The Flamingo Diaries

Have you ever received a strange birthday gift?  Someone's named a star after you, donated in your name to charity, or, even worse, you've been forced to shop in Topman?  This year I was left feeling fairly incredulous at my thoughtful if slightly perplexing gift of a rabies injection.  Granted in a life or death situation, that situation being an attack by a rabid animal, this gift would potentially save my life, I say 'potentially' because in said event the injection doesn't actually prevent the infection or onset of rabies it just means you don't die immediately, it's a purely preventative measure - it's like wearing two condoms when shagging someone from Fife.  Still at least I will always remember this year's birthday as the year my parents - mum - got me a rabies injection.  For Christmas I'm getting an epipen.

My parents - mum - gave me the money for the injection on account of a trip to South America I made over the summer.  In order to appease my parents - mum - I also got myself immunised for Hepatitis A and B, Yellow Fever and Polio, with an old fashioned tetanus boost and a shit load of malaria tablets to boot.  I was so well immunised when I eventually landed in South America I was determined to get bitten by as many animals and share as many dirty needles as possible just to get my money's worth.  And I hate injections; my friends are always teasing me for choosing to smoke my heroin.

Purchasing injections, Spanish lessons, travel insurance, and my base tan from 'Tanz' on Granton Road Edinburgh, left me in a fairly precarious financial state before I had even left the country, even my Lonely Planet guide 'South America on a Shoestring' cost me £22 - a little paradoxical I'm sure you'll agree.  Still it was important to my parents - mum - that I was prepared for every eventuality.  I did find it a little strange I was traveling to an inherently dangerous part of the world with some of the highest rates of violent crime and terrorism on the planet and my parents - mum's - greatest concern was that I carried enough plasters and savalon.

This was the first time I had ever undertaken anything like this before.  I had travelled previously, two summers working and travelling in America and one summer inter-railing through Europe with an ex-girlfriend.  Those trips taught me a valuable life lesson; travel may broaden your horizons but it does nothing for your bowels or liver.  When I leave the safe haven of home and head out into the great beyond an even slight departure from my normal routine tends to turn me into a boarder-line alcoholic with bipolar bowels that switch from chronic constipation to devastating diohera.  It pretty much limits your trip itinerary to drinking and shitting - and usually in that order.  When I was in Ecuador I couldn't go on an excursion with some very attractive Dutch girls...

I had even greater reservations over my mental health.  I suffered not so much foreboding or a fear of loneliness, my greatest concern was other people.  That's why I hate hostels.  The last time I stayed in a hostel I was welcomed by a perfect pile of hair on top of the plain white sheets that comprised my bedding, it looked like a pubic hair clitoris.  Hygiene is a concern anytime I stay away from home but even pubey sheets aren't as worrying as the people who stay in hostels.  When I stay in them I tend to get into arguments, sometimes altercations, usually over the issue of acceptable social etiquette.  Maybe I'm 'square' but I don't think it is appropriate to shag your big fat German missus at four in the morning with the light on, use the toilet of a room you're not staying in at silly o'clock in the morning - I said 'if you're going to use someone else's toilet at least flush after yourself', he said 'there's a water shortage in California', I said 'go fuck yourself' - or cheat at beer pong.

Despite the concerns over my physical and mental wellbeing when I arrived at my first destination - Lima, capital city of Peru - I felt chipper, optimistic even.  I was untouchable, and anything that did touch me I was immunised against.  It didn't matter I was travelling alone.  I was mature, street wise, and my Spanish was tip-top - this I based on my ability to follow the inflight movie, an old black and white film about a female matador avenging the death or her father, I thought she was the most beautiful girl I had ever seen, that was until I arrived in Colombia where all the girls look like female matador's avenging the death of their father, ie breathtakingly beautiful but also look like they could kick your c**t in.  This sense of optimism barely made it out of the terminal door before I was reminded I wasn't streetwise or savvy at all.  My first conversation in South America, perhaps unsurprisingly, was with a coke dealer, a coke dealer I tried to buy chewing gum off.  He wasn't an obvious drug dealer - well, actually, he probably was - because he carried with him a tray of chewing gum and lollipops as a rouse to any watching policia.

 

I did find it a little strange they sold chewing gum by the gram in South America, he was f*cking delighted when I offered to buy fifteen grams.

My rendezvous with the minty-fresh drug dealer or even the taxi driver who charged me the equivalent of a Peruvian mortgage payment wasn't a concern, my biggest worry of course was the hostel, my first South American hostel, which fulfilled all my pre-conceived anxieties.  It was a hedonistic cesspool swarming with hippies who never got out of their pyjamas no matter what time of day it was.  Within two minutes of arriving some Canadian girls asked if I wanted to hula-hoop and watch the sunset.  Being a competent hula-hooper and avid fan of sunsets I agreed.  So it was I watched my first sunset in South America while hula-hooping for the first time in fifteen years, I even taught some local primary school children how to hula-hoop - failing to notice the wee shite bags were simultaneously stealing my booze.

After the sunset we went to a flat party.  Sitting nursing a beer I pondered how little time it had taken me to become engrossed with this eclectic group of Canadians, Americans and Israelis.  As I sat contemplating all I had gone through to make it to this point, how far I had come, and the incredible journey that lay ahead of me, I began to panic, not through a sense of unease or nervousness but because it was at that moment I realised I had made the classically Scottish move of trapcing dog-shit all through the flat.  Aware of the ticking social time bomb on the bottom of my shoe I made a clandestine move to the toilet and discarded it like a shitty Cinderella.  I was devastated to find a lack of toilet paper, towels, or anything that could dislodge the ungodly amount of dog-shit from my shoe.  The only available shit-flicking instrument was the toilet brush, which, after the sheer volume of excrement it had to displace, was left un-useable even after a thorough rinse under the flush of the toilet.  Not wanting to finger bits of dog-shit down the plug hole or compromise the health of the guests in attendance by rinsing the toilet brush in the sink basin, I opted for the only option left available to me and lobbed it out the window..

They lived on the fourth floor.

Hula-hooping hippies and dog-shit you may think constitutes a pretty unsuccessful start to the trip, importanatly however it was on that first night I met an Aussie bloke with whom I would travel for the next twelve weeks.  For the remainder of the trip we were like a Celtic-Antipodean Che Guevara and Alberto Granado - if Guevara and Granado went everywhere with a surfboard and frivolous use of the 'c-word'.  Over the next twelve weeks we would explore five countries, visit cities dwarfed by smouldering volcanoes, trek through dense jungles, deserts, and endless salt flats, raft down Andean rivers, marvel at thousands of Flamingos', snorkel with sea-turtles, sea-lions and sharks, race one hundred year old tortoises, join in noisy football celebrations, salsa lessons, and never ending fiestas using ropey Spanish chat-up lines and travelling on even ropier buses, we would drink copious amounts of rum, visit ancient Inca and Mayan ruins, and live with Indigenous peoples, all the time picking up some of the best travelling companions you could hope to meet and getting higher than either of us had ever been in our lives - over 5000m in Bolivia.

When the time came to part ways my Australian soul-mate and I decided to 'mark' the occasion by taking the classically stupid move of getting matching tattoos - I still hadn't made use of my hepatitis injections.  I'm not sure how Guevara and Granado decided to mark the end of their trip, but just imagine for a second how much more powerful the socialist revolutionary movement would have been if it was headed up by a man sporting a giant pink Flamingo tattoo.  We opted for Flamingos because they are quintessentially South American animals: proud, colourful, flamboyant, social, just a little aggressive, and in no way camp - although I have to say when I was brandishing my Flamingo tattoo around Rio's gay district at silly o'clock in the morning while wearing a floral shirt and white cowboy hat it was difficult to reaffirm my heterosexuality.

South America took my breath away - and not just because so much of it is at altitude - it boasts unforgettable scenery, history and culture.  Never before has somewhere struck such a cord with me, never have I felt such an affinity to somewhere that wasn't home.  Since I've returned I feel more open-minded, altruistic and cultured - and my pals just can't get enough of it..

 

I've talked a lot about South America without really describing any of the things that I did when I was there.  Despite this and the fact I've chosen to talk mainly about dog-shit and injections I can assure you I was actually there, it's just really hard to try and condense the trip of a lifetime into a single blog entry.  I could write 1500 words alone just describing the view from machu picchu mountain. I can however sum-up the whole trip in one word with relative ease. Amazing.  Quite simply it's the best thing I have ever done.

I left my heart in South America and one day soon I hope to go back and fetch it.  In the mean time I'll practice my hip rotations - for hula hooping, obviously - flick through my photographs, and allow my bowels to recover in a country where you're allowed to flush toilet paper down the pan - it still just feels so decadent.

Brawling and Loling

A lot of people seem to think heckling is what makes stand-up comedy unique, and in some perverse way appealing - because a meticulously rehearsed twenty minute set just wouldn't be the same without wistful and intelligent audience insights such as;

If you are one of those people who shout out in comedy clubs then you are obviously an arrogant, egotistical, megalomaniac.  Your misguided belief that anyone actually gives a f*ck about what you think or what you have to say is completely unfounded - in fact the more I think about it the only real difference between you and the person you are heckling is that they have a microphone.

My mum has watched me performing only once, and on that occasion in what was a particularly supportive and appreciative room she was the only one to heckle me.

For those who are regular readers of my blog you will be aware there is a back story to this.  My mum keeps trying to tell me I'm adopted, my dad - Akbar - assures me this is nonsense.

Usually heckles are just semi-conscious gargling noises, and, on one pleasant occasion, projectile vomit.  I can say from experience that reacting to someone throwing up during your set is not easy.  It's like vomiting while making love do you stop and acknowledge it or continue performing?

What really annoys me is the sheep-shagger thing.  The level of ignorance is incredible, I have seen hecklers accuse Aberdonian comics of sheep shagging, which is ridiculous, Aberdonian's don't shag sheep, that's just what woman from Aberdeen look like.  'Sheep-shagger' is a common heckle for comedians from rural areas so when it occurs you need to have an appropriate put down prepared.

Bringing the mothers into it isn't big or clever but then again neither are those people who consider 'sheep-shagger' a particularly humours heckle so it is at least a little justifiable.  On most occasions I use this put-down it gets a good enough laugh, the heckler takes it in good grace, and we all move on - to my sheep shagging material.  There was one occasion however..

If you're reading this and you find that response shocking then you obviously went to the school where no one says 'yer maw' - did you go to school with Will's and Harry?  Everyone else should be familiar with the use of 'my maw's dead' as a standard retort, a disabling tactic used to try and put your adversary on the spot.  Now I'm not sure if this guy's mother was in fact dead or not, but I do know he certainly wasn't the result of an immaculate conception - hence not affecting the jokes validity - and if she was dead he was probably the one who killed her.  Either way, the fact I'd just insulted the local maniac in a room that resembled a BNP rally in a basement where gentlemen go to exchange videos, meant that I kind of killed the gig for myself at that point.

You meet some weird and wonderful people through comedy and travel to some weird and wonderful places - hello good people of 'Dove Holes' in the Peak District, I apologise for suggesting your village sounds like a synonym for anal sex.  In the time I have been performing comedy I have met some bizarre people and found myself in some even more bizarre situations; I have gigged with a self-confessed Nazi-sympathiser, performed to one man in Glasgow, shared a bill with a male stripper selling sex toys, had a lady ask me if I wanted to go home and 'stay' with her daughter, witnessed a headline act singe his pubic hair on a table candle and put a crisp packet up his arse, gone on a gay bar crawl, had someone vomit and several fights break out during my set, and, on two separate occasions, been offered heroin - stand-up comedy is basically just like a night out back in Dingwall.

Throughout my short comedy adventure I have endured some horrible, haunting, sweat-inducing stage deaths more cringe-worthy than that time you called the teacher 'mum'.  In this respect the gig that still keeps me awake at night took place in Stornoway on the Isle of Lewis and was for the islands 'Volunteer of the Year' awards ceremony.  I came prepared with my best fifteen minutes which at that time involved some jokes about the Taliban, an a-z of female contraception, and a comparison between WWF wrestling and pornography.  To my horror I had been billed as an after dinner speaker with 'a few words on volunteering'.  The event was being hosted by the head-boy at the local High School and in attendance was a sizable proportion of the islands Free-Church community.  So, I decided to dispense of all controversial material and dropped any swear words, I wanted however to remain a little tongue in cheek, this inevitably turned out to be more foot in mouth.  I opted for the comedian's death of choice, death by one-liner.

At no stage did I mention volunteering - although I'm sure I wouldn't have been short on volunteers wanting to give me the Wicker Man treatment.  That gig took at least five showers to get the smell of failure off.

On the whole audiences respect the barrier between the performer and themselves.  Even when the comedian is so obviously dying on their arse, most audiences will allow them the opportunity to do so with what little dignity they have left intact.  That's most audiences of course, there are those gigs where you just can't help ending up in a fist fight covered in jam and beer.

The true inspiration for this blog entry was a fundraiser I did for a bike club just before Christmas.  It was perfectly pleasant until the compere started handing out raffle prizes.  A group of local lads not associated with the club entered the raffle and were obviously delighted when they won a jar of rhubarb jam; other equally impressive prizes on offer that evening were a headband, a water bottle, a water bottle holder, a keyring, and a bottle of lube - for your bike chain, naturally.   Perhaps it was the group's level of intoxication, or just their love of jam, but they were pretty excited about winning and increased the evening's joviality by lobbing the jam at each other.  When a sizable portion of jam ended up on my face and person I politely suggested to the group that perhaps this was not the most suitable behaviour for a comedy club.  They disagreed, insinuated I interfered with sheep, and threw their pints at me.  At this point I felt I had exhausted diplomatic efforts and what ensued was chili con carnage.  Drinks were thrown, along with punches, and a battle royal broke out between me and the jam loving, inbred, jakie-fuckwits.

The next morning I awoke with a swollen wrist - I had won the lube.  Despite having a background in martial arts - I am lethal with a paintbrush - that altercation with the jam and beer throwing baw-bags was, to my recollection, the first time I managed to successfully hit someone.  That is not to say I haven't been in my fair share of scuffles, most of which have been pretty farcical in nature.

When I was at university I managed to get in an altercation with two massive rugby guys in the weights room at the uni gym.

After that I had to change my exercise habits for fear of running into those roided up maniacs ever again.  It wasn't all bad, if it wasn't for those guys chasing me with dumbbells I wouldn't be the dab-hand I am now at Pilates.

I was once held at knife point at Scotland's annual music festival/NED fest 'T-in the Park' thanks to some pretty garish attire I happened to be wearing at the time.

 

 

 

 

For those who don't know the history or politics of Rangers and Celtic just know that if they ever see each other out and about they tend to get stabby - the best way to stay safe is to assume all Glaswegian's are out to stab you.

It's not often you can say you've got a lot in common with Humpty Dumpty but I too have managed to get myself in trouble sitting on a wall.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

  

Sometimes something as simple as ordering a beer can descend into violence, particularly if you're abroad and especially if you find yourself in one of America's 'agro-States'.

 

 

 

I'll never understand the animalistic, knuckle dragging nature of the alpha male who seeks out violence and confrontation.  Stand-up comedy provides all the misogyny I need; stand-up isn't that far removed from a brawl, sometimes it feels like it is you versus the audience like you're somehow trying to 'win' the gig, and as I have alluded to in this blog often punching yourself repeatedly in the face would be more pleasant.  But it isn't all gigs in Fritzil style basements to audiences of questionable personal hygiene and patience.  Most of the time people don't vomit mid-set, and you are rarely accosted by jam lobbing lager louts.  When it goes well it's great, really great; you know, like all those times you managed to have sex without vomiting.