by Randy Ross
She grabs a pen from her purse. As she writes, I look at her more closely: tapered cheek bones, petite chin, tapered and petite all around. In Venezuela, home to this year’s Miss Universe, Bennie probably doesn’t get a second look. But in a Cambridge Whole Foods, she’d collect the grand tiara.
“Here, call me if you get into trouble.” She squeezes my arm again and walks off. I glance down at my watch: One hour, one phone number. Not bad.
I look up in time to see her exit the terminal and disappear into the arms of some guy in a suit.
Maybe she’s just being friendly to me. Or to him. Or maybe after thirty years of dating, I still don’t understand why women do what they do.
I scan the terminal and spot a white guy holding a card with my name on it, “Mr. Randall Burns.” I pop the old lady’s Jawbreaker into my mouth and stride over.
After a thirty-minute flight from Caracas across the southern Caribbean, we land on Mojito Island, Venezuela’s Cape Cod, my home for the next two weeks.
Outside the small airport, I approach a cab driver standing by his car and recite from the guidebook: “Cuanto cuesta a el hotel Bonzi?”
The book says the ride should be 25,000 bolivars, or about twelve dollars.
The driver says, “Treinta.”
I don’t know what ‘treinta’ means, but it sounds a little high, so I say, “Ten dollars US.”
He mumbles something that sounds like “ka-brone” and opens the car door.
Twenty minutes later, at dusk, we pull into Playa El Playa, a world-renowned windsurfing town. One-story shops pop up on the ocean side of the road. On the other side, huge signs promote vacation real estate, and beyond, a vacant field is strewn with trash. The air is hot, humid, and redolent of rotting fish heads. A few dark-skinned guys in board shorts lean against a rusty fence and wave to the driver. Several loose dogs chase our cab for twenty feet and then duck into the brush.
The Bonzi hotel is two stories of peach-colored stucco engulfed by ferns, fronds, and palms. An al fresco bar, an open-air roof deck, an empty hammock shading an empty margarita glass. I imagine sputtering blenders, sloppy happy hours, and arm-squeezing beauty queens without husbands.
The manager takes my backpack and gestures to the staircase. A dog passes us on our way up. I try to look away but can’t. It has six swaying a-cups, a nursing mutt, the first breasts I’ve seen in months.
“That is my dog, señor,” the manager says. I’m not sure if he’s simply stating a fact or letting me know the animal is spoken for.
He shows me to a room with rattan furniture, a Caribbean view, and a queen-sized bed with a mosquito net.
“Will I need that net?” I ask.
“No, señor. We have no mosquitoes this time of year.”
No mosquitoes, no dengue fever. After the manager leaves, I secure my money belt and medications in the room’s wall safe, drop my bag, and pass out on the bed.
The next morning, I hit the Bonzi’s free breakfast buffet just before it closes. The spread covers three card tables in the open-air, roof-top restaurant. The offerings: tropical fruit, cereal, yogurt, cold cuts, fresh juices, and a yellow beverage flecked with black things that are either seeds or microorganisms. In Venezuela, take Ciprofloxacin.
Below, in the pool area, an elderly man suns himself, black moles the size of raisins hanging from his skin. No babes. They must already be at the beach.
The dining area is empty except for a thirty-something couple seated in the middle. The woman looks up and returns to her meal, but the guy waves, smiles, and gestures for me to join them. I guess once you leave Boston, everyone is friendly.
Aurek is stocky, balding, and resembles a muscular elf. His girlfriend, Zofia, scowls at me from behind skinny, severe glasses. Her shoulders are lightly freckled and her toned triceps are shaped like little horseshoes. Aurek has done well for himself.
He speaks perfect English and says they’re from Poland and have stayed at the Bonzi several times. Zofia says nothing and proceeds to cut her food into tiny pieces. Maybe she’s shy.
“How’s the food?” I glance at Zofia while she eviscerates a cantaloupe. Her biceps flex with every cut. She doesn’t look up.
Aurek smiles. “It’s good in the hotel, but you should check out a place on the beach called Manrico’s.”
“How about the water?”
“Warm,” Aurek says. “We’re just north of the equator.”
“But is it true that you’re only supposed to drink bottled water, brush your teeth with bottled water, and keep your mouth closed in the shower?”
Aurek looks at me curiously.
Even Zofia looks up.
“Is this your first time out of the US?” he asks.
Zofia shakes her head and returns to cutting her food.
I wasn’t always so concerned about dirt, germs, and life in general. As a kid, I had the usual fascinations with bodily functions and all things gooey. I collected green and yellow boogers in a shoebox hidden under my bed. Later I graduated to slimy pets such as frogs that ate worms, turtles that ate goldfish, and snakes that ate mice. I never thought twice about kissing Harold the basset hound on the mouth or nipping him on the ear if he nipped me on mine.
In my teens, I worked in a kennel cleaning cages. When I ate lunch, I might have a drippy Reuben sandwich in one hand and a steaming dustpan of beagle crap in the other.
But once I hit forty, something changed. I worried that every cold was TB, that every pimple was malignant, and that every annual checkup would be my last. And now I’m about to spend four months traveling through countries with hygiene practices that would horrify Jane Goodall.
Aurek looks at me, possibly with pity. I chug my glass of juice flecked with swimmy things.
At the Playa El Playa beach, the sand is warm, powdery, and interrupted only by clusters of palms and beach umbrellas. The water is greener than a key lime daiquiri. Small hotels, restaurants, and tiki bars line the shore. Unlike the real Cape Cod, the Venezuelan version is not crowded.
I catch a whiff of coconut suntan oil and margarita mix. A few people in skimpy bathing suits are drinking and jabbering in Spanish. Loose children run around throwing sand at loose dogs.
The guidebook warned about thieves working the El Playa beach. I perform a quick security check: My money belt, credit cards, and plane tickets are locked in the hotel-room wall safe. Ten dollars in cash, the room key, and a photocopy of my passport are sealed in a watertight bag zipped into a hidden pocket in my hat.
I proceed to the windsurfing center where the staff greets me by name, “Hola, Señor Burns. Welcome to World Boardsailing.”
The good news: The center isn’t crowded. The better news: The center is offering a free group lesson and today I’m the group. I recall the guidebook saying that partying typically runs late. Everyone must be sleeping off hangovers in their rooms.
My instructor, Edmundo, is about my age and bare-chested. He sports a near-black tan that would qualify him for the cover of Melanoma Weekly. He isn’t wearing sunglasses. With mine still on, I look up at the equatorial sun: The last time I saw anything this bright, it was followed by a mushroom cloud.
I half listen to his opening remarks thinking: Isn’t he worried about cataracts? Or skin cancer? If he’s a forty-something windsurfing instructor, how is he going to retire? How do people who don’t own Mercedes-Benz dealerships retire in this country?
Edmundo stops talking and looks me up and down. I look me up and down: long-sleeved windsurfing shirt, matching sun-blocking tights, sailing gloves, rubber booties, and a sunhat the size of a garbage can top. The SPF-50 sunscreen on my face is so thick it probably looks as if it had been applied with a spackling knife.
“Hey, ka-brone. Nice pants,” he says. “What you want to work on?”
Ka-brone? Where have I heard that before?
“Beach starts,” I say.
“Let’s see what you got.”
A beach start is a move in which you stand in the
water on one foot, put the other on the windsurfer, and let the wind pull you up into a sailing position. This is an alternative to the uphaul start, in which you bend over, grab a rope attached to the mast, and pull until a disc pops in your back.
I attempt three beach starts and fall each time. Edmundo shakes his head. I feel my face redden under the sunscreen.
There are two types of windsurfing instructors in the world. The “nursery school teacher” is warm and effusive, and talks to students as if they were frightened hamsters. The “dick” is cool and condescending, and spends most of the class trying to sell students pricey, private lessons.
Edmundo is a dick. He snatches my board, enters the water, and starts tossing around terms like “broad reach,” “windward,” and “clew.” He might as well be speaking Spanish. After he demonstrates, I follow his example and actually get up on the board.
Edmundo is a good instructor.
I agree to three future lessons for $120, perform a shaky beach start, and head offshore. Zipping around, I rake the sail back to turn or pull it in to speed up. The wind feels good. The nose of the board rises out of the water. Soon I’m going so fast the board is skipping across the water like a flat stone. This is a maneuver called “planing,” something I’ve never done before.
Two other windsurfers pull out in front of me and wave: Aurek, closely followed by Zofia. I detect a smile on her face, probably her first in ten years. Her calves are toned and slick with sea water.
There are two types of women who travel. The “twat” is attractive, condescending, and usually has a boyfriend. I’ve heard there is another type, but I’ve never met one.
I pull in my sail to catch them.
Windsurfing experts say that the faster you go, the more stable your board becomes—unless you’re riding a wobbly, oversized beginner board like the one I’m on. Aurek and Zofia are riding small, sleek expert boards. The nose of my board shudders.
At a certain speed, water changes temperament from soft and forgiving to hard as ice. If you fall at that speed, you will need evacuation insurance and a doctor who speaks English. Your remains may need to be repatriated. I’m not sure what that speed is because I don’t normally windsurf this fast, but by the sound of the water thudding against my board, I must be pretty close.
I’m gaining on Zofia, who is no longer smiling. My board shudders again.
I imagine wiping out and cartwheeling across the water. Two years ago, I was skiing too fast, hit a snow mound the wrong way, and went cartwheeling across the Vermont ice. When I came to a stop, my foot, ribs, and wrist were all fractured and I was laid up for months.
As I rocket across the sea, I think: Am I going to replay that accident every time a little adrenaline kicks in, every time I’m looking down a steep chute or into one of life’s barrels?
Damn straight.
I let the sail out to slow down and head back to shore as Aurek and Zofia head out to where the water changes from iguana green to marlin blue.
Manrico’s tiki bar has a hempy roof overhanging a row of cane stools. One stool is occupied by a white guy with thinning hair who is nursing a shot of black liquor. Next to him, a dark-skinned beauty queen traces the leafy patterns on his yellow aloha shirt. The other stools are vacant. Beyond them, ten tables with cabana umbrellas sit unoccupied in the sand.
The guidebook has a photo of Manrico’s at full throttle: DJs with face paint, palm trees with tinsel, and wet girls sprinkled with confetti. None of that tonight, but maybe that’s because it’s a Monday.
I hop a stool at one end of the long wooden bar. The bartenders are both female and half my age. One wears a flimsy outfit that barely covers what has to be an upgraded torso. She ignores me. The other bartender, the plump one, smiles and takes my order: a beer and the seafood dinner special.
A flat-screen TV is tuned to the Yankees and Red Sox season finale. I imagine Lenny, Abe, and Rachel watching at the Minuteman.
The El Playa beach is dark and empty except for a torch that illuminates two bony cats fighting over a dead finch that will barely feed one of them.
A wiry stranger takes an open stool near me. The attractive bartender chats with him in Spanish. Passers-by greet him.
He’s probably about my age and wearing flip-flops and a large, expensive-looking watch. He glances at my Keen water shoes and flame-retardant shorts. He points to the Yankee player at bat. “Bobby Abreu is Venezuelan,” he says in a slight accent that could be French or German or Russian. I’m not good with accents.
“We don’t like him in Boston,” I say. “He’s too good.”
He lights a filter-less cigarette from a pack of Gitanes sitting on the bar.
My beer arrives. It’s in an eight-ounce bottle, half the size of the pints I drink back home. I finish it in three gulps and consider the tiny bottle. A nip for beer drinkers.
“The small bottles stay cold longer,” the stranger says. “Welcome to the tropics.”
He returns to the bartenders and speaks to them in Spanish.
I return to my seafood special: pasta with rubbery strands that could be squid, octopus, or old windshield wipers. I want to ask where everyone is, but my head aches, probably from too much sun, so after eating, I leave a tip and head for the Bonzi.
The next morning, I join Aurek and Zofia again for breakfast. He is very chatty. She is very tan. I notice that she’s armed with a steak knife.
“How long have you been riding?” Aurek says.
“About a year.”
“You’re not bad for a beginner. Maybe you should try a smaller board. They’re faster.”
Zofia smirks into her plate.
I gesture at the room. “Where is everyone? I’ve seen a few couples around town—and no offense—but I was expecting it to be a little more lively.”
“Oh, didn’t you know it is slow season?” Aurek asks.
My stomach spasms: empty beach, empty bars, a nonre-fundable flight, twelve more days in El Playa. Did I overlook something or did Pittman?
Zofia smirks again. I haven’t lost my touch. Women still love to see me suffer.
“Cheer up,” Aurek says. “You probably saved a lot of money traveling off-season. And they love dollars down here.”
“Have you changed any money yet?”
“Yesterday. The bodega in town pays 3,800 bolivars per dollar.”
“Wow!” I say.
The legal exchange rate is 2,100 bolivars. So 3,800 is a good deal. Maybe too good a deal. I want to ask about the risk of arrest, but that would likely yield another smirk from Zofia.
I change the subject. “How’s your Spanish?” I ask Aurek.
“Bon,” he says in French.
“OK, wise guy, what’s the polite response when someone addresses you as ‘ka-brone’?”
“Kick them in the balls,” he says. “Or you could punch them in the face. Either will do. C-a-b-r-ó-n means a man with no cajones, a major asshole, and other flattering things. Isn’t that right, honey?”
Zofia looks up, pinches her mouth shut, and goes back to disemboweling her papaya. Her steak knife scratches the porcelain plate. What’s the feminine for cabrón?
From the outside, the bodega is small, dark, and seedy-looking. From the inside, it is small, dark, and seedy-looking. The walls are dotted with shelves of American delicacies: Mars bars, Cheez Doodles, Almond Joys. A few couples are shopping for wine or balsamic vinegar or lube or whatever it is that couples shop for.
A big guy with long, dark hair mops the floor. Another big guy eyes me and mumbles something to the mopper. I examine a Cat in the Hat Pez dispenser, and then glance up at the two guys, and then back to the Pez.
Thug One and Thug Two
don’t like me one bit.
They glare and they glare
as if I were shit.
I pretend to read the Spanish Pez packaging and have second thoughts about this whole caper. The State Department warned against illegal money changing: Apparently, Chávez and his bo
ys consider it theft. Bank theft. El Playa is a small town; there would be no place to hide.
Still the guidebook includes money changing on its list of “Things to do in El Playa.” Aurek does it. Zofia does it. Even blonde Bennie who visits Nantucket does it.
The young woman behind the counter notices me fidgeting. “Change money?” she asks. I look around. The thugs are gone. I’m the only one in the store.
“Sí,” I whisper.
“How much, cabrón?” She speaks in a normal voice. I decide to let the insult drift by.
“One hundred dollars, US,” I whisper.
She pecks some numbers into her calculator and shows it to me: 3,800.
I nod, “OK.”
I’m going to walk out with 380,000 bolivars. For $300, I could be a Venezuelan millionaire.
She rummages around in the change drawer, retrieves a stack of pastel-colored bills, and counts out seven orange notes and some smaller bills. I fork over the $100 bill and throw the bolivars into my daypack. I exit the store slowly and, once outside, I run for my hotel like a kid who has just committed his first Halloween prank.
Saving money has always been a preoccupation. For me, money is a source of security, a defense against scarcity, my protection against ending up on the street when I’m old and alone. I’m a hoarder, not a spender.
After college, my first full-time job paid minimum wage. My apartment was a second-floor walk-up with a sad, little space heater that I couldn’t afford to turn on until November, when I could see my breath indoors. For meals, I’d buy a family-sized box of Corn Flakes and a pound of hamburger, which I split into gum-ball-sized portions that had to last a week. Eventually I turned to a life of crime.
My favorite target was the corner store, Kitty’s Kwick Stop. I started out swiping bags of Beer Nuts, which I’d hide in one of my mittens. Soon I graduated to pricier things, like bars of cheddar cheese. I even began to save money and went out for an occasional beer. One day, as I was paying for a carrot, the manager said, “What about the block of cheese in your mitten?”
People in line peered over my shoulder. A guy on his way out of the store stopped to look back.
