by Steve Deeks
In saying all this, it could never be a surprise when you saw a men engaging in this sort of practice – mainly because they don’t care, or are vain, or both. But when you have flocks of women doing it, it is truly bizarre. After all don’t they know what men are like? To add to my confusion many of these women supposedly came from countries where they were meant to be somewhat reserved, and act with tact and class, such as those from Sweden or Spain.
Yet as I was lying on my bed one day a Scandinavian, standing by a nearby bed, casually whipped off her top leaving her boobs drooping in full view of the room, before she pulled a top on casually, as if she was in the confines of her own room with no one around. The reality of where she was, though, was somewhat different, especially as there were several men with their mouths open pretending not to look, but who were in fact blatantly staring. The girl would then have three or four of her friends stuffed into the bed where they would chat incessantly while eating cookies. I was beginning to see how strange people were from other countries.
Yet arguably the most bizarre of all these liberal provocateurs was a strange Italian woman – though it could just as easily have been a man with all her facial hair – who only stayed for two nights. After having a shower she would wander into the room with just her towel, dropping it to the floor, leaving her bare flesh totally exposed for a few seconds, before pulling on a g-string. With her considerable chest out for all to see she would then stride across the room and moisturise her face in the mirror, located in the centre of the room, for several minutes before returning. As if she hadn’t gone far enough, she would then proceed to vigorously rub moisturiser all over her body, including right up to her inner thigh and beyond, before lathering her buttocks. Perhaps this was normal behaviour in Italy but it seemed to be pushing the boundaries, even in this room’s no-holds-barred approach to self-exposure.
As with everything else in the hostel, normal straightforward tasks such as cooking became Herculean efforts. Especially in a place that had 300 guests, many of whom would inevitably be fighting over the one functioning oven when it came to meal times. I quickly realised what a luxury it was to find clean cutlery and cooking items and desperately wanted to throw gone off milk in the faces of the anonymous individuals who would leave all their dirty stuff after a meal for others to clean.
Then there were the thieves, who without a single thought, would steal your most prized possessions. There was nothing worse than starving and going to the fridge to get your bag - that had your name and room number on it, just in case anyone was in any doubt who it belonged to - in anticipation of a glorious banquet and then, to your total disbelief, finding someone had taken your prime beef burgers. I could tolerate someone taking a few slices of bread or perhaps some economy butter if they’d run out, or even a drop of milk but helping yourself to such quality items, especially when they were mine, was too much to take. I knew I’d have to fight fire with fire by sourcing items to even things up.
Insult was added to injury when nothing was left of your stuff, which meant venturing down three levels and through the crowded streets to buy more expensive food with my rapidly evaporating money. I took to performing covert surveillance when in the kitchen vicinity, in particular maintaining an eye on any dodgy characters, while also keeping my ear to the ground in case anyone revealed incriminating information.
Chapter 6 – Room 301
The kitchen was the epicentre of socialising in the hostel – when people weren’t in the dorm getting slaughtered on goon, of course. Most people spoke in English, which although extremely convenient, I found a bit strange with all the eclectic mix of random souls from around the. Some clearly had the knack for it others did not, with the Swedes and Dutch normally the most accomplished, above that of many Welsh, Irish, Scots and regional English, who for all I could gather, were speaking in a foreign language anyway.
My technique for communicating with those I could barely understand would be to hope I could make out two or three words of a sentence, therefore allowing me to take an educated guess on what had been said. Often, to avoid embarrassment after failing to comprehend what on earth they were on about, I would inevitably find myself responding on an entirely different subject – “Yes you’re right, the weather here is lovely” – only to draw a host of blank looks. It’s fair to say that with some people, having your teeth pulled out by a vice would have been a more enjoyable experience. So to alleviate some of the tension I brightened things up by helping them add to their limited vocabularies. “You’re a smelly asshole,” they would repeat after me, stuttering in broken English, as I congratulated them on learning how to greet a friend or someone who was serving them in a bar or restaurant.
I felt a smidgen of sorrow for foreigners, or those of a non-English speaking persuasion, who hoped to improve their English as part of their Australian experience, but had to contend with the regional forms of the language. If I could not understand these people then what chance did some poor Estonian have? I found it astonishing how those whose first language was English would happily talk at lightening pace with no thought for the suffering listener, despite it being abundantly obvious they didn’t have a clue what was going on. These poor individuals, already isolated by their inability to speak the language, would look blankly and occasionally try and get a word in before being subjected to further punishment as the person, exuding staggering arrogance, continued to garble on about some irrelevance, blissfully unaware they had not been understood. Then again, it was no great loss they had missed out on hearing about Eastenders or whatever crap subject they were going on about.
I respected those people who spoke such impressive English, especially as in my country it’s fair to say we’re not renowned for being great linguists. My expertise in foreign languages stretched to random one-liners in French such as, “Bonjour, oui est la picine?” This, when stood by a swimming pool in France, just to see if my French was up to scratch, which many times, surprisingly and to my great delight, it was. But despite my early promise, when averaging 98 per cent in class exams, I was then unceremoniously thrown off the course after my glittering scores suddenly plummeted to around 40 per cent. All this coincided with when my fluent French-speaking friend I had been sitting next to left the school.
Even though I was still relatively new to the country and indeed hostel life I was already beginning to grow tired of the same conversations and the same questions when meeting new people. As a matter of course the usual flow of questions would be, “What’s your name? Where do you come from? How long have you been here? How long are you staying? Where are you going to next?” Such questions became ingrained to the point where I could concisely reel off my well-rehearsed answer in the blink of an eye. “I’m Steve from England. I’ve been here several weeks now. Not sure how long I’m staying for but maybe the whole 12 months or maybe just a few more days, especially if I carry on jerking money like I have been.”
With absolutely no desire to go travelling around the country, I felt at odds to most people solely there to explore Australia, or passing through on an exotic voyage around the world. They were the real backpackers and, frankly, I was perfectly happy it was them and not me. But I was finding the overly enthusiastic conversations between travellers reaching excruciatingly tedious levels. In particular, one phrase - “I’m going down the east coast” – would be wheeled out like food to an American, prompting the listener’s eyebrows to raise with interest, as they would then either tell them about when they went down the east coast or that they were also, coincidentally, soon to be doing the same hallowed journey. A journey that no self-respecting backpacker who came to Australia would dare miss out on. Apart from me, of course. If someone gave me a dollar for every time I heard that sentence I would be a rich man.
Though I was still acclimatising to my new home, as the days went by it struck me how the place was nothing more than a large youth club with sleeping facilities. The only difference being that 16 year olds at youth club
would have been behaving in a far more adult fashion than many of the inhabitants here. It soon reached cringingly high levels as every time a new girl ambled into the room wearily with her backpack - probably having made her way down the east coast after flying over from Asia, prior to her South American sojourn - a swarm of overfriendly men with devil horns would introduce themselves.
Time and time again the usual suspects would trot out their bland customary introductions in the hope of getting in the girl’s knickers. “Hey, how you doing? You just arrived?” A look of understandable surprise would be evident on the face of the female, after all she didn’t know these men and hadn’t even found herself a bed in the room yet before they had began hitting on her.
Nonetheless, out of politeness, she would respond. “Hi, yes just been down the east coast and now I’m in Sydney for a bit.” The eyes of the men would light up at the prospect that she may be around for a reasonable amount of time. Enough time, they hoped, to at least finger her.
“Yeah it’s good fun down the east coast. Sydney’s a good crack too. You travelling alone?” the men would then ask, attempting to build rapport while also establishing whether they would be wasting their time, if she had a boyfriend for example.
“I was with a friend but she went home.”
“That’s a shame. You want to come for a drink later?”
“Umm maybe, bit tired after my travels.”
Not wanting to let the opportunity slip through their hands after all their hard work they had put in, the men would instantly respond. “Ok, well let me know if you do. If not tonight then maybe tomorrow. If not tomorrow then maybe the day after that or the next one?” they would say before pointing to their bunk, ”That’s my bed there, come over whenever you fancy.” These men had figured that steaming in like an express train seemed to be the best method, especially with the knowledge that other predators would be ready to swoop at any moment. Although some women were clearly not impressed by the transparency of the approach, others were more naïve. “What a friendly hostel this is, much better than my last one where nobody spoke to each other. I was a bit worried about not knowing anyone but a few people have already invited me out and I’ve only been here five minutes,” I heard a blond German girl say. Little did she know.
In this particular case, the girl’s delight soon turned to horror when a rival guy scuppered any faint possibility of a bonk. “I’d watch out for him, he’s just racked up two girls in the last couple of nights,” he announced, after choosing to tell her once his rival had left the room. She rolled her eyes, as it sank in what the friendliness had really been about.
At the same time, it has to be said, there was the odd new woman who simply did not care about who the man approaching her was. The attitude appeared to be: “Anyone will do.” This was certainly true for an Australian girl with thick black bushy eyebrows and a nose longer than Pinocchio who swept into the hostel like she was working for a sex charity. According to witnesses on the first night she slept with a random man from a different room, before moving onto a quiet individual who everyone thought was gay on the second night, and then finally succumbing to the charms of the individual spurned by the German girl, who secured sloppy thirds. “Good to see she’s made the most of being in Sydney and broadening her horizons,” some of us agreed.
On a personal level, though, things took a turn for the worse when two pouting French girls moved in and wasted no time in getting to know people – mainly of a male variety. One happened to be in the top bunk next to me while her friend was dangerously close in the bunk above. Shyness was clearly not a word in their vocabularies, as they barely concealed their flesh, wearing low cut tops and skirts that looked more like belts. Despite having make-up caked on, there was no hiding their zombie like faces. Within the hour they had been persuaded to join in the drinking games that were underway in the room. As I sat sober on my bed reading, I knew it would be a long night.
To save my sanity I popped out to get some food before returning to a surprisingly peaceful room where I settled into my bed and drifted off to sleep. Until I was rudely awoken at some ungodly hour by shouting men and the French girls, who had been suitably plied with alcohol by now. “Got any more goon,” one lad bellowed.
“Yeah just there in the corner,” another replied eagerly.
“Well get it over here then you twat,” a third yelled. And so on.
I rolled my eyes in disgust at their complete lack of regard for the room. “Why don’t you all just jump out the window instead?” I pleaded under my breath.
Although it was the middle of the night at around 3am you would have thought it was daytime from the way these jerks were storming about. Thankfully there was a reprieve as they went outside to the kitchen area, but I knew only too well it was merely a temporary stay of execution. Fearing the inevitable backlash, I desperately attempted to get to sleep before they returned. But, sadly, amid all the tortuous thoughts of what laid ahead, this was not possible.
After about an hour, the real pain began as they galloped into the room like a herd of rhinos and scrambled up the bunk stairs into their respective beds. Each girl had finally settled on the nearest man having tantalised several others earlier, as they now got down to business. I prayed it would be over quickly.
Developments appeared to be going slowly in the bed above me before the pace quickened. “Ummmmm,” the girl groaned, but just as she was really starting to enjoy herself another guy rattled up the steps, inches from my head, and got in bed with them. “Must be a threesome,” I thought. But within seconds he went down the stairs. And then up again. And down once more. Each time the bed wobbled and creaked at a particularly annoying volume, adding to the growing irritation I was struggling to deal with. He was up and down those stairs like a jack-in-the-box. How I would have dearly loved to punch him square on the nose. Instead I just lay there paralysed, with my anger brewing with every passing second of this agony I had to endure. If it was possible, my mood had been worsened when one of the eager buffoon’s managed to somehow smash a glass on the floor as he sprang from the bunk, causing a spraying of water over my face.
Whispering and giggling from above punctuated the deadly silence in the pitch black room as the bed inevitably began to softly sway. As the thrusting got quicker and quicker my bunk started to bounce around like I was lying on top of a spinning washing machine. Hearing and feeling every movement, every noise, I felt like I was part of the action, especially as I was right underneath the main event. It felt odd to know that a man, possibly two, were wielding their big sticks on this accommodating French female, no more than two feet from my very head. They didn’t seem to care a jot that the whole room would have heard them, were it not for the fact that most were asleep. I shook my head in disbelief that of all the beds this could have taken place in, it had to be in the top bunk above me. At least the other French girl in the bunk next door was being more discreet about the roasting she was receiving. But I wasn’t much in the mood for taking the positives out of the dire situation.
Vigorously rocking like a small boat surrounded by giant ocean waves, things gradually eased off after the climax. However, my hope they would now simply fall asleep exhausted by all their drinking and quick-fire lovemaking was misplaced, as to add insult to injury they then began talking and laughing, as if without a care in the world. Meanwhile I had just been subjected to a form of torture no man should have to go through. Now I wanted them to suffer and I wanted them to suffer badly.
As the excitable chattering continued, and with my genuine fear a re-run could be on the cards shortly once the man had been given a chance to recover, I had a kind of outer body experience where you imagine what you would like to do to such people. However, this time it was happening for real. In a trance like state I suddenly stood up and peered over the bunk and asked the lovers, who were in the midst of a post coital embrace, in a polite but firm manner to be quiet – or words to that effect. But to my total disgust they simply looked
at each other and giggled.
My blood, now boiling like water in a kettle after this further insult, prompted an uncompromising response. And like a force of nature I stormed out the room and into the kitchen where I grabbed the nearest large container and proceeded to fill it with cold water. I then purposefully steamed back into the room and once again stood by the couple. “I think you need to be quiet now,” I said, knowing that more giggles would follow, which of course they did. Fortunately they hadn’t seen the water. “Ok have it your way then,” I replied coolly. And then slowly lifted the container up and gently poured all the water over them, leaving the pair as soaked as a drowned rat. “I thought you might need some water to cool down, hope you didn’t mind?” I said jovially.
God it felt good. Having been violated for so long I could now hold my head up high knowing that I had stood up for myself against these bell-ends. Naturally the couple were gobsmacked. “Why you do that? You stupid,” screeched the female.
“Oh sorry, I thought I was helping to cool you down that’s all,” I hit back. “Do you want some more?” Interestingly, there was no reply. The guy, in particular, was conspicuous by his non-response. Perhaps the penny had finally dropped that they had overstepped the boundary. I retreated to my warm, dry bed a happy man. I heard some sniggers in the background from other victims, also clearly pleased with the outcome.
The next day there was some natural awkwardness between myself and the couple but I didn’t let that get in the way of me wishing them a good morning. “Hope you slept well,” I said cheerily. Funnily enough but the French girls were gone by the evening. It turned out several other people had heard the previous night’s antics and expressed their eternal gratitude that I had put an end to the furore, which brought a smile to my face.
