We’re done here people.

But I may just get bored one day and come back on. Until then though, I don’t really have much else to say.

See you.

I don’t know if any of that conflict reflected in the blog itself, I’m too close to home as far as this issue goes to really address it with any accuracy, but there’s been a growing sense of disenchantment and other such fun experiences, and all of them basically lead me down the same garden-path: this blog should just come to an end. Protestations aside, that makes me really fucking sad. Four years is a pretty long time; it’s certainly longer than I’ve held any one job, and giving up Venial Sin is going to be a little bit like amputating a limb (if you’ll forgive the melodrama).

But at the risk of stretching the analogy just a wee bit too far, when something reaches a point at which it’s septic, you cut it off. I’m done with people presuming to know/judge/criticise me on the basis of this little portion of my life, I’m tired of actually thinking that I have to base what I write on what I assume people will think, and I’m really not happy with how strangers or acquaintances take what I’ve written–and without a shred of decency–spread it to the known universe, thereby leaving me stranded with awkward moments (an example would be back when someone who knew the Guy from back in January of this year went up to him and babbled on about how I’d been writing all about him–even more embarrassing if the person isn’t actually the object of my affection, but you get the drift–and the only plausible way for that to have happened would be through this site).

Like I said in the post before this one, I’m not going to stop writing. I am going to write something different, and what that different something is, I haven’t a clue yet. Maybe it’ll be my first attempts at a novel, or a collection of short stories, or just more “blog” stuff, I haven’t got the foggiest. I may well wind up spending hours on end composing passages about Ellen, her damn’ dog and Benazir Bhutto, that remains to be seen. But I think I would like to perhaps start writing that long-elusive novel, and see how it comes along.

This is probably pretty self-defeating, but I’ve been incredibly fortunate to have met a number of wonderful people via this site (there are more, but I’ve run out of words through which to link ‘em), both in real-life and “online” (which is pretty real in any case now), so for those of you who would like, drop me an e-mail at {sin} a.t. [venialsin]{.}com and I’ll most likely be happy to provide you with the link to the new site. This is probably not the most effective way to drop out of sight, but at the very least it’ll ensure that–to begin with–only the people I really want to, have access to what I do/say/feel.

I’ve dithered on long enough (I’ve been trying to write this for about a month so far). It’s been an…experience, certainly.

So yeah.

Bye.

I don’t much like blogging any more.

It’s not the comments (a lot of the hate-filled ones I delete anyway, because I’m just tired of getting into flame-wars with random prats), or that I’m looking for some sort of affirmation (“Oh do keep blogging, don’t ever stop!”). It’s that I’m not doing it for the same reasons that I originally began, which weren’t all too clear to begin with, and only got more complicated over time.

You’ve got to acknowledge you have an issue when your Technorati score is a prime mover of how your day is going to unfold (i.e. with a good attitude or a terrible one).

I remember when I originally started writing this blog, it was because of laziness. It was easier to give friends the URL so they could stay in touch and keep updated on my life than it was to send out mass (or personalised) e-mails with any real regularity. And then, somehow, it…evolved, I guess? Strangers started reading it, connecting with it—and me. I don’t really know how that happened, and I never realised how much of an impact the Internet has actually made in “everyday” life—I mean, we’re talking about, for example, someone I’ve got to know through his blog and spoken to a few times on the telephone flying out from the West Coast of the US to come visit me in London. It’s wonderful, and it’s terrifying.

And it’s not necessarily what I thought I would accomplish when I began writing. I think what really rattled me is that I’ve wound up writing for an audience of sorts. That’s largely because apparently the entire universe knows that this is my blog, and so the list of things I used to be comfortable with revealing is rapidly shrinking. And I’ve started avoiding writing, because like Über, I wasn’t quite pleased with the fact that I couldn’t continue to be myself, not on my terms. This is all probably in my head, but every time I began writing a post this past year—and there are many, many incomplete posts saved—I would start feeling this pressure to, oh I don’t know, pass, to perform, to write under the aegis of expectations. And I would stop, I’d start scanning those lines again and again, is this going to make them laugh, what will they think, do I really want to say this, if I write about going there or doing this, will there be more concrete facts that someone can use to really conclusively pinpoint who I am?

It’s really uncomfortable, because while who you are on the Internet is only a small part of who you are in real-life, people still feel compelled to judge or categorise you on the basis of what you write and present to them. It’s bad enough with strangers, but it’s even worse with people to whom you have some sort of tenuous offline connection, because you kind of hope they would know better but all the while in the back of your head, there’s the realisation that they either (a) don’t know, and/or (b) don’t care, because actually thinking about what the person behind the words would take too much effort. And when you’re queer, in a country where that particular state of being carries huge amounts of drama, both incidental and actual—legal, religious, social, familial, it all gets overwhelming.

I’m not going to stop writing. I don’t think I actually can. But I’m not going to write for anyone else now, not unless I really have to.

“I’ll take you to the airport,” whispered Hopkins wistfully, eyes tearing up.

“You don’t have to do that,” I muttered into my drink, trying to avoid eye-contact for fear of outright sobbing taking place. “The company will pay for me to go back, it’s not a big deal.”

“No,” he said, gulping loudly, lips trembling. “It’ll be the last chance I have to see you, and…”

My phone beeped. It was Heartbreak, sending me a text. I’m at a concert with some friends. How are you and [Hopkins]?

Tae took one look at my face, at Hopkins’ woebegone expression, and immediately added another half-litre of vodka to my pitcher of (at this point far beyond dirty and well into utterly filthy) martinis. And at the same time, thereby earning himself yet another enormous tip, he surreptitiously filled the rest of Hopkins’ glass with a small mountain of ice-cubes. The latter, busily engaged in trying to restrain his heaving sobs, ignored the dilution of his drink entirely, opting instead to try and press my hand (with cigarette precariously held) in an effort to express his entirely justified inconsolable grief at my impending departure.

“Just relax,” I said, not dealing well with the second-hand embarrassment of having a 29-year-old man break down in tears in a bar that was rapidly filling up with ever-more-curious queens who had no compunction about staring and pointing. “You do realise I had to go back home at some point, don’t you? Now why don’t we finish our drink and go to DJ Station instead? Some good music, a good drag-show, you’ll feel much better.”

Hopkins nodded, and grabbing a stack of bar-napkins, went to the bathroom (presumably to have a good cry, although he looked fine when he returned). I, in the meanwhile, responded to Heartbreak’s text. We’re fine. Heading over to DJ Station. How’s the concert? Would have been nice to see you before I left, but not a huge deal. Hope you’re having a good time.

Tae poured me another drink, leaned over the counter flicking a towel/dish-rag over his shoulder, and smiled at me sympathetically.

“Everything OK?” he asked.

“Fine,” I said grumpily, tossing back my drink.

He stood up, flicked his towel from one shoulder to the other, then leaned forward onto the bar again.

“Why do you keep doing that?” I asked, slightly curious.

“I learned it from Cheers!” he grinned back proudly.

“Oh wonderful,” I groaned, “now I’m dealing with a Thai Ted Danson.”

Hopkins came lurching back out of the bathroom, waving away my attempts to help him stand upright without swaying, and suggested instead that we go to DJ Station, since at this point, the drag-show would be over and there would be plenty of room for us to squeeze inside. Tae cocked an eyebrow at the two of us as we walked out, and assured me that while the Balcony closed at midnight, if we needed to come back and stay later than that, he’d be happy to let us in. I silently counted my blessings and half-carrying Hopkins, headed off.

We were about halfway to DJ Station when Hopkins seemed to shake off the worst of his excesses (whether emotional or alcoholic, I’m still not sure), and began to walk under his own power. We made it through to the second floor of the club and were ordering our next round of drinks (well, “drink”, singular, I convinced the bartenders to reduce the amount of alcohol in Hopkins’ drinks to miniscule levels), when Hopkins started pawing a rather well-built white man who wandered past wearing a blue tank-top, and the Australian version of Divine grabbed my ass and insisted that I come dance with him and his friends. I begged off, trying desperately to finish my Absolut Pear and Sprite, when I both felt my cell-phone vibrate in my pocket and saw a very handsome young man smile at me in a most fetching manner. I was smiling back as I fished out my mobile and looked at the message.

Am at DJ.  You with [Hopkins]?

Both my drink and my smile went crashing to the floor. Oh, fuck me, I thought, this is just not going to end well. I texted him back furiously. [Hopkins] and I are here together, and he’s drunk and emotional. He may try to attack you! Be warned! I was deadly serious.

Heh. read the response. He’s the one who should be worried.

I sat back and ordered another drink, placing my fate into the hands of a truly unforgiving deity, somewhat enchanted by the idea that two men could actually be at the point of coming to blows over me.

Hopkins and Heartbreak reached me at the same time. I looked from one to the other, as they both circled, warily making eye-contact, and hastily gulped down my drink as the Cute Smiler looked at us curiously.

“Oh [Hopkins],” I said, with as much insouciance as I could muster, “this is [Heartbreak]. [Heartbreak], this is [Hopkins].”

“Oh, hello,” sniffed [Hopkins], turning away with as much composure as he could manage with his shoulders hunched up and an expression of rage-mingled-with-contempt.

To his everlasting credit (and the detriment of his “competition”), [Heartbreak] was incredibly polite and nice. He asked Hopkins how he was, chatted with both of us very peaceably, was altogether socially very adept, and when I asked what he was doing there, responded with the very diplomatic “Well, I figured since you were leaving tomorrow, you’d probably be here, so I came to see you before you left. I wanted to say good-bye in person.”

I almost swooned when I heard that last sentence.

Heartbreak excused himself after a few minutes of conversation (and glowering silence from Hopkins), pleading a commitment he had made to his friends of only stopping in for a minute.

“I think he comes here a lot,” sniped Hopkins.

“Really?” I asked, somewhat irked at the unnecessary rudeness, particularly in the face of Heartbreak’s politeness. “Have you seen him here a lot?”

“No,” was the sullen response. “But he looks like he would.”

“If you’re going to behave like a five-year-old,” I snapped back, tiring of the rapidly mounting drama, “then we should just go home, because you’re obviously not going to enjoy the rest of the evening.”

What might have transpired next was averted by the Ozzy Divine who flounced into view, grabbed each one of us by one ass-cheek, and squealing “Oh behave you naughty naughty boys!” dragged us into a large group of people dancing. Several of those people, derisively referred to as “money-boys” by Hopkins, were actually quite friendly, buying me drinks instead of the other way around, and increasing the frown on Hopkins’ face until at one point his features bore a remarkable resemblance to a mummified pit-bull. Things came to a head when, at around three in the morning, I got a text from another person I’d met on Craigslist, someone who hadn’t any interest in hooking up, but with whom I’d got along really well and I regretted not having a chance to meet before I left. With his permission, I used Hopkins’ phone to SMS him, responding to his query of whether we were going to go to G.O.D., the after-hours club with a non-committal “If my friend wants to go.”

We were sitting outside DJ Station, having a last smoke when Cute Smiler from the upstairs bar came up to me and started chatting. He also invited us to go to G.O.D., and I demurred politely, sensing that Hopkins was on his last leg, both metaphorically and otherwise (he’d bruised himself while dancing). Cute Smiler hung around for a while, but progressively more dour comments and expressions from Hopkins (who in retrospect was being quite a little bitch), finally drove him away as well.

And then the drama began. About five steps had been taken towards the hotel when Hopkins burst into tears, started screaming about how I didn’t love him, about how he loved me, about the weather, the colour of his watch, the fit of my shirt, the sexiness of my lips (???) and just about everything under the sun. There was bawling. There was screaming. There was struggling to restrain. There were strangers trying to intercede. By the time we got back to the hotel lobby (so he could take his overnight bag and drive home while roaringly drunk, an idea I immediately quashed, mainly for the latter reason rather than the former), we had approached the hotel from opposite sides of the street, and the crying (him) combined with the scowl (me) made every security guard in the parking-lot sit up with expressions of rapt interest.

We walked inside, and straight into a crowd of screaming Super Junior fans, who seemed to have multiplied exponentially in a matter of hours, and who had taken over the entire lobby and the entrance to every freaking elevator in the hotel. We rode up to the room in silence, surrounded by teenagers babbling excitedly, when all of a sudden, as the elevator stopped on one floor, Hopkins exploded into a flood of Thai, forgot almost all his English and started screaming “You no love me! You no love me!” loudly enough that even the teenagers stopped their chattering to stare at him. No fools they, a couple even made the fatal mistake of asking him, in English (and presumably the same questions in Thai) what was going on, which led to a torrent of stuff, dirty looks being given to me, and in a moment of sheer unmitigated drama, a group of the younger girls surrounding Hopkins in some bizarre fag-hag group-hug.

I’m still not sure how we got back to my room without being assaulted by the throng of Thai girls who were convinced that I had in some manner grievously harmed Hopkins, but once we did get inside, I pointed to his bag (too worn-out to deal with any more drama) and waited for him to pick it up. What I got instead was a flying tackle that landed me on the bed as Hopkins straddled me, quite literally tore my shirt off and proceeded to start sobbing and sexually mauling me about at the same time. There’s a certain surreal quality to having sex with someone who’s crying and gasping “Don’t go, don’t leave me” at the same time as he’s trying to establish as much skin-to-skin contact as is possible at the same time, one that’s quite literally indescribable and not a little ridiculous. It was like some sort of grand farce, not mitigated in the least by the fact that at some point while he was on top of me, Hopkins called the front desk and cancelled my car, all the while insisting in shuddering gasps that he would be the one to take me to the airport.

So to recap, I got into a slap-fight with a gay stalker who cried while we fucked, and then drove me to the airport at a breakneck speed because my flight time changed by two hours (earlier), sniffling all the way, and who tried to make out with me at passport control.

I am so going back to Bangkok. Mainly because of the following exchange of text messages as I sat in the Thai Airways lounge sipping my Campari and orange:

Sin: It was really good to see you last night. Even though you weren’t really there to say good-bye, I was very glad to see you before I left.
Heartbreak: Me too. But I really did come to say ‘bye. I wanted to see you before you left. That wasn’t a lie.

I know I’m an ass for feeling like this, but every time I read that text message, generally when I’m feeling incredibly unloved and solitary, my heart skips a beat.

Ah, Lahore. If it weren’t for the fact that my office-car driver is exceptionally good-looking, I don’t really know what I’d look forward to there.

In addition to all of the actual work that seems to pile higher on my desk every time I return with a cup of coffee, the oh-so-holy month of Ramzan (Ramadan, or however you like to spell it) kicked in about a week ago. For context, Ramzan’s a bit like Lent, only instead of giving up one thing you cherish for a month, you fast every day for a lunar month, between sunrise and sunset. Fortunately, since the lunar calendar moves backwards every year, I haven’t had to fast during the summer (4:00 a.m. dawn, 8:00 p.m. sunset, you get the drift) for a couple of years yet. I’ve also spent the last couple of Ramzans outside Pakistan, wherein life pretty much continues normally—the world doesn’t stop. In 2004 I was here in Karachi, but in 2005 and 2006, I was in London. And it’s always a little disturbing to see exactly how insane everyone gets during this month.

For starters, the entire point of Ramzan is to gain an understanding of how it would be to live in poverty, to not have ready access to food and drink. The life of a celibate is also apparently taken into account, because during the fast you’re not supposed to have sex (or masturbate), or smoke etc. (which quite frankly, if I were poor, I’d be chain-smoking to kill my appetite or just jerking off a lot to pass the time until I somehow managed my next meal, but OK, it’s about denying yourself the pleasures of the flesh, I’ll go with that). In Pakistan at least though, this is an excuse for people to gorge in the mornings (Sehri, the pre-fast meal to be had before dawn), moan incessantly about how faint they’re feeling during the day because they’re SO virtuous and fasting and thereby do a grand total of nothing, then race home early from work so they can nap until sunset, at which point the gorging starts all over again.

Not in all cases, admittedly. And I recognise that occasionally, abstinence for an extended period of time can be a good thing for a person. But it’s the strictures surrounding the fasting period and the way in which Pakistan shudders to a halt that drive me insane.

OK so the non-Muslim population of the country is at about 3%. Which, out of 160 million people is going to be somewhere in the region of 4.8 million. And working on the fact that about 10% of the country’s total population resides in Karachi, there’s probably about half-a-million non-Muslims living in my city (there is undoubtedly some sort of mathematical error in here somewhere, but that’s really none of my concern, these are all approximations in which I’m taking refuge), it’s a little ridiculous that for the better part of the day, none of these people can eat at a restaurant, because it’s apparently illegal to serve food during the time that people are fasting. Except in the major hotels (the Marriott or the Sheraton, for example), that is.

Worse than that though, is the fact that you can be attacked/punished for eating/drinking/smoking in public during Ramzan, because apparently the entire Muslim population of the country is so incredibly weak-willed that the very sight of someone engaged in the act of consumption could trigger a firestorm of broken fasts (and therefore, by extension, the damnation of an entire city).

There is of course the argument that it’s “disrespectful” or “inappropriate” to be consuming food and drink in front of people who are not in a situation wherein they too can partake. To which I say, “bollocks”. The spiel commonly trotted out is that by fasting and depriving oneself of physical satisfaction, one learns what it’s like to be poor and starving and hungry, etc. I don’t see anybody refusing to eat or drink in their cars when surrounded by hordes of beggars, because at that point it’s generally not Ramzan, and so it’s OK. Horse apples.

My real issue with Ramzan is how logic and common-sense, not to mention courtesy, go flying out of the window. You’re supposed to finish your breakfast by the dawn prayer, around 5:00 a.m. these days. Fair enough. But work timings begin at 7:30 or 8:30, which basically means that you wake up at an (un)godly hour, eat, go back to sleep (generally, since you’ve been up late already, because no one has the energy to do anything during the day and so all social events occur after sunset), wake up kind of cranky, go work about five or six hours—at least half of which are spent cribbing about how much fasting sucks and how you can’t possibly get anything done without tea/coffee/breakfast—come back in the early afternoon and pass out for another few hours until you wake up to eat again at sunset and call it a day. The Saudis have it even better—they eat at sunset, work all night, eat at sunrise, and pass out all day long.

Hell, if sleeping through the entire thing is considered a fast, I’ve been fasting at least 11 months each year.

Not only would I much rather sort of just pick my own eight-to-ten hour period in which to fast, I’d probably also prefer being able to go into work right after Sehri, working until I’m done, and going back to bed. But of course, that’s complicated by the fact that the couple of times I tried that routine, no one else was at the office, and therefore I couldn’t actually get anything other than the composition of a hundred fire-fighting e-mails accomplished, so boo to that option.

Now all of this might even still be tolerable except for the part where it starts really impinging upon my life outside the fasting and all. Because see, during Ramzan, the Muslim population of this city goes slightly mental, and everyone starts heading to the mosque for their evening and night-time prayers. Valid, sure. Not so valid? The parking. Just because you’ve decided to prostrate yourself before Allah, that doesn’t mean that you completely violate every law of common-sense when it comes to parking your cars in front of the flipping mosques. I’ve had to detour for ten minutes to get around what would normally be a ten-second thoroughfare because some assholes who’ve found their faith temporarily have decided to triple-park their cars along main roads, in the intersections, at cross-roads, on side-walks and basically block off all traffic.

I’m sorry, what the fuck? Your faith shouldn’t inconvenience the hundreds of other people, and “I’m going to pray” should NOT be a valid excuse for you to park smack-dab in the middle of the fucking street, you self-righteous, sanctimonious PRICKS. When some guy started trying to parallel-park his car IN THE MIDDLE OF THE ROAD, I honked at him a few times, only to wind up getting into a heated argument that went something along these lines:

Sin: Do you mind moving your car? I can’t get through.
Prick: But that’s the mosque. I have to park here so I can walk there.
Sin: There are three other open parking spaces less than fifty feet from here. Why don’t you park there?
Prick: *baffled* Because the mosque is here.
Sin: *eyeing a gut the size of an asteroid* And so you can’t walk the extra couple of feet why?
Prick: *resentfully* Because it’s the month of Ramzan! It’s a holy month, I have to go pray!
Sin: *grinding teeth* Sure. I get that. What I don’t get is why you can’t PARK SOMEWHERE ELSE.
Prick: *pompously* For the glory of Allah, I must pray*
Sin: *preparing to smash into his car* For the glory of my patience, MOVE YOUR DAMN’ CAR.
Prick: *taken aback* But…but…I have to go pray at this mosque!
Sin: *losing it* You DICKSMACK, why can’t you MOVE YOUR FUCKING CAR OUT OF THE MAIN ROAD? PARK IT SOMEWHERE ELSE, THERE’RE ALL THESE NEARBY SPOTS!”
Prick: *muttering* Allah…namaaz…Ramzan…
Sin: *firmly* Move it, or hope your insurance will cover the damage.

I mean, what the hell?

And this, ladies and gentlemen, is one of the many reasons why I find the month of Ramzan an incredible inconvenience, and a self-defeating proposition. Because it makes us all assholes.

Without waiting for an answer, I hopped into the bathroom, where I shoved my contact lenses on, severely scraping my cornea, shaved while in the shower and then realised I hadn’t actually brought my clothes inside the bathroom with me. Ah fuck, I muttered to myself, now he’s going to bolt. He’s not drunk enough for this yet. Shrugging on a bath-robe, I opened the door to gauge the appropriate angle at which to reach for the wardrobe, when I realised that I couldn’t see Heartbreak anywhere.

He can’t have left! I panicked, more worried that he could have pinched my laptop and my painstakingly selected pornography collection sensitive work data. I didn’t even hear the door slam!

And with that thought, I stepped into the suite to find Heartbreak naked and lying on the bed, apparently asleep.

Oh. Oh my.

Naturally, my first instinct (after staring at him for a good three or so minutes—it could have been more I suppose, but I’m fairly certain that I couldn’t have gone without breathing for much longer) was to faint, but I controlled the impulse to swoon. Instead, I pulled out my mobile, and thanking any number of tutelary deities for Nokia’s high-res camera-phones, was just focusing the shot when the phone rang in my hand, thereby managing to—all at the same time—scare me half to death, convince me that God was calling to yell at me for being a bad person, and lead me to the immediate conclusion that my mother was somehow monitoring my activities via some sort of secret camera that she had undoubtedly managed to plant in my suitcase. Luckily my yelp was somewhat muffled by my having bitten my own tongue in the shock, and the blue streak that came out of my mouth wasn’t loud enough to rouse Heartbreak.

Even more unfortunately for me, it was my boss calling. And at the end of that phone call, I found myself booting up the office laptop, logging on to the VPN and having to go through about a million documents to find the data he needed. I was a little ticked off at being interrupted for bullshit at that hour (and, if I’m to be completely honest, because I was itching to tie Heartbreak to the bed and keep him there until my flight on Sunday), and while I scrolled through Outlook to find the right e-mail, I poured myself a Diet Coke and lit up a cigarette. Ten minutes must have gone by, when, as I was in the middle of responding to an e-mail (I believe my exact words were “Fuck you sideways, you ignorant twat”), an arm reached past my right ear to grab and stub out my cigarette, another arm wrapped itself around my neck and pulled me so that my chair tilted backwards, and Heartbreak kissed me. Upside-down.

Holy shit, I’m Mary-Jane Watson-Parker! I thought excitedly, this is just like the best thing ever!!

And then the chair overbalanced, as did he, and both of us wound up on the carpet in a muddled heap of limbs and terrycloth. I don’t think we actually stopped making out, even as gravity had its wicked way with us, not even when we grazed our elbows, barked our shins, bruised our forearms, scratched up our backs, and did all sorts of other things to some other…organs, on assorted pieces of beautiful antique Thai furniture. There was a moment when in an effort to get up by means of holding on to the bed, we managed to drag half the bed-sheets down on top of ourselves, and so in a tangle of linens. inebriation, and semi-hysterical laughter, we proceeded to have one of the most fun nights I’ve ever had the good fortune to enjoy. In many ways. It was fun enough that by the time we finally fell asleep, he had to wake up an hour and a half later to head off home.

“Don’t go,” I whined, trying to shake off my sleep-haze long enough to pin him to the mattress, and failing miserably at both. “It’s too early for you to leave. It’s only six in the morning!”

“I’ve parked in the hotel lot,” he smiled at me, lacing up his shoes, “and if I’m going to do the walk of shame followed by the drive of shame, I’d rather do it at this hour when there’s no one around to see me than later on when the lobby’s full. Besides, have you forgotten that you’re supposed to be meeting [Hopkins] at 10:00, to go to the Royal Palace?”

I sat bolt upright. “Oh fuck!”

He laughed, and pecking me on the lips, disappeared out the door as I realised that he and I had both discussed Hopkins and his slight dementia at quite some length the previous evening. I didn’t really have much time to go through the memories in any detail since I had, as a matter of fact, promised to meet Hopkins at 10:00 a.m. to visit the Royal Palace, and even though it was only 6:00 a.m., I had to somehow scrub myself clean of Teh Seks and all that jazz, so I wound up finally stumbling into the Silom BTS station (or was it Sala Daeng, I can’t remember), and being guided to the right subway line by a very sweet young lady who was obviously concerned at my haggard appearance. And then Hopkins met me on the platform, pulled me into a lip-lock and the next thing I knew, I was scandalising half of the tourist population of Bangkok as well as some obese American tourist (Southern, natch) who whispered loudly to her husband (“I think he’s one of those lady-boy-folk!”).

“I most certainly am not,” I snapped back at her, pausing for a second. “And neither is he!”, this delivered with a quick flash of Hopkins’ six-pack. “So piss off!”

Then we made out all the way to the Royal Palace, wherein I spent three hours being completely fascinated by the various nooks and crannies into which I was dragged by Hopkins for surreptitious groping and canoodling. Also, there were observations of some really mind-boggling architecture and gargoyles, renditions of the Ramayana on the walls of temples, and the shrine of what I believe was the Emerald Buddha, but to which—in all honesty—I didn’t pay a lot of attention because it was just so unbelievably serene, the sense of balance and belief in there was almost palpable and a little discomfiting for the declared cynic that I am.

Following upon which, I immediately ran off to the Chatuchak Weekend Market, completely tossing to the winds all notion of balance and separation from earthly desires so that I could buy plants and those incredibly comfortable Thai fisherman pants. Hopkins headed back to his place so that he could get some work done, and I decided that it was time to hit the highly recommended (by Diplomat)–and I quote–Cutey & Beauty Salon, where I got a great pedicure and hand-massage, and back to my hotel-room to shower and change. Hopkins showed up–again–at about 10:00 and we wandered back over to the Balcony pub, where Tae goggled at my brazen change of Thai men, and then started laughing. Hopkins asked him something in Thai, and there was a very dismissive answer.

“What was that all about?” I asked, sipping my Midori Sour.

“I asked him who you were here with yesterday,” came the sour response from a decidedly pissy Hopkins.

“Oh,” I said, hastily (yet surreptitiously) putting a bar-stool between the two of us. “And what’d he tell you?”

“He wouldn’t,” growled Hopkins, downing his Black Russian. “He said he doesn’t know anything and neither do any of the other bar-staff.”

I promptly slid Tae a 500-baht note and grinned at him. He winked right back and then leaned over to the bar to mix up our pitcher of daiquiris.

“The other one’s better for you, I think,” he whispered into my ear, and with that, poured me a gallon of alcohol.

You will be missed. For many reasons, but I think the best one is that you used to say things like this:

“Why does anybody tell a story?” Ms. L’Engle once asked, even though she knew the answer.

“It does indeed have something to do with faith,” she said, “faith that the universe has meaning, that our little human lives are not irrelevant, that what we choose or say or do matters, matters cosmically.”

I still get tingles up and down my spine when I read A Swiftly Tilting Planet, even though I don’t necessarily subscribe to her faith. There’s just something wonderful about that adapted prayer:

In this fateful hour,
I place all Heaven with its power,
And the sun with its brightness,
And the snow with its whiteness,
And the fire with all the strength it hath,
And the lightning with its rapid wrath,
And the winds with their swiftness along their path,
And the sea with its deepness,
And the rocks with their steepness,
And the earth with its starkness:
All these I place,
By God’s almighty help and grace
Between myself and the powers of darkness

Bye.

Friday was the last day of the conference, so with a sense of ebullience, I finished up all of my work by lunch-time and then wound up going for a massage right after. An hour of being pummelled, stretched, pounded, kneaded and otherwise mauled about later, I staggered out of the spa and onto the street to find another text-message from Heartbreak. I’m having dinner with my aunt, it read, but can we meet later? I live very close to where you’re staying, so I can come by any time.

Sure, I responded. I’m just around the area, so text me when you’re free, and we can meet up. Feeling as though I’d done my duty, and waiting for the two co-workers with me to get done with their beatings massages, I decided to check out Heartbreak’s Gaydar profile (which he had also messaged to me at some point overnight). The page opened up on my mobile, I zoomed in on the little icons that were his images, and promptly fell over into the path of an oncoming tuk-tuk.

“He’s 6’3” tall!” I screamed into the phone a minute later, deafening the Opiate and the profusely apologetic tuk-tuk driver. “And he’s 31, and single, and built like a fucking tank! He’s got body-fat so low that his blood must freeze in the shade! This has to be some sort of hoax. Are you responsible for this? I swear I’ll kill you if this is another one of your sick jokes.”

“Umm…” she responded intelligently. “What the hell are you talking about?”

I took a deep breath and told her the entire story.

“MMS the pictures over to me,” she advised, “so I have some context.”

I did as she asked. Three minutes later, as I was through my fourth cigarette since hanging up, my phone rang, and the sudden shock caused me to topple over on top of a poor monk who was passing by.

“If you don’t sleep with him at once,” the Opiate stated with silky venom in her voice, “I will fly to Bangkok and castrate you.

“Then,” she continued. “I will make sure to get the hottest chillies I can find in the local markets, grind them up with a little bit of salt and fish sauce, and smear them all over what genitalia you may have left after I’m done.

“Also,” she said before I could assure her that I had every intention of getting my nude on with Heartbreak, “DON’T FUCKING OVERANALYSE IT, HE’S HOT, IF HE WANTS TO SLEEP WITH YOU WHO ARE YOU TO COMPLAIN, TAKE ADVANTAGE OF THE INSANITY AND JUST BANG HIS ASS SILLY.”

And with that, she hung up. When I tried to call her back to explain the several dozen reasons for my paralysis and complete inability to try and score with someone who impacted my libido so severely that in order to compensate for the increased activity, people within a dozen feet of me were losing their “mojo”, she rejected my calls.

“Why doesn’t anyone realise how difficult all of this is?” I howled, sinking to my knees in abject despair, but not before I’d finished composing an abusive text message to the Opiate.

After fending off rescue attempts conducted by about four hundred passers-by who were trying to figure out why I was writhing on the pavement, I lurched across the pavement, trying my best to reach my hotel room, shower, shave, change and get emergency plastic surgery before Heartbreak contacted me again. I’d just entered the lobby when another text message arrived.

I’m in the lobby of [hotel] it read, and I groaned in abject misery. I contemplated the idea of ducking behind an assortment of potted plants and avoiding all eye contact with anyone even marginally attractive for fear of being rejected in a most withering fashion, but before I could fling myself behind a tall vase of orchids (all very beautifully suspended in ice and marble chips), a (tall) vision of hottitude made his way across the lobby.

“Sin?”, he asked, looking me up and down.

“Mgrexxrewopl” I muttered, staring at the carpeted floor and tracing coy arabesques with my foot.

“I’m [Heartbreak],” he continued after a slight pause. “You are Sin, aren’t you?”

I prepared myself.

“Yes, that’s me,” I beamed, hastily assembling my face into some semblance of a smile. “How are you?” Idiot!!!! Could you have come up with anything LESS suave?

A few minutes of brief—and highly awkward—conversation ensued, before we decided to walk across to one of the many gay bars in the area. Well, he walked. I scampered to keep up with his giant strides, mentally thanking the years of living in Manhattan for my ability to power-walk without losing my breath. We crossed the street, walked past a dozen vendors asking if we were interested in sexy DVDs, porn, sex shows, girls, ping-pong ball shows and assorted items of clothing, and found ourselves standing in the middle of a strip of bars.

“Do you have a particular preference?” I asked him, as we surveyed our options.

“Not really,” he said, still not looking at me. “Why don’t we go to one of the less-crowded ones?”

“Of course,” I replied, deciding that in no way would I continue to play groupie to him. “Why don’t we go in…there?”

And with that, I led him into the Balcony pub, where Hopkins and I had spent the past evening. The bartender, Tae, took one look at me and a giant grin split his face. We parked ourselves at the bar, and after perusing the menu in another moment of awkward silence, ordered our drinks, a Bombay and tonic for him, and a Finlandia Lime and cranberry for me.

Once our initial drinks were done, I noticed that his knees kept bumping into mine. Well of course they are, I thought dismissively, the man IS 6’3” tall, it’s inevitable. And after a pitcher of margaritas, when he got up to go to the loo, I sat back, ignoring the knowing smirks from the entire bar staff. When Heartbreak returned, he did the “reach-around tap”, gently rapping me on one shoulder and scooting around to the other side, and basically doing all sorts of other cutesy things including playfully rubbing the tip of my nose and running his hands over my goatee “to feel what it’s like”.

After that, I honestly don’t know where the time went. The drinks might have had something to do with that, since I suspect Heartbreak assumed that his height gave him some sort of alcohol-absorbing advantage over me (more fool he!), and over the course of four hours, we went through (in addition to the previous drinks), a pitcher of daiquiris, a pitcher of Cosmopolitans, a pitcher of Kamikazes, a pitcher of Manhattans, a pitcher of Amaretto Sours, and about half a dozen Midori Sours each. By the time we got out of the bar, I knew that he was 31, in advertising, half-Thai and half-American, lived in San Francisco for some time, had an ex-boyfriend with whom he shared an apartment (“We realised that we were much better as friends than as lovers”), wasn’t out to his family, was an orphan, didn’t go out to the bars/clubs much, didn’t have a boyfriend, was enchanted with the idea of just hanging out at the bar and having happy hour drinks (“I don’t really do this, just come and hang out with someone and have evening drinks), and was a very good kisser, as evinced by the three or four times that we leaned forward on our bar-stools and made out.

“My friends,” he said as we walked out of the bar unsteadily, “are asking me to come out tonight, to DJ Station. Do you want to go?”

“Sure,” I giggled back. “But I’m a wreck, I’ve been in my work clothes all day and can’t go out looking like this. How about you go ahead to the bar and save us a spot, I’ll drop off my bags and change, and meet you there since it’s only a five-minute walk away?” Maybe this is the best way for us to do this, it’ll give him the chance to back out, he’s drunk and I don’t know how into me he’ll be once my shirt comes off.

“No,” he declared emphatically. “I’ll come with you to the hotel, and we’ll go together.”

Yes! I exulted. “Well, all right. If you insist.”

And people wonder why there’s so much rage against the current U.S. administration. Perhaps because they seem to consider that they are–in some way, shape or form–inherently absolved from adhering to policies that were they to be on the receiving end of, would cause all sorts of screams of moral outrage. I really do wish sometimes–and this would be one of those moments–that my American friends weren’t American. It wouldn’t be so hard for me to reconcile what their country has turned into with the wonderful people I know them to be.