Virtual Gypsyz

Sept. 8, 1994
Twenty-four hours…plus. I have just lived out the longest day of my life. And where is it ending, as well as marking a new beginning?

London, England.

I look outside my window and see a dirty white old building that would definitely stand out of place in Florida, and yet seems sufficiently familiar to provide me some comfort from this foreign city. Perhaps it reminds me of a certain part of New York, but then I see those little compact cars driving on the wrong side of the road and I remember — wow! I’m in London.

Then I picture the continent in relation to home and I fully, finally realize that I am about to embark on the most tremendous adventure in my life. I like the English accent and clever words of the people. They almost seem like they are from another world. They drive a bit more boldly, but I guess they are essentially the same as home.

I stand apart not only because I am American, but also because I am the first and probably the youngest in my family to travel to Europe. I wonder if my family has certain expectations of me while I am here. Most likely only to get the most out of it that I can, increase my knowledge and get home to tell them all about it. I believe that now they are worried, apprehensive of the possibilities that await me, but I suppose they are simply sharing my own feelings.

Despite my weakness, I am truly in awe at the size and excitement that London has to offer. Every building and structure has a history behind it, going beyond the few 200 years America has experienced. The land is so old, the people, the traditions — an automatic respect rushes over me in a new way.

September 17, 1994
I got tired of writing last time, so I didn’t get to make my official social commentary on Miss Saigon. It was a story about a girl looking for love. Pearl in “Starlight Express” was looking for love. So is Julia Roberts in “Pretty Woman.” And Eponine in Les Miserables died without/because of her love. I am so outraged that every time a girl/female, whatever, is the main character in a story, movie, play, etc, her main goal is invariably to find the man that she loves or else she dies. That’s what happened in Miss Saigon and why I finally realized it now, at 19 years old - heck if I know!

It’s the story of my life and I’ve been so oblivious for so long. What I’m so completely angst about is that when a man is the main character, love is usually just a subplot and his focus is usually to conquer evil or something along those lines. It seems that women are regarded as hopeless if they do not find a male counterpart, and I resent that I, myself, am a victim of that very fallacy. How depressing. But I can’t help it despite all my attempts. Should I just let it be, or live a life like Murphy Brown? The latter sounds a bit more interesting…

Wednesday was a very full, accomplishing day. I saw Buckingham Palace (an utterly disgusting aspect of human society - I wrote more about it in my British Political Systems journal); St. Paul’s Cathedral (absolutely breath-taking - literally - we climbed more than 500 steps to reach the top); and Westminster Abbey, another beautiful human masterpiece. It is just amazing how small, insignificant men and women can produce anything so divine. It was also exciting to see the graves/tombs of the great literary giants in Poet’s Corner including Shakespeare, Dickens and Shelley, to name just a few.

Thursday was our trip to Stonehenge and Bath. On the way we stopped at Salisbury Cathedral. It was another beautiful church that is supposedly engineered incorrectly so parts of it are “imperfect.” Whatever. I appreciated it just the same.

Friday I went to the Natural History Museum. That was really a great experience, although I must go back because it was so enormous. It seemed rather modern and geared toward children because of all the neat visual displays. The dinosaur experience was my favorite. I felt like I was in the movie “Jurassic Park” because they seemed so real (the dinosaurs). The only thing that seemed weird was my underlying skepticism. I thought back to the days when my dad would bring us all to the Natural History Museum in NY and how easily and fascinated I was by the massive displays of dinosaur bones and interesting facts about their environment. When Jon was there with me (here in London) he made me feel like the entire thing was a hoax. It made me feel bad because I want so much to believe that dinosaurs had indeed existed at one time. Oh well. My age of innocence is really, truly fading…fast.

That evening Leigh, Jon, Dave and Leah and I went to Picadilly Square for a night out. Jon, Leigh and I stopped at a pub with extremely loud music, but Dave and Leah didn’t like it much so we moved on. We foolishly bought beer for 2.5 pounds and made eyes at a few people. Shortly afterwards we ventured into the touristy, cheesy Hippodrome. It wasn’t all that bad, but it wasn’t great either. There was a great mixture of people, which was good, but the music SUCKED. It was, as Jon would describe it, “Bootie Music.” There was this short drunk guy who practically got on top of me and it was a bit irritating. Jon came to my rescue. Up on stage there were dancers/strippers, both male and female, but the one that caught most everyone’s eyes, both male and female, was a black guy with a buff body and a lot of nerve (or indifference…?). He stripped all the way down to a G-string and proceeded to take that off too. He didn’t do it all the way, though, he didn’t leave much to the imagination. He had the firmest, shiniest, blackest butt I’ve ever seen and I thought it was rather humorous until I realized that Jon was also a witness to this crass human being/barbarian. Then I felt embarrassed for him, especially when the guy was moving his body in an epilleptic-convulsion sort of manner - his unit was flying practically a foot away from his body. It was like a detached penis! Not as interesting, but somewhat amusing was the trapeez artist above the dance for…random??

What really got me that night was a girl in a red dress and her “close, intimate” friend. They had gotten there on their own, obviously looking to hook up with any guy who would have them. As they gyrated on the floor, I saw a group of guys staring at them not too far off. As they got bolder, they approached the girls and started grinding with them immediately. Later when I saw them, all four were grinding in a row, but with the two girls in the middle, apparently feeling each other. Even later on I saw the girl in the red making out with her guy, pausing every so often to say absolutely nothing to each other. The guy didn’t seem too interested anymore, obviously by the distant look on his face - boredom. It’s absolutely amazing how one moment I can be revelling in the capacity of man’s potential greatness and then feel shame at the utter brainless, carnal, animalistic attitude others have. They let ego-level desires rule their entire life because they never found a way to transcend to a level of intellectuality. God forbid! They need to get laid, and that’s all there is to it. I look good, you look good, why not fuck?

We are turning into beasts and are calling it freedom.

The next day after classes we went to Harrod’s, the massive department store. What a waste of a building. 185 pounds for a bathing suit? Give me a break! Everything was so incredibly expensive and useless to most people’s life - it just brought out the greediness in me and probably everyone else who set foot in it. I WANT, I WANT, I WANT!!!! ————>>>>>