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August 10, 2007

Tour Blog: When We Hit Japan

Written by Girth McDürchstein on August 10, 2007 3:17 PM
Permalink |  Splitcock Tour -- Europe & Japan '07  | Digg It

I felt a little stupid wearing the pith helmet and khaki shorts, but Margo insisted. She wore the same basic outfit, although with more cleavage, and we sat across a small, private booth from a grimacing Algerian. He and Margo were engaged in a staring contest, an alarming battle of wills. This man may have believed he knew the score, but nobody knows Margo like I do, and I knew, just as I’m sure she did, that after a short time he would—

“All right,” he finally said in his musical accent. “I’ll do it.”

Margo grinned, undoubtedly thinking about how easy it is to blackmail a man when children are involved, and reached one sinewy arm across the table. The man flashed a reluctant smile, exposing violently white teeth, and gave her hand a firm shake.

“So we’re agreed,” Margo said. “You will provide us safe passage into Tokyo.”

“Absolutely,” he said, “but there is one catch.”

“Oh?”

“Have you ever used a parachute?”

She nodded slowly, catching on. I was still a little slow on the uptake, but Margo explained later that we’d need to parachute into Tokyo because legally, the man couldn’t land anywhere in southeast Asia.

In fact, she casually made note of this as we approached Tokyo in his old, beaten Cessna. I was jittery in general after the flight, but this took thing to a new level.

“Are you fucking kidding me?” Carl grunted, aptly summarizing my own complex emotional turmoil.

“It’s the deal we made,” Margo said.

“The deal you made,” Carl said. I was glad I didn’t have to say it. She didn’t enjoy my rare but eventful attempts at assertiveness.

“Well, what the hell are you going to do?” Margo asked. “Go back to Algiers and book a commercial flight?”

“Now that you mention it—”

Margo shoved the pack into his chest and said, “Not gonna happen, fat boy. Put this on.”

Neither Riffs nor Mikey attempted to continue the argument. We all just silently put the parachutes on.

“All right,” Margo said. “I assume I’m the only one who’s done this before?” She searched our faces and came up empty. “Okay, that’s fine. We’re gonna drop a bit, then release the chutes, okay? Follow my lead—when I pull the ripcord, you follow suit immediately, and trail me into Shiba Park. Got it?”

We nodded awkwardly. I couldn’t tell you what the rest of them were feeling, but I had a tiny ball of nausea in the pit of my stomach. I could feel it waiting, biding its time for the right moment to explode.

“Okey-dokey!” shouted the pilot. “You go now.”

Margo nodded at him, then ripped the plane’s cargo door open. The wind threatened to suck us all out one by one, but we held steady. Margo stood near the gaping hole in the plane and motioned for us to jump. Riffs, always the ballsiest and most confused of us, took a running leap out of the plane. Margo nodded, then waved for the rest of us. Mikey rolled his eyes, carefully approached the lip of the opening, looked down, and made a careful leap out.

Carl and I exchanged terrified glances. Carl said, “On three?”

I nodded, urging the nausea to dissipate before I made the jump. I didn’t want to be puking when it came time to pull the cord.

“One…” he said. “Two…”

“Three,” we said together, clasping hands as we leaped from the plane. I couldn’t tell you for sure, and she won’t own up to it, but I think I heard Margo shout, “Fags!” as we made the jump.

I looked straight up and saw Margo coming after us. The plane roared away, and I felt an odd sensation—weightlessness, I guess. An odd combination of pressure building all around me, and yet being utterly free of constraints. Also, I had a hard time breathing.

It felt like an hour that we hung there, whirling through the air, managing to level off and form a tight circle, each of us grabbing hands and exchanging exhilarated but confused gazes, and then—

Margo pulled the cord, tearing free of the group as the force dragged her into the air. Our eyes seemed to pop out in unison, and we yanked our individual cords. I was afraid the chutes would get tangled up in each other, but somehow the wind or the force kept it from happening—we just separated, guiding our chutes behind Margo, who expertly aimed herself at a lush city park below.

Things got a little strange as we got low enough to consider the skyscrapers and tightly packed buildings a problem. Margo manage to slide herself down into a canyon of buildings, still aiming for that park. I managed to follow, but I heard a shriek of shattering glass and turned my head in time to realize Riffs was no longer in the air. His chute dangled lifelessly out of a smashed window a few blocks away.

Just as I turned, my fear finally came to fruition: Carl and Mikey’s chutes got tangled up, probably a consequence of the wind-tunnel effect generated by the buildings, and as the parachutes wrapped around each other, Mikey and Carl sunk like extremely slow stones toward the busy street below.

I turned back to look ahead and realized I was about to slam into Margo. Instead, I wrapped my chunky arms around her and rubbed myself against her back. She moaned softly and whispered something I couldn’t hear over the high-pitched squeal of the wind and the dull roar of the traffic below.

“What?!” I shouted.

“I said, ‘Not now!’” Margo screamed back.

I let go and we drifted onto dew-slickened grass. I lied back like a king, trying not to vomit. Margo was on her feet 30 yards away, unclasping her chute. She ran to me and hopped on my disappointingly hefty belly.

“Did you love it?” she breathed.

“I love you,” I said evasively.

“Good enough,” she growled.

Five minutes later, we were walking along some street or another to find Mikey and Carl. They were pretty easy to spot since their rough landing caused accidents for both directions of traffic. As we approached, our compadres had finally managed to unhook their chutes and get to their feet. Carl lumbered in our direction, an angry, sausage-like finger outstretched. You can guess which one.

“Never again!” he roared. “NEVER AGAIN!”

“Settle the fuck down,” Margo said. “You should know we’ve already spent our last $10 booking return passage, hidden in a shipping container with a bunch of 15-year-old prostitutes.”

Carl raised his eyebrows. “Really?”

Margo nodded seductively. “They’ll do whatever you want.”

“Will they give me money for a real plane ticket?”

“Asshole—”

As Margo and Carl each put up their dukes and started to dance around each other, I shoved myself between them and broke them apart. Riffs, arms flailing and bleeding as usual, came running up the street, shouting something almost coherent about international spies. As he padded up the empty half of the street toward the scene of the accidents, he slowed to a stop and looked around, more puzzled than usual. We all looked around as well and realized something: every person in sight of us had either gotten out of their cars or gotten off the sidewalk to form a wide, lumpy circle around us. Many of them knelt, rocking back and forth and weeping.

“What the fuck is going on?” Carl asked.

“We’re like gods to them,” I said in awe.

“You mean like Paoponicheleus?” Carl chuckled.

“Shut the fuck up, man. He did a lot of good works in his life—”

“Dude—”

Just then, one of the many gigantic TV screens placarding the second and third floors of buildings along the block began playing something odd, some strange combination of concert and documentary footage, plus some bits of the Girth McDürchstein’s ‘The Hedge’ movie spliced in, set to our smash hit (in Japan) “Rolling in It.”

Just then, a surprisingly tall, salt-and-pepper-haired man with a goofy smile and bushy black sideburns stepped out of a limousine and approached. He walked with a gait of well-bred confidence and the body language of a robust patriot. His driver trailed him, but as they approached the driver stepped out in front of the mystery man and dropped a gauzy linen mat onto the asphalt. The man knelt on it, bent forward, and kissed the ground we walked on.

After an awkward moment involving a bit too much tongue action, he stood up, smiling that chipmunky smile. He placed his clammy palm around my right hand. “Greetings, Mr. McDürchstein,” he said. “I am Shintaro Ishihara, Governor of Tokyo.”

“Nice to meet you,” I said, both uncomfortable and slightly aroused by his caressing of my hand.

“We appreciate with utmost joy your visit to our humble nation,” Shintaro said. “I would respect very much if you will accept a token of our gratitude. You will stay in our finest hotel, the Westin, in private suites for each of you.”

“Wow,” I said. “That’s an incredibly generous—”

“And your concert this evening has been canceled.”

“What?!”

“I apologize for the inconvenience, but the American-style ambassador believed it best if you performed a private concert for the many government officials of Japan.”

“But what about playing for the people most important to us—the fans who buy our albums and erotic t-shirts?”

“Your concert shall be simulcast on MTV.”

“You mean—your MTV actually plays music?”

“Sometimes. Far better than Real World-Road Rules Challenge marathons.”

“Indeed.”

I wiggled out of Shintaro’s hands and held it out for him to shake, American-style. He did. “We thank you sincerely for the opportunity.”

Shintaro nodded. “Follow me to my limousine. We shall fetch your instruments at—where are they?”

My eyes widened as I glanced back at the boys. They shrugged apathetically. I turned back to Shintaro and said, “I think we left them in France.”

Shintaro chuckled and clapped me on the shoulder, then began to rub it with alarming eroticism. “It is all right, McDürchstein. Provide us with a list of required equipment, and you shall be furnished with new instruments before tonight’s performance.”

“Awesome,” I gasped.

“And your previous instruments shall be fetched from the Grenoble EconoLodge—”

“How’d you know where—”

“The whole of Japan has followed your blog exploits for weeks. We have looked forward to your stay. Come, now. To the limousine.”

Once again, I looked back at the boys (and Margo and Mikey) and shrugged, baffled. The five of us left the scene of these car accidents and followed Shintaro into his limousine. The driver expertly maneuvered us through a nearby alley and onto the street one block over, free of the traffic snarl. We headed toward the Westin.

I would like to partially apologize for not appearing at Makuhari Messe as promised, but I urge our Japanese listeners to tune into MTV tonight night at 9 p.m. You will see us in all our glory, plus many close-ups of our bulges that you’d never see live. I’m looking forward to it.