We are having our customary American Coffees at Salvador’s this morning. Sal’s is one of the finer cafes i have ever experienced in China. The food is great, the prices are low, the place is owned by a few gringos from kansas and colorado and run by an army of western yunnan munchkins, under the close supervision of Ping Di — King Diesel — a four foot little yunnan girl with a squeaky voice and absolute authority.
It is time for us to go. we are headed to Dali in the afternoon where we will meet with the owners of the Bad Monkey and other assorted devils and thieves. Before i forget, let me give you a rundown of Sammy’s “disappearance” which began with whiskey and tramidol, continued into the halfway house and raged out into the streets in front of the speakeasy. The rest is legend.
“The Disappearance” according to Sammy:
“Super Cool in Kunming. This guest’s opinion is what the fuck. not sure what happened last night. Thought we were supposed to get drunk. I did then got “lost” but i met a nice woman who helped me find my way here and upon arriving got cockblocked by the night reception whore who scared her away and then wouldn’t let me into our vacant fuckin room because i’m not fuckin michael even though i told the cunt that i paid for the bullshit. So i had to rent 103 or sleep in the street which i tried but it sucked. i dont speak chinese.”
I woke up in the morning and saw that sammy had disappeard. I spent the day wandering the streets around our hotel and chillin at Sals thinking he could find his way back. I eventually headed back to our hotel and was gonna take a shower when i found the above note stuck under the door of our room, 304. i ran down and knocked on 103, sammy jumped out, we embraced and it was all good. turns out i was in a drunken coma whilst he was banging on the door at 2am with a sceptical receptionist in tow. its not my fault.
Yesterday we spent lunch with Mr. Huang. He is my friend Huang Jun’s father. Huang Jun is one of my oldest and best homeboys here in China. Recently, i introduced him to a sweet little Thai girl who was coming up to kunming to study. they fell in love and now Huizzle is down in bangkok with her. He is our man in Bangkok. Me and Sammy told stories of northern Minnesota and we all toasted to Huizzle. Mr Huang pulled out a doctoral thesis he wrote for his son, because his son has no time to do it as work is getting him down. I said Huizzle was a punk for allowing his father to write up this thesis, but i was deeply touched. His mother then asked if Sammy could carry a couple bags of love to Bangkok with him and give them to Huiz … of course Sammy said yes.
i had a dream that i got off the subway in NYC and a chubby black man was telling me about the judo he was studying — i didn’t believe him right away, but he pulled some moves and told a story of thugs trying to take his shit and when he pulled those moves they backed off, made a phone call for reinforcements. They told their homies on the phone:
“Man, we gotta a Cain muthafucka all up in here, all like My Way is Your Darkest Fear … “
I woke up then because i knew I should remember that line.
