Dung From Confusion Sprung, Again

[Vung Tau, 11/13/24]

Arriving too early, I sat in the dark on a concrete bench just out of sight of the café on General Uprising. I didn’t want the owner, Liên, to see my pitiful self waiting for his discount church to recharge and extend my life. At the far end of an alley, a cat in silhouette eyed me. Bug sized to each other, we weren’t meant to be, simple as that. Predictably, pussy disappeared. In a future life, perhaps? Never say never the twain shall meet.

Though my heart gladdened at the sound of that steel door rattling open, I waited two impatient minutes to amble over. Feigning indifference if not boredom, I nonchalantly claimed my first row seat. Fuck you, Liên, there are thousands of cafés across Vung Tau.

Before 4AM and without a motorbike, my options are limited, admittedly. Dreaming of his hometown, Da Lat, my cyclo guy, Hùng, is still asleep. At 58, he has never had an apartment. Looking up, I see Pale Face entering. We don’t talk.

Today, Liên began his praise of the most miraculous country by citing some website that can predict the weather 12 months in advance, “It knows how many hurricanes Vietnam will have! America is amazing!”

Laughing, some old guy sneered, “In Vietnam, traffic lights keep malfunctioning.”

The US is supreme because it attracts the best minds. Liên, “They gather the best scientists, collect the best art.” Far from becoming Idiocracy, America is the ultimate Meritocracy. “Genes matter. Just look at boxing. When you see a black guy fighting a white guy, the white guy will be knocked out immediately!”

Tèo, a man in his late 30’s, jumped in, “It’s like cockfighting.”

Liên, “That’s right! America is great at that, too. Like us, they love cockfighting, and they have the best cocks.”

Lesser cocks are laid off, live in tents and cars, kill themselves with fentanyl and tranc, go online to vent pseudonymously and vote for Jew sanctioned candidates. Rich cocks from China and India gobble up the best American real estate. Attending US colleges, their kids stay clear of the humanities. Whites flee hard science classes filled with Asian super nerds.

At Philly’s Friendly Lounge, we had a semi regular, George Tsui. Since he was richer than everyone and had been everywhere, George wasn’t quite one of us. Absent for two or three weeks, George would reappear to say he had just visited Kyrgyzstan and Tajikistan, for example, or Beijing and Shanghai. Born in Hong Kong and educated in Iowa, George became an insurance executive before retiring. He lived among the blue blood in Blue Bell. Starting out, George camped in a state park and washed his clothes at the edge of a lake.

At the café on General Uprising, I’m even worse than George Tsui. Since no one here has even been to Huế or Hanoi, they don’t want me to say anything about anywhere, especially the United States. To Liên, Pale Face and Tank Top, etc., it’s a necessary Utopia to counter not just Vietnam, but all that’s wrong with this earth.

From a Philly friend I found out George died this March. When I last saw him in 2018, George appeared very healthy. Unlike most of us, he never got maudlin, snarled or threatened to take anyone outside. Even Frank Wilson, born 1941, left no doubt he was ready to whack any insolent asshole with his cane. Wilson had been head of book reviews at the Philadephia Inquirer. Online, I found this tribute to George:

Judy and Kids,

I can’t tell you how very sad I am to learn of the loss of our loved George. I have great memories that I will carry forever. You were blessed to have him—and I know he felt so blessed to have you. I will always remember his story of meeting you at a college dance, Judy. “Would you like to dahnce?” British accent from Hong Kong style English. One of so many entertaining stories from my unique pal George. I regret that we lost touch in recent years.

Sending healing thoughts—

From this, you’d have no idea George had left his wife decades ago. I’m surprise they never got divorced. In Friendly, George spoke often of his second son, Sam, but never intimated this YouTube singing sensation was famously gay. There are videos of Sam’s wedding and fifth wedding anniversary.

Though we all sculpt our image, no one has done it better than Uncle Sam. His most ardent fans are like teen girls getting wet and screaming while staring at their idol on a huge screen. They’re too remote to see their living god dancing on that speck of a stage. Rumors of orgiastic excitement are amplified by distance.

Twelve time zones away from that fabled arena, most Vietnamese reject any suggestion it’s beslimed with corruption, depravity, madness, all sorts of violence and, simply, shit. The only Uncle Sam they see is arrayed in laces, brocades and tissues. If that sounds queer, it is 2024, no?

In 2019, I suggested all American colleges “be renamed Hasbara University, and deployed with exactly the same curriculum,” so no white male literature, of course. With many already canceled, is Jonathan Swift still taught? I thought of his “The Lady’s Dressing Room” when pondering Uncle Sam’s impossible allure.

Before stepping out, Celia must spend five hours to clean and dress up. Sneaking into her staging zone, Strephon discovered unsavory truths, such as:

Hard by a filthy basin stands,
Fouled with the scouring of her hands;
The basin takes whatever comes
The scrapings of her teeth and gums,
A nasty compound of all hues,
For here she spits, and here she spews.
But oh! it turned poor Strephon’s bowels,
When he beheld and smelled the towels,
Begummed, bemattered, and beslimed
With dirt, and sweat, and earwax grimed. 

Swift piles on. Here’s its most famous passage:

The petticoats and gown perfume,
Which waft a stink round every room.
Thus finishing his grand survey,
Disgusted Strephon stole away
Repeating in his amorous fits,
Oh! Celia, Celia, Celia shits! 

It’s no indictment to say any of us shits. Swift is merely highlighting the absurd gap between fantasy and reality. Though it’s hard for Joe Sixpack to deny his own shit, bad habits, lies and vices, etc., he somehow believes those way above him, with much more ambition and means, are somehow cleaner.

The most ruthless claw to the top. Once there, they must reward themselves with increasingly sick pleasures, for they, too, must die. On Epstein’s island, Trump and Clinton selflessly tutored wide-eyed kiddies in the one R, over and over. Monica Lewinsky had to be flushed away, most bitterly. Though Vietnamese are familiar with their government’s lies and corruption, many believe Washington is honest and humane. I had a neighbor at DC HomeStay who even denied Agent Orange causes birth defects.

The nausea many Americans felt under Biden pales with what Viets experienced during hardcore Communism. That’s why Trump’s avowed nationalism resonates. As his daubs, paints, ointments and creams melt away, there will be nothing left but that familiar stench, but worse. Corpses pile up, eternal war ripens and shit accrues. A bankrupt nation steered by a hostile elite and filled with the disunited, brainwashed and dumbed down will keep imploding.

As everything worsens, many will cite the New York Times, Washington Post and Economist to insist nothing is wrong. Others will go online to emote while waiting to vote into infinity. The rest will save up for that flying car, several AI girlfriends and a third class ticket to Mars on the Elon Musk Express.

Way outside that toxic bubble, I will sit among the ordinary to hear their babble, jokes and rants. I hope Tank Top is OK. He’s been absent nearly two weeks. Though he’s liked well enough, no one seems to miss Tank Top. Even before your body is cold, your name fades. Those with exceptional stench will linger.

[Vung Tau, 11/13/24]

[Vung Tau, 11/13/24]

[Vung Tau,11/13/24]

[Vung Tau, 11/13/24]