that we call Special-K, the one that raver kids snort in long lines from coffee tables while 26 year old managers of Pizza Huts named Curly call their 19 year old friends "Sex Kitten" as they disappear into a back room with a waterbed - i know it works on humans too.
"combat is crazy." he says. "sometimes you need a drug."
--
he moves mechanically across the dining room, quickly and precisly pulling plates off tables and stacking them on his arms and hands. he is our best busboy. i shouldnt be surprised, as according to him, he was the best sniper in his unit. with 32 confirmed kills, clearing tables correctly shouldnt be such a challenge.
do they know he was a soldier? they sit there sipping on boutique drinks - "Peridot Pop", "Shanghai Cosmopolitan", "Fragrant Cloud" - could they suspect that his steady hands blew open 32 heads?
--
the dishwasher and i are taking a second to relax in the middle of a shift. we all call him "Papi - puerta rican for "pops".
i am chewing on a "mongolian glazed lamb chop", which is appealing somehow to my middleeastern roots. i chew on the bone, and wonder how it was that someone threw this away, this wonderful peice of meat? grease shines on my fingers. Papi drinks a beer we brought down for him. i drink a large glass of straight vodka.
i should be worried about the security cameras but not tonight - papi has pointed them towards the floor.
"mira, papi i say as i point to a leftover peice of crunchy fried squid "para ti"
im drunk, on the job, as usual, at about 8PM.
i love the restuarant life.
but i havent been sober for
for 3 months.
god hes wierd. i cant tell if hes being honest or not.
"there is nothing that you can do, ees like you are .. you you .. are totally helpless - becausze of za drug. you can just hear your commanding officer screaming, its like he is far away and all you can hear is the 'ting -ting -t-ting' and everything is so beautiful but- "
hes not smart enough to make up this kind of thing. or.. or is he? you never know.. the fucking isrealis.. semitic thinking is so hard to figure out, there is a different standard for truth - .
"-you are feeling.. . so fucked up when it happens."
he touches the wide scar that runs from his chin down to his collar bone. I imagine the pinkish flaps fo skin, the thick blood, the exposed musculature, his dusty Isreali Defense Force uniform as he is dragged away by his friends.
does the isreali army really issue ketamine to combat units? i know it was originally used as a vetrinary anesthetic, i know it. i know the drug that we call Special-K, the one that raver kids snort in long lines from coffee tables while 26 year old managers of Pizza Huts named Curly call their 19 year old friends "Sex Kitten" as they disappear into a back room with a waterbed - i know it works on humans too.
"combat is crazy." he says. "sometimes you need a drug."
--
he moves mechanically across the dining room, quickly and precisly pulling plates off tables and stacking them on his arms and hands. he is our best busboy. i shouldnt be surprised, as according to him, he was the best sniper in his unit. with 32 confirmed kills, clearing tables correctly shouldnt be such a challenge.
do they know he was a soldier? they sit there sipping on boutique drinks - "Peridot Pop", "Shanghai Cosmopolitan", "Fragrant Cloud" - could they suspect that his steady hands blew open 32 heads?
--
the dishwasher and i are taking a second to relax in the middle of a shift. we all call him "Papi - puerta rican for "pops".
i am chewing on a "mongolian glazed lamb chop", which is appealing somehow to my middleeastern roots. i chew on the bone, and wonder how it was that someone threw this away, this wonderful peice of meat? grease shines on my fingers. Papi drinks a beer we brought down for him. i drink a large glass of straight vodka.
i should be worried about the security cameras but not tonight - papi has pointed them towards the floor.
"mira, papi i say as i point to a leftover peice of crunchy fried squid "para ti"
im drunk, on the job, as usual, at about 8PM.
i love the restuarant life.
but i havent been sober for
for 3 months.
19.5.04
no jody dear its true -
i have to get out of this place -
i thought i was waiting on a job in washington doing
intelligence work - i thought i was just coming to NYC
for a couple of drunk months to shake before i tied
myself to the spook bureacracy for a full year -
but, o, woman, i find myself waking up in brooklyn
next to some korean girl, i find myself drunk before,
during and after work, i find myself waiting not on a
black suited job that will open doors and buy me wine,
but on large and angry south asians, fat women with
bad hair, celebrities and dignitaries
no money
and no, no plane ticket
i need deliverence
but - i can barely afford delivery
but - why should i complain, hey?
im in new york
even if this isnt what i want
send me the music,
and help me drink my way back to asia
yours,
beneath the city,
cem
--- jody swift wrote:
> hey cemco-
>
> dreamt I got an e-mail saying you are a waitor in
> New York.
> can't find it for the life of me, but so good to
> dream it, wow,
> the big apple and you live there? serving what to
> whom?
>
> yes,back to thailand at the end of june- to deepen
> that massage passion.Aek is in London,saw him at
> Christmas,
> paris is springtime, we're like insects rubbing our
> eyes
> crawling out from under rocks.
>
> lot's of music stuff going on-recording,playing and
> a new website coming up. teaching was hard and after
> corrections I am done. hope Bev and Pete- yes, they
> call hin Pete now, are doing well in la la land-now
> I am off to bed,
> Bonne nuit!
> and write soon-miss your dancing wit,
> any chance you'll be in asia???
>
> cheers-
> jody
>
i have to get out of this place -
i thought i was waiting on a job in washington doing
intelligence work - i thought i was just coming to NYC
for a couple of drunk months to shake before i tied
myself to the spook bureacracy for a full year -
but, o, woman, i find myself waking up in brooklyn
next to some korean girl, i find myself drunk before,
during and after work, i find myself waiting not on a
black suited job that will open doors and buy me wine,
but on large and angry south asians, fat women with
bad hair, celebrities and dignitaries
no money
and no, no plane ticket
i need deliverence
but - i can barely afford delivery
but - why should i complain, hey?
im in new york
even if this isnt what i want
send me the music,
and help me drink my way back to asia
yours,
beneath the city,
cem
--- jody swift
> hey cemco-
>
> dreamt I got an e-mail saying you are a waitor in
> New York.
> can't find it for the life of me, but so good to
> dream it, wow,
> the big apple and you live there? serving what to
> whom?
>
> yes,back to thailand at the end of june- to deepen
> that massage passion.Aek is in London,saw him at
> Christmas,
> paris is springtime, we're like insects rubbing our
> eyes
> crawling out from under rocks.
>
> lot's of music stuff going on-recording,playing and
> a new website coming up. teaching was hard and after
> corrections I am done. hope Bev and Pete- yes, they
> call hin Pete now, are doing well in la la land-now
> I am off to bed,
> Bonne nuit!
> and write soon-miss your dancing wit,
> any chance you'll be in asia???
>
> cheers-
> jody
>
13.5.04
lower east side.
"lotus bar". they are piping in reggae, indie, and wireless internet. guys with messy hair and old shirts are typing on glowing macs. everyone has interesting hair.
girls are reading thomas wolfe, girls are flaunting their tattoos, girls are talking about sonic youth and jeff buckley. a girl's cell ring is "iron man".
a fat old academic hippy sits with a read and frayed village voice in front of him presses a guitar into his stomach, perching it on his rolls. he rocks to the side, leaning towards a lesbian with a black bandana who owns the guitar, he strums out a beatles riff as if to harden the cliche to a rock.
fat old hippy mumbles about noam chomsky, wants some guy to burn the digital version of "dude, wheres my country" for him.
a gen Xer, pale and growing fat around the sides, balding with a bright yellow teeshirt and ambitious sideburns, talked about MPEG encoding with a young actor, then talked about korean technology.
"..they actually have computers in their couches, its just that much a part of everyday life.. "
i watched a man's head come off this morning. it was slow, painful, they sawwed his neck.
i remember most the men chanting "allahu akbar".
the guy was from philadelphia, right.
i was 17 and just on the internet, when i stumbled onto a video of an afghan beheading a russian soldier. the head rolled away, the body collapsed flat.
the fat hippy and several hipsters and a girl with a tiny toy dog are crowding around a laptop staring like children at the screen.
an mpeg of the guy from philadelphia's beheading is on the screen.
"holy shit"
"ive never seen a beheading"
"whooaah"
"ohhh huh dude"
the girl with the toy dog squeals
in minutes they are back to talking about MPEG software.
the fat hippy is bitching about "This Administration"
ill need a drink now, thankyou
"lotus bar". they are piping in reggae, indie, and wireless internet. guys with messy hair and old shirts are typing on glowing macs. everyone has interesting hair.
girls are reading thomas wolfe, girls are flaunting their tattoos, girls are talking about sonic youth and jeff buckley. a girl's cell ring is "iron man".
a fat old academic hippy sits with a read and frayed village voice in front of him presses a guitar into his stomach, perching it on his rolls. he rocks to the side, leaning towards a lesbian with a black bandana who owns the guitar, he strums out a beatles riff as if to harden the cliche to a rock.
fat old hippy mumbles about noam chomsky, wants some guy to burn the digital version of "dude, wheres my country" for him.
a gen Xer, pale and growing fat around the sides, balding with a bright yellow teeshirt and ambitious sideburns, talked about MPEG encoding with a young actor, then talked about korean technology.
"..they actually have computers in their couches, its just that much a part of everyday life.. "
i watched a man's head come off this morning. it was slow, painful, they sawwed his neck.
i remember most the men chanting "allahu akbar".
the guy was from philadelphia, right.
i was 17 and just on the internet, when i stumbled onto a video of an afghan beheading a russian soldier. the head rolled away, the body collapsed flat.
the fat hippy and several hipsters and a girl with a tiny toy dog are crowding around a laptop staring like children at the screen.
an mpeg of the guy from philadelphia's beheading is on the screen.
"holy shit"
"ive never seen a beheading"
"whooaah"
"ohhh huh dude"
the girl with the toy dog squeals
in minutes they are back to talking about MPEG software.
the fat hippy is bitching about "This Administration"
ill need a drink now, thankyou
8.4.04
letter to noone really.
--
"sir?
sir?
-are you waiting for a bus? are you? no? leave."
he scowls. at me.
him in armani suit, prada shoes, shaved head, leather
notebook, manicured nails, gym built full shoulders.
hes a black man in his late 30s, blue eyes; his
tired-yet-angry bunched up face is one you havent seen
yet. he fucks men, not women.
career waiter, former aspiring actor, now hes a
general manager of celebrity chef john-george
vanderrichten's take on modern chinese - 66 - a place
frequented by entertainment celebrities - will smith
on friday, the band Jet, etc. etc.
his staff wear gray chinese jumpsuits a la 1960s
cultural revolution era china - four pocket jackets,
tight collars designed by celebrity fashion designer
vivienne tam of hong kong.
he chastises his staff daily, in the true new york
restuarant fashion - noone is good enough and the
staff is ridden with slackers and idiot-theives; he
says 'pacifically' instead of 'specifically' due in
part to his lack of education and in part his
outrageous lisp
for 3 weeks hes been my boss.
--
at ludlow and stanton, in the lower east side,
watching outside as a pilot for some dumb new show is
being shot - PAs and camera people scuttle around as
their walkie talkies chatter. lookers-on watch for a
glimpse of the "talent" as they walk out of their
motorhomes to get a muffin or a power-smoothie from
the talent motorhome.
im typeing on a mac in a trendy little hole in the
wall nearby. it is run by affluent persians, it is
called ini-ani. there are walls made out of cardboard
and velvet drapes, there is clinky high treble lounge
music on and i wonder what im doing here. outside the
window, couplets of girls all wearing the same latest
fashion musts, guys with shoulder bags and pumas,
everyone is dressed like its TV, everyone knows how
good the wrens album is, girls in stripes and guys in
perms, everyone sucked off that guy from the giraffes,
and we all know eternal sunshine was amazing and
breakthrough. except for the limp-strutting black
kids and roosterish puerta ricans who live in the govt
housing and keep the check cashing places in business.
--
2 AM drunk and reading, as usual, the stories from the
wire.
iraq is on the brink of the abyss, and we knew that,
we said that, noone fucking listened. uzbekistan just
got bombed, we all wonder what that means - but i
dont. i knew and i know, and im just watching in the
paper waiting to be proven right again.
through the bourbon, i recall a serious conversation
earlier in the day between two queens at my job -
"these are sugar cookies."
"no - shortbread."
"sugar cookies -"
"shortbread"
"ITS A SUGAR COOKIE!? OHHHHH-KAY? BITCH!"
iraq is imploding, and these are my priorities.
the fuck am i doing? will i end up like www.mommyanddaddy.com? like them? why am
i in new york? shouldnt i be sniffing for murder in
dirty places, pissing into holes, eating chicken feet
and fermented shrimp?
--
maybe ill go back to rome. theres always the black
cat.
i applied to the AFL-CIO's International Solidarity
Center, part of the Iraq team. i interview in DC on
the 16th.
the defense intelligence agency gets back to me soon
enough.
i have a job offer to teach in the muslim corner of
china, Xinjaing aka eastern Turkmenistan.
i dont know
but for now, ill write to one of tomorrow's
aristocrats, clever, attractive girl with - i can
imagine - smokers fingers and a wicked half smile.
shes only there through latenite messages and one
blurry, purple haired photo in the corner of my mind
but -
thats all i need to know.
right?
--
"sir?
sir?
-are you waiting for a bus? are you? no? leave."
he scowls. at me.
him in armani suit, prada shoes, shaved head, leather
notebook, manicured nails, gym built full shoulders.
hes a black man in his late 30s, blue eyes; his
tired-yet-angry bunched up face is one you havent seen
yet. he fucks men, not women.
career waiter, former aspiring actor, now hes a
general manager of celebrity chef john-george
vanderrichten's take on modern chinese - 66 - a place
frequented by entertainment celebrities - will smith
on friday, the band Jet, etc. etc.
his staff wear gray chinese jumpsuits a la 1960s
cultural revolution era china - four pocket jackets,
tight collars designed by celebrity fashion designer
vivienne tam of hong kong.
he chastises his staff daily, in the true new york
restuarant fashion - noone is good enough and the
staff is ridden with slackers and idiot-theives; he
says 'pacifically' instead of 'specifically' due in
part to his lack of education and in part his
outrageous lisp
for 3 weeks hes been my boss.
--
at ludlow and stanton, in the lower east side,
watching outside as a pilot for some dumb new show is
being shot - PAs and camera people scuttle around as
their walkie talkies chatter. lookers-on watch for a
glimpse of the "talent" as they walk out of their
motorhomes to get a muffin or a power-smoothie from
the talent motorhome.
im typeing on a mac in a trendy little hole in the
wall nearby. it is run by affluent persians, it is
called ini-ani. there are walls made out of cardboard
and velvet drapes, there is clinky high treble lounge
music on and i wonder what im doing here. outside the
window, couplets of girls all wearing the same latest
fashion musts, guys with shoulder bags and pumas,
everyone is dressed like its TV, everyone knows how
good the wrens album is, girls in stripes and guys in
perms, everyone sucked off that guy from the giraffes,
and we all know eternal sunshine was amazing and
breakthrough. except for the limp-strutting black
kids and roosterish puerta ricans who live in the govt
housing and keep the check cashing places in business.
--
2 AM drunk and reading, as usual, the stories from the
wire.
iraq is on the brink of the abyss, and we knew that,
we said that, noone fucking listened. uzbekistan just
got bombed, we all wonder what that means - but i
dont. i knew and i know, and im just watching in the
paper waiting to be proven right again.
through the bourbon, i recall a serious conversation
earlier in the day between two queens at my job -
"these are sugar cookies."
"no - shortbread."
"sugar cookies -"
"shortbread"
"ITS A SUGAR COOKIE!? OHHHHH-KAY? BITCH!"
iraq is imploding, and these are my priorities.
the fuck am i doing? will i end up like www.mommyanddaddy.com? like them? why am
i in new york? shouldnt i be sniffing for murder in
dirty places, pissing into holes, eating chicken feet
and fermented shrimp?
--
maybe ill go back to rome. theres always the black
cat.
i applied to the AFL-CIO's International Solidarity
Center, part of the Iraq team. i interview in DC on
the 16th.
the defense intelligence agency gets back to me soon
enough.
i have a job offer to teach in the muslim corner of
china, Xinjaing aka eastern Turkmenistan.
i dont know
but for now, ill write to one of tomorrow's
aristocrats, clever, attractive girl with - i can
imagine - smokers fingers and a wicked half smile.
shes only there through latenite messages and one
blurry, purple haired photo in the corner of my mind
but -
thats all i need to know.
right?
7.4.04
9.2.04
in the basement of the house i grew up in, i connect with my father through the few things there is left
complex knots tied by his hands hold up a canvas cloth which cover the pipes and wires running the basements ceiling. if you know knots, you will appreciate how secure these are. they have held tight for 15 years.
he was a merchant marine. blown off the deck of an oil tanker that exploded on the bosphorous in istanbul, breaking 1/6 of the windows in the city, lighting the 3 nights as if they were day. he was the sole survivor of that accident, appearing in turkish papers with no eyebrows and singed hair. we have clippings, unless he took them when he left.
i look up at the canvas. he built a bar down there. so he could drink with that english guy with one arm, joe. he installed speakers, put the parrot down here. joes wife, who drank as much brown liqour as joe, had a poodle, i recall.
i sip bourbon from his tumblers.
92 proof.
maybe one day i will tie similar knots.
sometimes i know that i mean it when i say that given the chance i will kill him with my hands.
sometimes i dont.
complex knots tied by his hands hold up a canvas cloth which cover the pipes and wires running the basements ceiling. if you know knots, you will appreciate how secure these are. they have held tight for 15 years.
he was a merchant marine. blown off the deck of an oil tanker that exploded on the bosphorous in istanbul, breaking 1/6 of the windows in the city, lighting the 3 nights as if they were day. he was the sole survivor of that accident, appearing in turkish papers with no eyebrows and singed hair. we have clippings, unless he took them when he left.
i look up at the canvas. he built a bar down there. so he could drink with that english guy with one arm, joe. he installed speakers, put the parrot down here. joes wife, who drank as much brown liqour as joe, had a poodle, i recall.
i sip bourbon from his tumblers.
92 proof.
maybe one day i will tie similar knots.
sometimes i know that i mean it when i say that given the chance i will kill him with my hands.
sometimes i dont.
9.1.04
im confused in the street, driving around in a borrowed car, cocking my eyebrow at things in a desperate effort to make them more interesting, trying to find something new about the place where i grew up, the suburban vacuum just outside of washington.
the new american architecture, the one they will dig up, is brittle plastic, its the signs and the siding, and its breaking apart as quickly as the spanish speakers put it up. theres an outback steakhouse, heres a starbucks, and i stop for a tea. its a dollar twenty, named after an emotional state. i sip the bliss flavored tea and watch the girl with very bad dolphin and bird tattoos on her forearms with the large ass simper. her attentions direct at the guy with the laptop, hes wearing a georgetown shirt.
"ORDERING:"
he was just talking about the elevated terror alert, about a mountain biker in california who was attacked by a mountain lion yesterday. i saw the same clip on the news. why does this kind of news get transmitted so far - why do people love to be afraid here?
back straight, i blink 3 times slowly, sitting by the window. my arabic cards are in front of me, not cards but scraps of paper really, kept in a ziploc bag. laptop guy looks at me funny, apparently unhappy with the unsophisticated approach i am taking to learning the language. obviously i need more product to be doing anything serious. like a laptop.
"sorry to bother you but - what are you studying"
"arabic"
"oh really? arabic? what for, if you dont mind me-?"
"its the language of god as revealed to Mohammed by the angel Gabriel."
"oh."
he looks at me and my ziploc bag.
ziplocs are for potato chips, he must be thinking.
he gets back to typing
i smiled.
i recall an accident i saw on the way to the spot we were sitting in. it looked lethal, engine blocks tucked unnaturally in passenger areas, exposed internals. 3 autos, brand new, 2 toyota trucks and a dodge car. the dodge lost. brittle blue shards plastic dotted the intersection.
im still confused.
where the fuck am i again?
the new american architecture, the one they will dig up, is brittle plastic, its the signs and the siding, and its breaking apart as quickly as the spanish speakers put it up. theres an outback steakhouse, heres a starbucks, and i stop for a tea. its a dollar twenty, named after an emotional state. i sip the bliss flavored tea and watch the girl with very bad dolphin and bird tattoos on her forearms with the large ass simper. her attentions direct at the guy with the laptop, hes wearing a georgetown shirt.
"ORDERING:"
he was just talking about the elevated terror alert, about a mountain biker in california who was attacked by a mountain lion yesterday. i saw the same clip on the news. why does this kind of news get transmitted so far - why do people love to be afraid here?
back straight, i blink 3 times slowly, sitting by the window. my arabic cards are in front of me, not cards but scraps of paper really, kept in a ziploc bag. laptop guy looks at me funny, apparently unhappy with the unsophisticated approach i am taking to learning the language. obviously i need more product to be doing anything serious. like a laptop.
"sorry to bother you but - what are you studying"
"arabic"
"oh really? arabic? what for, if you dont mind me-?"
"its the language of god as revealed to Mohammed by the angel Gabriel."
"oh."
he looks at me and my ziploc bag.
ziplocs are for potato chips, he must be thinking.
he gets back to typing
i smiled.
i recall an accident i saw on the way to the spot we were sitting in. it looked lethal, engine blocks tucked unnaturally in passenger areas, exposed internals. 3 autos, brand new, 2 toyota trucks and a dodge car. the dodge lost. brittle blue shards plastic dotted the intersection.
im still confused.
where the fuck am i again?
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