Curtis King and the Disco Nazi

Curtis King Band back at Sharky Bar:
Nothing better to do? Check out the Curtis King Band tonight at Sharky Bar. I missed them last time they came around but by all accounts, they kicked ass. Nice rock, soul, R&B sound. Professional grooves you don't often get in KH.

Along those lines: Betty Ford and the GT Falcons will be disbanding. Word is that one of the principals will be heading back to Australia. They'll probably re-form under another name.

On that note: The (unfortunately named) Taxi Boys have a new drummer and a new sound - now all they need is a new name - Taxi Guys isn't where it's at. Anyway, they'll be playing New Orleans funk at a bar near you. Keep a heads up.

Shanghai Bar:
True to his word, BongRob cleaned house a while back. The Valentines Boat cruise was a winner and the place has picked up. What changed? Some call it, "The Great Girlfriend Massacre."

(No, not the Khmer-style - pump a bunch of bullets into your husband's mistress in front of an ESL school on a crowded street in the middle of the day - BECAUSE I CAN - style girlfriend massacre...)

This one involved firing the hostess mafia that had run the place by racking up boyfriend bank (monthly remittances, CRVs, Camrys,...) scaring off the true goers, and being indifferent towards anyone not buying them a small sedan. 9 of them are gone (Left with nothing but their CRVs, Camrys, and monthly remittances.)

So - new women have been hired and the last time I was there, they were wearing school uniforms. Still the same semi-upscale place - golf on TV at 2am - but some cuties and the drink prices are pretty standard.

Martinis Bar and Disco:
The M was good over the holiday. The Africans have mostly moved on, and I guess that made room for, THE DISCO NAZI. There I was, buzzed and ready to spark. Ran into CoolSwami and Martin104 near the door. Lit up and....next thing I know some khaki/golf-shirt-wearing asshole is in my face DEMANDING that I leave the disco immediately. Angry stream of German and then something like, "You cannot smoke that in HERE! You want to smoke, you will go outside immediately, or you will go into the corner....You DON'T smoke here."

Many thoughts ran through my head. Two words came out, "Fuck Off." End of conversation. He turned red, grabbed a bartender, and started barking into his ear. I turned around in time to see him being led out of the disco by a security guard and a bartender. Someone said he was ultimately ejected from the bar.

Adhoc is wrong - There is justice in Cambodia.

Disco Nazi probably went to the airport for an emergency evac to Singapore.

Where the White Women At?

Notes from Plunger. Still down in Old Mexico and chomping at the bit to

GET THE FUCK OUT.

• Uniformed cops shaking down foreigners in the street
• Sly ladyboys angling for your wallet, et al....

Can you imagine??

Year of the Pig:
Chinese New Year is winding down. We are officially in the The Year of the Golden Pig. I can feel it. It wasn't just the Ticos bombing around town with big branches hanging out the windows or the SUVs with torch-sized sticks of burning incense sticking out the back. I feel PIG. It feels right. It's going to be a good one! (Knock on wood...)

Where the White Women At?
Blame it on the Rambler. He had 2 silver bellies in tow, it was getting late, Jim at Cali2 angling to get us the hell out so he could go party. Where do you take 2 well-heeled White women at that time of night?

Pontoon:
We weaved our way down the Quay towards the landing across from Street108. Burned one on the way. Preventative RX. Safety-word, "Sharky." First sign of trouble, "Sharky!" and we'd be out the door. And so - down the steps through a wall of stench (the boat is located next to a sewer outlet) and into another world.

We hit the scene. Whale and Porpoise were already at the bar- being chatted up by some Brit sporting a large camera with a telephoto lens. He was trying hard to scam them and....it was funny as hell. Go for it, Rico Suave. Gotta love a guy working chicks at a barang bar with the aid of a camera...("I'm doing fashion in London, but I came over to do some travel shots for the Agency....")

Vodka from the Khmer kid behind the bar. Reasonable. ($2) Music from the stereo: Marvin Gaye and Curtis Mayfield. Cool. Maybe I got this place all wrong. Maybe there's a world beyond Howies and Sharky and Martini's and Sophies...

Then the crowds started showing up. Barangs you know live here, yet you've never seen before. They came in cars and white SUVs. They dressed up to go out. Silk shirts. Khakis. Dudes in coordinated outfits. People who wear watches. (!!)

The music changed. Curtis was gone. Techno-electronic crap took over. I couldn't remember the "get-away" phrase. Bad scene. Porpoise ordered a round of pink drinks called, Californications. ($2.50, I think.) I felt like the un-easy rider. But I was drunk and high and watching the NGO/Embassy crowd try and cut loose - without really cutting loose was kind of fun.

Dregde showed up with an ex-Cyrcee cutie. Barang wives and girfriends took note. Win. Pink drinks for everyone! We broke out a bone and sparked it. NGO-dude working the bar not down with a taxi-girl scene but hey, Pontoon is smoke-friendly. Score one for 'em. Comfortable booths, too. Middle-aged couple behind us caught the 2nd hand smoke. Wife looked pissed. Guy looked envious - maybe thinking about what could have been....

DJ Luv showed up and got the techno shit off the sound system and started playing grooves that didn't make me angry. Porpoise and Whale said they had 2 bottles of wine and some beer at their place. Rambler said it wasn't enough. Martini's on the horizon.

Lovelies at the Beach

I recently had the pleasure of a few days off, so I decided to take a Lovely to Cambodia's sleaziest, shadiest, and snookiest of cities, Sihanoukville. I recommend taking a girl with you when traveling to Snooky for a variety of reasons. A). It's slim pickings for ladies, unless your a chicken farmer. B). All day nooky in Snooky....can't go wrong there. C). Getting spanked off in the ocean.....now we're cooking! After looking at all the tight little bodies on the beach a man needs some relief without making the trek back to the hotel. I must have inadvertantly impregnated something in the Gulf of Thailand with all the man chowder I left squirming in the sea. That's not flotsem and jetsam you see in the water down there, it's jizzim and gizzim.
The only drawback I encountered was the Westerners and Khmers gawking at me and my Lovely. Some of this may have been warranted when you take into consideration that my Lovely would summon me with an ooh yah..ooh yah (not the Kool-Aid man oh yah), from 200 meters away on a crowded beach.
One day whilst slurping on a whiskey bucket with my pal the Belgian Waffle, he encountered the double head turn, double scowl, from a tubby, pasty white whale. Why? Was it because he was with a Lovely half the size and age of him, or her? Could it have been her own self-loathing? There's no telling, but the BW responded in a prompt and appropriate manner. As tubby's second scowl was slowly tapering off the BW gave her a big shit eating grin, then slowly raised both of his middle fingers and mouthed the words...Fat Cow. This sent our blubbery friend tubbling away in disgust. We were a little disgusted as well witnessing her departure, put it this way, I can't eat jello anymore. Well done BW!
Go to Snooky, have fun, ignore people haters, and if you catch a dolphin that speaks 3 languages (dolphin, English, bargirl) it very well could be a baby left field rambler.

Left Field Rambler

The Truth About Gerbils

Sitting at Howies watching TV when my head started to spin. Harsh bed spins- at the bar. That never happens. Time for home. Fuck a moto - Needed to try and walk it off. Focused power. Put one foot forward and..pinballed back and forth down the street all the way home.

I get plenty fucked up. But I've NEVER been that fucked up. Can't pin down the reason. Didn't do anything out of the ordinary that night. My conclusion: Someone dosed me. Either that, or I was swilling counterfeit booze somewhere.

One more thing to worry about:
Next day, I brought it up with some people and they'd all heard similar stories in the past few weeks. Happy to have made it home in one piece at 4am. Weaving down the street past packs of motodops, taxigirls, and the men who turn them out - equilibrium unavailable - I was prey.

Damn.

In other news:

California 2 Guesthouse:
I figured I'd see the Rodin exhibit at the Museum before it closed. Didn't work out that way, but I did make to California 2 to get to work on a bottle of vodka. I've never had the fi-tacoez (fish tacos), but intelligent conversation is always on the menu: Politics, health, sports, finance, whose gf is fucking who, and....

• Lonely? Try sex with a chicken. Don't forget to cut it's head off, and enjoy the wild action.
• Sheep's as good as a woman. Put the hind legs in boots (so they can't kick you) and go to work.
• Gerbils.....
  

The Truth About Gerbils:
According to an emergency room MD (said to have treated Richard Gere) - SF's Finest occasionally put the little guys in plastic bags, jam the bag up in there, and let them go nuts. Sometimes the gerbil dies. A complication: sometimes the gerbil dies sideways and can't be retracted. Time to high-tail it to the ER....

But another reason to be thankful because - it could be worse: Next time you're feeling low, think to yourself, "I had a baaad day but... I am NOT a bagged gerbil stuck up some guy's ass...."

That should make you feel better.

Sharky Bar:
More women in town than I'd thought. The US Navy was down in Sihanoukville and I'd heard a lot of girls headed down that way - and why not? Good money. Good time. But then again, it is still tourist season, so there are plenty of deep pockets in town.

It's also Valentine's Day and the romantic in me feels the need to...express my affection through the physical act of love. Or something....

More soon, and A Very Happy VD y'all.

Plunger Goes South of the Border

Got a report in from Plunger:

"So is it still fucking cold? I've had enough of the...[Mexican Nationals.] Let them do their own fucking plumbing work! Why so agitated...? Here's my grudge:

The Press and rep Cambodia gets is so undeserving nowadays. If you heard about the cops singling out Westerners working over there and robbing them- AT GUNPOINT - you might say, "Of course, it's Cambodia...[That kind of shit goes on there.]"

So maybe I'm new here, but I didn't expect that shit [when I was] going to work in the USA's... [developing nation] neighbor. No, not Canada. The other one: MEXICO

But at least it's warm!"
__________________________________

Damn. Sometimes it's not safe to leave the bubble. Hang loose and hope we see you soon -

D. Bong

Feral Pussy

About midnight. Sitting in bed, chillin', and channel surfing. Mellow night in.

Then I heard the CRASH. A glass smashed, pots and pans tumbling all over... I made for the commotion thinking -SHIT- another tweaker asshole coming through my ceiling. Little cocksuckers....

I armed, crouched out of the bedroom with a straw broom, and made for the commotion thinking, "I should've stayed in my locked room. I'm in no condition for a...."

It was a fucking cat. A ceiling panel broke, she dropped into the kitchen and went ape-shit. RABIES - PLAGUE - TETANUS - BIRD FLU...Not down with getting scratched or bit by one of these feral neighborhood rat catchers. Got the broom up waiting Gladiator-style for the little bastard. It charged. I jumped the FUCK out of the way, and it flashed by me into the bedroom and straight into the window. I managed to get it open without getting clawed. The angry beast rocketed out into the night.

Another day in paradise. Except she left behind 3 newborn kittens. Tiny, splayed out on the floor looking all helpless and shit...

Dazed and confused, headed to the mini-mart and got some baby formula ($4) and figured - feed them, put them outside, and wait for the mom to come back for them. Gotta do the right thing.

Long story short - feeding newborn kittens is a major hassle. Never again. Landlord came by the next AM, (by then another kitten had dropped down) and he took the 4 up to the rooftop garden where the mom came and took them back. Or, the dad came and killed them...I like to think the mom got there first.

I hate cats. But what're you gonna do?

Khmer Justice, American Style

So the GF comes home the other night and explains that her brand new $140 chinese phone got nicked at Heart. This was not surprising in itself, Heart's a saugagefest and a snakepit and we all know it. But the fact that she was mugged by one of the security staff was. Apparently he approached her by the washroom, explained that he had a gun, and relieved her of her phone and $35. He also explained that if she wanted it back he would happily return the items for the nice round sum of $100.

Well, the GF being Khmer, wouldn't let this go without a little vengence. A few days later when the punk-ass security dude showed up at Boeng Kak near the mosquito bar, she bitch slapped him into submission in the presence of dozens of patrons including a couple friends of mine. Punk-ass's fat english girlfriend intervened but made the mistake of sticking her index finger in GF's face. She recieved a free apsara lesson and a backward shove into a convenient mud puddle. The next day punk-ass was sporting a new fat lip and fat english girlfriend had a bandage from the wrist down that reminded me of Goodfella's when Tommy was making fun of Spider's cast after shooting him in the foot the previous day while imitating the oklahoma kid. But I digress...

Still not satisfied justice had been served, the next afternoon GF hauled punk-ass into Heart with the help of a few cop friends and explained the story to management. Apparently dissatisfied with his staff already, he hauled the entire contingent into the local cop shop where it was explained that if the items weren't promptly returned, the entire staff would be seeking new employment. With punk ass in the line-up twisting and turning to avoid recognition, he was easily fingered and spent the night in the grey bar hotel. The next day, in the presence of Heart management and many cops, he handed back the cash and phone and was summarily dismissed from his position as assistant western backpacker groper.

Although walking away is the safest action in such a situation and one I would certainly recommend being the chickenshit I am, I'm glad GF had the chutzpah to see honor served in a just and legal fashion. Her action saved me about $175 but will probably cost me a fortune in bodyguards in the future. Oh well, it was worth it.

So what's the going rate on having people whacked these days anyway?

New Poll

The last poll got old about a month ago. In response to much (warranted) bitching, I've come up with a new one. Vote early and often.

Results of the previous poll:

If you had your choice....
Answers Votes Percent 1. Balcony sex 24 23% 2. Blow job in the bathroom (of the bar) 23 22% 3. Hand/Blow job at the bar 19 18% 4. In bed 17 16% 5. Somethng tender and respectful 6 6% 6. Too weird to admit to (even anonymously) 15 14%

Total Votes: 104

Bong is Cold

To all the people bitching because I haven't posted in a while....I deserve the abuse. What can I say? Blame it on all the bizarre (free) Japanese net porn. It gets in the way. What's new?


Fucking Cold:
A universal topic - weather. It's been pretty damn cold. Of course, it's -11 windchill in NYC, but fuck comparisons - this is KH and it's cold. Gotten down to 7 (C) up country. I've been wearing layers and hiking boots. Didn't stop me from getting a nasty chest cold, etc...A hassle, but chest colds are not a big deal:


RIP, Teacher:
Landlord's daughter grabbed me on the way out the door to ask if I'd heard the commotion around the block. No.

The neighborhood Khmers talk:
The polite young British teacher came home around 3am (the neighbors know these things) and was found dead later in the AM. They reckon it was alcohol related but the Khmer scuttlebutt is as reliable as....the barang scuttlebutt. Doesn't matter. I didn't know him well, but he seemed like a very cool guy. I had no idea he lived so close.

He had many close friends around town and will be missed. Condolences from everyone at PNH Confidential.

The latest in a line of recent barang deaths:
A lot of barangs dying lately. Seems like a lot more than usual. A string of moto/auto accidents took 5 barangs in one weekend last month. Maybe time for a helmet and some evac insurance?

It's true:
Only the good die young. Alley Pest will live to be a thousand. My children's children will curse her name....Anyway:

Martini Bar and Disco:
Same old...Which is good. The African contingent has mostly moved on. Not sure where they went but I'm guessing they'll eventually carve out a colony up at backpacker lake. A good fit. It's so dysfunctional up there no one will notice them, and the people that do realize what they are up to will be too politically correct to complain. Ha. Ha. Ha. They deserve each other.

Happy Man:
Happy's is doing well. And why not? It's a fun place. A bump in the road: Went looking for tall dark villager and ordered a vodka. She was there. The vodka wasn't. In its place: Green Apple Flavored "Vodka." Shit's sweeter than candy. I asked if they had any other vodka. They did. Strawberry. Oh well....No sense in giving a lecture. Smiled, paid, left - without my country squeeze. (2 sips of green apple-flavored vodka is enough to kill a libido- at least 'til you get to Martini's...)

A nice surprise: Next night Happy was outside Sharky. Maybe he was working or maybe he was doing damage control. (I probably wasn't the only one who noticed.) He grabbed me and said the problem had been corrected. Went back. Had a proper vodka ($2) and a relaxing crotch massage ($2) Happy is cool. His place is cool. For a hostess bar - place is very cool.

California 2 Hotel and Guesthouse:
Mixing it up on the stereo. All the way from Public Enemy to Zappa to the Outlaws to Korn. Nothing too weird happening. An occasional asshole complaining about a bar tab. After 6 hours of drinking he's decided that he'd only downed16 beers - not the 17 the bar was charging him.

Note: If you are thinking of checking-in, call / e-mail first. They are booked solid through Feb. but you may get an open room here and there.

Sharky Bar:
The usual shit. Big Chef on a roll the other night. Willing to rattle the Commune Chief out of bed all in the name of ROCK N ROLL*. Good time. Also noted: First timer in town from an ESL gig in Korea. Thought he knew the world. He does now. I think he likes it. It was fun to watch him decide. Been there. My guess: It'll be a long flight back to the ROK.

Howie's Bar:
The usual shit: Drunken rambling. People NOT getting laid. Blow ups at the pool table. (The latest one conducted in French.) Boozle jumping around and being a pain in the ass and:

• Howie's has 100% beef sausage - damn good. ($2)
• A certain wife is keeping a VERY close watch on her man. I guess that's what they do.
• A new (Mrs. VN) addition to the bar staff. Nice to have someone who's making your drink as soon as she sees you pull up outside the bar. Like CHEERS but...Not.

Sugar Shack:
In an effort to try something new, I took the alley behind CA2 to the Sugar Shack. A hostess bar. Hmm.....Not sure what to say. Cute women working the bar. They seem to be goers, and they seemed to have a good attitude. Air-Con. I dig that. Vodka w/ ice - $1.50. I dig that, too. Downed one and...

They asked if I wanted another. I did. They gave me a whisky. I returned it. They apologized. Took it behind the bar and...gave me back the whisky. Still whisky, I said. Sorry. Same shuffle. With a smile - they produced - the same whisky. Did I look that drunk? I never look that drunk.

Ok - whatever. I got my drink. Chicks shaking it on the bar. Everyone having fun. Almost learned what a body shot is- but Mythicaldude learned it would cost $3 and said no. Cheap bastard. At least he waited til the girl had her shirt off.

Time to pay - 2 vodkas - $3. Cool. Gave a $5. Change back - $1.75. (And I'd already left a tip.) I don't mind leaving a tip (despite what the Sharky waitresses say....) but I hate it when they tip themselves. An honest mistake? Yeah, maybe. Will I go back?...Probably. The girls were cute and the crowd was cool. And I still want to know what a body shot is. (Noticed: Body Shot specials Wednesday nights. I think they're $1.50.)

Weak post? It's been a while. Want a smile:

http://jflores.com/jokes/chowmein.htm

(*Muther Fuckaaah)

Shits & Giggles

A guy goes to the supermarket and is startled when a gorgeous blond waves at him. "Do you know me?" he asks. "I think you're the father of one of my kids," she replies. He flashes back to the only time he cheated on his wife. "Are you the stripper I banged on the pool table at my bachelor party with my buddies watching while your partner whipped my butt with celery?" "No... I'm your daughter's math teacher!"