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Sun-baked, platinum blond stretched out on the grass. Her cat's eyes wander the lake and her legs are slung lazily before her with feline grace. She's reading, and so am I.
Anyways, we talked for awhile and decided to eat ice cream. Then we went to the lake. Here name is Lisa.
Later on I met two French girls on the sidewalk baring the weight of their packs and looking a bit lost. Imene is tall and dark skinned, her hair tied into braids beneath a head scarf, while Leila is razor-eyed and tough and smiling. They're looking for a place to crash, bed down in the grass, save some cash. I ran the pizza I'd been carrying back to the hostel and into the fridge and guided them through the city in search of a quite place. They've got a bus to catch in the morning. Turns out they're headed to Thailand in a month, same as me, and we decide to meet there.
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Back at the hostel everybody is Israeli except my father and I, who aren't, but have Hebrew names. One girl is rather stubborn. In conversation I mention that it had been windy in the morning; her response - no it wasn't. Taul is pretty cool. He sleeps in the bunk above my Father. He has a beard that is matched in density only by the hair on his chest
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James tells us where to go. James is an American that hangs out at the Peterpan Rental shop. He hangs out there because of the Swedish girl Svea. He wears his hat backward and smiles a lot. Svea wishes he would leave.
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First off - she's quite gorgeous. Got those sexy war-like eyes and pointed teeth, smile like the curved blade of a scimitar. Her hair is feathered back of her ears and she's wearing black, blue jeans, and a pink silk scarf. She's perched on the stone wall overlooking the lake. Her poise is something regal, catches my eyes like butterflies in a net. I'm snagged into action, stop walking and approach. Her name is Anita. Where are you from? Hungry. Of course, I say, the most beautiful women in the world usually are. She's quit her job and followed a dream and all of the sudden I've got a place to stay on Saturday night.
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We met Kristjan and Lindsey at a bar. My dad knew them from earlier. I didn't. He's from Estonia. She's from Washington. He's a skateboarder. She's a botanist. They've been traveling together for awhile and are parting ways in Queenstown. He tells his stories with wild gesticulation - what a great guy, great heart. We need more people in the world like him. The picture he paints of Estonia is a grim one. He left home and spent two years in Australia, in the dirt bowl Outback with the Aboriginals, now he's in New Zealand and ready to immigrate.
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Asian New Year. Imagine: dozens - if not thousands - of Asians dumped off, arriving in large bus loads, snapping pictures with iPads and Selfie sticks. Yammering at each other. They approach my father and take pictures of him, blank faced, without a word spoken and slowly sidle away...
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Asian New Year. Imagine: dozens - if not thousands - of Asians dumped off, arriving in large bus loads, snapping pictures with iPads and Selfie sticks. Yammering at each other. They approach my father and take pictures of him, blank faced, without a word spoken and slowly sidle away...
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Lisa and I climb the mountain and she takes a dozen pictures of the view. Her skin is so fine and tan it's like caramel, and her smile is a sunny slice of perfection. She exudes mystery - though not in shades - it isn't her life, but her emotions; they're enshroud and subtle, locked behind thoughtful eyes and the occasional shrug. Afterwards we bask in the sun in the grass and discuss decisions. She eats a muffin and complains about her weight even though she's perfect.
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Some shirtless guy, fifty years old, with a single standing dreadlock and a nipple ring.
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Anita and I are stretched out beside each other, burning now. Our skins are red in places, hair pulled back, shorts rolled doubly for maximum exposure. She's so full of life, having escaped the stagnancy of her homeland and employment; she's here, ripe and ready for adventure, so eager, so smiling, so lovely.
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I sit down and see:
Two handsome, very ripped dudes holding hands.
A pretty girl with too much hair on her arms (face woefully dusted with fuzz).
Asians progressing down the sidewalks with their cameras, sidestepping like crabs, shooting loads of nothing committed to their camera-cards till the great upload and eventual printing.
Backpackers with bags of groceries, perpetually trudging.
Party boys who all look the same - same hair styles, same shirts. Same uninspired personalities.
"I like it longer on the top, but shorter on the sides." Some guy explains to his friend. He says it with such excitement and conviction. Yeah - you and everybody else, bro, I think.
And every morning the local psychic wheels his sign to the waterfront and sets up shop.
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How is it that I miss you? Even now. Amid so much motion and noise. My heart is in Noosa, swathed in a dream.
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An Austrian carrying 15 pound barbells in his pack to maintain muscle mass during 4 months of travel. He brought only tank tops and cargo shorts and his arms are sunburned and scabby. He refuses to buy sunscreen, rationalizing the burns as a necessary step toward the perfect tan. He lays on the beach all day and uses his barbells after dark between the bunks. Curling, curling, curling. His name is Renolph.
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This portion of the city is dead, the occasional passerby no more than a stray pulse.
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Throngs of girls in their sleeveless blouses and hot pants and jeans parading the midnight streets, half-drunk, looking to fuck (for the price of a few drinks and a guy in flip-flops). My father and I drink two pitchers of ale with Greg and Kristjan. Greg is a tall well-traveled Englishman with a long goatee and an air of distinction. He wears a cap and a sweater. Kristjan sports a sleeveless shirt and a straw hat decorated in shells, there are about a dozen bandages on his arms and legs from a skateboard wreck. He's grinning and excited. Eventually we wander toward the beach where we encounter Max and Phil and Tanja. They invite us to The Cowboy which is a bar with an electronic bull and cheap beer. Kristjan rides the bull.
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I'm shockingly, shamefully slow moving, lethargic after last night's iniquitous debauchery. Not that I'm hungover. Not that my head hurts. I'm just feeling sluggish. Floating around moderately sick and depressed. Yes - there are low points even in travel. I have the wretched sneaking suspicion that giving someone the benefit of the doubt is essentially denial; the emotional equivalent of social retardation. In other words: No, I'm not picking up what you're laying down. Sorry.
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Frank introduces himself to other people as Marco. He's got Jesus Christ tattooed on his stomach.
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How is it that I have run into 3 other people from Hailey, Idaho in New Zealand? WTF?
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I slept on the linoleum floor of a bathroom one night, having climbed through an open window two stories high from the banister of an outdoor stairwell, sliding inside like an insidious hobo. The next night I slept snuggled in the nook of a grave in the Queenstown cemetery. This is what happens when Chinese New Year occurs and all of the hostels are booked.
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This is not a pick-up. I tell her what I think, and resist the urge to touch her. I'd hate to spoil it, cheapen it. Give it motive beyond the simple truth of what I see in her.
Seduced by the somber song of the street pianist. She smiles and glows and the whole world around her dissipates. It's only she and I that are left, sitting in the street with the music. Our wine is finished. The moment fades, unraveling. I realize that this isn't my poem, but hers. She vanishes, and the dream vanishes with her. It's not about me. It never was. I pass through lives, fleeting, falling. Bright, perhaps. For a moment. But also alone, trapped in psychotropic space - a despondent comet, transmission lost.
She is a star but can't see it.
I am a comet, fading fast.
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