Hello Children
I’ve written this before, it’s in Italy on the floor in a dirty dank hostel with a Rasta for a manager:
It’s 4 in the morning and I’m sitting here, in the middle of Roma, 4 min from Termini. We’re sitting on a table for a shut coffee shop. I’m with Dave, who’s drunk out of his mind. I was drunk 1hr ago, for that reason I twatted him round the head with a pool ball.
The events of tonight start with a pub crawl. Roma is dead in the summer; all the locals have gone to the coast. For this reason no clubs are open, (apart from Gay Village in Pyrimide obviously) a pub crawl is however organised by some guy from Chile as a way to extort money off the tourists.
We start at Spagna the great Spanish steps, there we have 15 Euro extracted from us and all the free beer we can drink. That is, four horses beer mind you. The most disgusting beer one could ever consume. Two beers are lovingly downed before heading off to the first place. Not to sure what the place is called but we have a shot of lemonchella on the house and buy a tequila for 2.50 Euro. Not bad, we can’t wait for the Old Bell however, shots being 1Euro when the bell tolls.
On the way we meet some rather attractive American girls, they laugh at how pathetic we are. American bozo starts talking about how he fought a wild boar with his bare hands and received a tattoo from a tribe who had never seen a white man before. They buy the bullshit. Another American by the name of Gregg befriends us, he seems nice enough. Tries to tell us the O.C isn’t actually like it is in the series, we don’t believe him.
The old bell lives up to its name, tequila is consumed quite readily. We’re drunk. Dancing occurs, or what can only be described as dancing. Mike gets to know some German girls, still no French girls about.
Here’s where my memory begins to get fuzzy and things get fucked up:
At our penultimate place (5? In total) I’m on the prowl with Mike. We’re having a laugh. At some point, the largest Italian guy pinches Mike’s wallet, he sees the guy, the guy drops it and walks out. Some confrontation occurs, I’m screaming ‘where the fuck is the wallet’?, he runs. We’re legging after him, 4 staff pursue with us. We get two blocks down and the police join the pursuit, get hold of him and nick the guy. For some reason the police station is next door, meaning the guy ran straight past the station.
The mans big fat girlfriend has by now entered the station crying her eyes out, we’re swearing the shit out of her. The scene is apparently all to common. Here’s the catch 22. The man can only be prosecuted if Mike appears in court in a month, he can’t. If the man is let free and we spark the fucker, we have to appear in court in a month, we can’t.
The police, being owned apparently by the mafia give us their word he won’t do it again. Me and Mike (FUCK YOU) head to the club where everyone has headed to but he’s to drunk and pissed off to enjoy it. I have one key to the hostal while Matko has the other, I go inside and tell Matko to get Max Dave and Graham home safely because he has the last remaining key, he agrees.
Mike and I (Yeah yeah) arrive safely at the apartment while Matko and Graham arrive shortly after, Graham falls asleep in the toilet. Mike and I go back to the club to fetch Dave and Max, I’m such an altruist, did I mention self effacing too. Got that good ass feeling that you get when you give money to beggars, knowing it’ll go to their next fix.
Looking after drunken people is the most frustrating thing, they proceed to have a competition of press-ups and sit ups. Dave is so drunk every time he goes down for a press up he hits his head. I laugh for 5 minutes and tell them to be good quiet drunks in the hostel. This doesn’t happen, as I’m drunk and pissed off about the Mike incident I grab my newly acquired pool ball and twat Dave round the head. Shuts him up for 5 then he starts up. There’s only one last option, I drag Dave out of the room only to find white Rasta dude staring at me. Take a piece of paper, a book(the dog book) and forget my shoes. Half way down the road I regret forgetting the latter. We meet up with some Irish people who say they know a place for food. They don’t. We end up sitting her, 1 min from the club and opposite a fountain in the middle of a square, its quite picturesque.
As I write this I think of all the great people I’ve met ( Margaret Manveen and Brenda come to mind) but also who I’d like to be here with me now. We cross the road and sit on the fountain steps. Drunken tourists are playing the guitar, Hallelujahs playing, with fairly decent vocals. Not the original Leonard Cohen, but Jeff Buckley which sends shivers down my spine. Reminds me of a girl I like and I decide to start to write a love letter. I suddenly realise why I’m so scared of her, I can see myself in love with her.
On the way back, after walking in filth and dried up piss we walk past a black hooker, she says in a pseudo coy lecherous voice ‘hello children’?, think that sums up my thoughts for the day