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I had a great time. I had been waiting for this trip, dreaming about this trip,
saving up for this trip virtually since the 1999 WWW Winter trip. I
really had a great time.
Okay, I will start out this report as I did last
time, with a prologue. As you may
recall from my last report, the days leading up to the trip were filled with
harassing snide comments from my co-workers asking me what I was going to do
at the nudist colony, as well as juvenile taunts such as Dan, Dan,
the Nudie man.
Cut to this year. I have been transferred from the mountains of
Nagano to the hustle and bustle of metropolitan Tokyo.
Remembering what had happened the year before, I told my new co-workers
that I was going to a resort in Jamaica called Hedonism II with all the
confidence of a bomb squad dog sniffing
a suitcase from Belfast. No
reaction, other than ooos and ahhhhs about going to such an exotic place
(Hawaii, Thailand and Australia being normal, mundane places to go for someone
living in Japan), and well-wishers hoping that I have a good time.
Perhaps in some cosmic rulebook
I think that there most be some law somewhere that there must be a jerk
in most every social scenario. Since
there was no one in this case acting like the butt of the jackass (as
opposed to acting like the eye of the tiger), it fell upon me to play the
cosmic role of the jerk. Looking
at it from hindsight, I must have been pretty difficult to live with.
Every spare moment I had, I was reading my Lonely Planet guidebook to
Jamaica. Every chance I could I
was telling people about my trip to Jamaica.
I guess that I had been waiting so long for this moment, I could not
believe it was happening. And, I can only imagine
that as I said my last goodbyes and
left the office and the door closed behind me, that there was a collective
sigh of Chirst, Im GLAD hes
FINALLY GONE!!!
I may have gloated about it a tad too much.
Perhaps a souvenir of several pounds of
Blue Mountain coffee for the office is in order.
Ooooooh yeah.
Be that as it may, I was off on my vacation.
After a short visit to Chicago to see my mother and to get
her monthly when are you coming back to America?
question, I was off to Jamaica (My mother is diabolical.
She took me to a warehouse club and as I was marveling over the crates,
bushels and drums of stuff that you can get she lets slip the comment You
know, if you lived in America, you could come here EVERY DAYlike I saiddiabolical)
I took the usual early morning flight from OHare
to Kingston and got in about 11:00am. I
decided to take Bobs advice and list everything I had on the Customs form.
It worked. They took
one look at it, saw all the touristy stuff on the list and said go
on through, mon. I decided to
take the Timair flight rather than taking the bus.
Now you have to know this about me.
I used to work for the airlines. My
Dad worked for the airlines. I am
the worst white-knuckle flyer in my family.
We get even the slightest bit of turbulance, even on a 747 and I have
one hand clutching the bottom of the seat.
And I was about to get on a CESNA, also commonly
known to me as a puddle jumper.
I am a big believer in Murphys Law, and I
could see how it might apply in this situation.I had been planning this
trip for SO LONG and had gone to such great lengths to make it happen, I could
easily see myself getting THAT
close (my thumb and forefinger are about
3 millimeters apart) to Hedo.
Luckily, I was wrong, and we landed safely.
As I got out of the place, I repeated to myself in a mantra-like
fashion Im taking the bus back, Im taking the bus back, Im taking
the bus back.
Waiting there was one of the locals who offered
to take me to Hedo for 5 bucks. Not
knowing how far it was to Hedo from there, I took him up on his offer.
About a block and a half later, we pulled up to the Hedo front door.
As I handed him the fiver, I smiled, shook his hand, and cursed him in
Japanese.
It was when I checked in at Hedo that I noticed
that I was missing something---the winter coat that I had meant to stow away
in my bag was back at the Timair waiting area. Oh well, I thoughtIll
check on it later. I never did.
Okay, I will admit, this trip was a blur to me
and I dont really remember all the stuff that I did, so I will just go
through some of the highlights. It
was fantastic meeting all the WWW members.
This time I came in after most of the crew, so the party was in full
swing when I got there. I saw
Denny and Diane in the Pool, saw Jerry in the Dining area, and met others
along the way. There werent as
many Are you danimal? questions as there were last trip (I guess I made
an impression on youse guys -as Captain Steve from the catamaran would say)
I also got to meet some new folksKuno and Nora, Marina, Rebecca
(with whom I had been corresponding for a while) and Roland, just to name a
few.
Let me just say that you are all vividly in my
mind and I will never forget you all. We
always say that it is the people that we meet at Hedo that makes it so
special, and I am glad that I was able to spend this special week with all of
you.
I did meet one person that I hadnt expected to
meet, and I really didnt meet him till the day AFTER I got in , and that
person was my roommate, Peter. I
must admit that I was a bit bummed that I actually HAD a roommate (I didnt
have one last year), but once I got to know him, I am very glad that I was put
up with someone. I hope Peter
doesnt mind me saying this, but it was his first time here, and I kind of
thought he looked like he needed a vacation.
He seemed to be kind of a
workaholic and I got the impression he needed a good, relaxing vacation. I tried to show him as much of the ropes as I knew of
Hedo, but as all of you vets know, Hedo is a place that you have to experience
for yourself to a certain extent. All
during the week, I would hear him say I did NOTHING today!
and Id come back with yup.feels good, doesnt it?
I think hes hooked.
Knowing that you are home differs with each
individual. To some, that first
Rum and Coke at Delroys does the trick.
To others, its that first dip in the Nude pool.
For me, it is that first song at Veronicas Piano Bar, and hearing
Dave play. I walked into Veronicas
an sat at one of the seats along side the piano.
At first he didnt recognize me, but gradually he said I remember
youyou were here last year. Dave
has two simple rules1. You
take nothing personally. What
goes on in Jamaica STAYS in Jamaica. 2. If you dont sing, you have to strip. Youd be surprised at just how many people would rather
strip than sing. Last year, he
had the folks stand along side him and strip.
This year, he gets them up on top of his piano and gets them to strip.
Every Tuesday, there is an event called the Wet
T-Shirt contest, in which ladies dance for the men in wet t-shirts and then
go through various different activities to win the contest.
Now the reverse happens on Thursdays and that is called Mr. Body
Motion. On this particular
Thursday, there werent a lot of people at the main dining hall.
Anton, one of the coordinators (who now
knows my name and will occasionally yell
out DANIEL-SAN!!!!!) Asked
me if Id be a contestant. Now
I must tell you that I am not
much into costumes, or a whole lot of things that will draw undue attention to
myself. Plus the fact that it has
been a LOOOONNG time since THIS particular booty has done any shaking,
publicly OR privately. But, I
gave it my best shot.
Imagine either Sean Connery or Anthony Hopkins
taking Jennifer Beals role in Flashdance.
That is about how I felt. I
was totally out of my element. I
was busily trying to imitate what the other guys were doing, and ended up
basically jiggling my butt and mooning the girls that were sitting there. Then
came part 2. I was called to select 3 ladies from the audience and place
them in my favorite sexual positions.
I am trying to look as calm as possible, but in my mind, the little
devil is coaching me from the sidelines like Pat Reily at a playoff game,
yelling ANYTHING BUT MISSIONARY!!!.
With the first girl, we did it standing up.
With the second, it was lying down, side by side.
The third was standing again, but with me holding her, supporting all
her weight.
It was nerve-racking , and I was embarrassed as
all hell, but I had a really good time. (Ysee, my mistake was that I got to
lunch too late on Tuesday to get in on the Wet T-Shirt contest, yet I hung
around too late on Thursday to avoid the Body Motion contest .
Would I do it again? Ask
me after several months of constant going to the gym and several rum and
cokes.
I had made a commitment that I was going to do
something for talent night. As I
seemed to be proficient at singing, I
thought that I might do a song, and decided on the English version of the 60s
hit Sukiyaki (I have fond memories of my Dad singing the Japanese
version around the house all the time, so I knew the melody; I just had to
learn the English lyrics.) I must
say that I was nervous, but not as much as I thought I would me.
I have to thank all of you for putting up with the singing, because I
did not hear one snore from the audience.
Many of you know that I work in Japan as an
English Teacher. You also know
that one of my assignments was teaching volunteers of the Japan Peace corps,
and that one of the developing countries that people get sent to is Jamaica.
I have had two students in particular that I taught and have gone on to
work in Jamaica. Before I left, I
emailed them and told them that I was coming.
They wrote back and insisted that they wanted to come and see me. I
told them where I was staying, and they said that they would try and stay
there too.
So here I was, expecting Shin and Chi, my two
students to show up at some point at Hedo.
Just before I got on the plane from Japan, I stopped off at an Internet
caf to check my messages. Sure
enough, there was a message from Shin, saying that theyd be there Dec 16,
but that there were other students who remembered me and wanted to see me too,
so instead of 2, thered be
TEN, and that a couple of them would be women.
Now, I spend most of my
time on the Nude sideokay, I spend ALL of my time on the nude side, and I
could probably coerce a couple of the guys to come over to the nude side.
But the ladies?
Hmmmwed have to wait and see.
Okay, so the big day arrives and I am more
nervous than I was bumping and grinding and gyrating at the Body Motion
contest. I meet them, and help
get them settled, and they start to relax.
At lunch, one of my students asks is there a nude beach here?
I sheepishly say yes, and they ask if Ive been on it, and I again
sheepishly answer yes, and ask them if they want to go.
They at first say no, then maybe.
The tension was getting too bad and so I told
them look, this is Hedonsim. You
can do anything here that you want to do.
You will see a lot of people doing whatever they want to do.
Im not your mother, hell Im not even your teacher anymore.
If you want to go to the nude beach, go ahead.
If you dont, then dont. You
can have just as much fun on either side.
They seemed to be relieved at that, and as it turns out, they decided
to stay on the prude side for the most part.
I know what youre thinkingwhat did the
danimal do? Well, despite my
saying that I wasnt their teacher anymore, I still felt they were my
students. So, I went back to my
room, dusted the cobwebs off my favorite speedo, put it on and marched onto
the prude side. The things I do
for my students, I tell you. We
played a round or two of volleyball in which everyone won hedobucks (which
they later pooled to get a couple of bottles of rum) and had a great time.
They left the next day and I saw them off at the
lobby. After they left, I went
back to my room to get out of my speedo, and noticed in the mirror that I was
starting to develop a TAN LINE!!!!! I
was shocked, dismayed, and a little ticked! Now,
dont get me wrong, I DO have a tan line (I keep my watch on at all times),
I just don t get bathing suit tan lines.
This was unacceptable. I
laid out the rest of the day and made damn sure I was nude! Besides, wet
bathing suits really, really DO suck!
The other things that I did this trip pretty much
fall into line with the stuff I did last trip. I did the Catamaran cruise, but I did miss the Magical
Mystery tour (Sorry guys, the jet lag got to be too much for me.)
I ate far, far too much, drank far, far too much, and did a whole lotta
NOTHIN.which is what you are supposed to do at Hedo.
As I and many others much wiser than myself have
said in the past, the best part about Hedo is the people, and this trip
certainly was no exception. To
all the folksSteve and Char, Nick and Tina,
Kuno and Nora, Don and Donna, Ian and Karla,
Harold and Lisa, Rupe and Pat, Twayne and Julie, my buddies Dave and Ellen,
and all the other couples I met and did not mention, as well as the single
folkPeter, Roland, Rebecca, Bob, George W, Marina, Gerry, and everyone
else, You are all very special to me.
My life took a lot of twists and turns from last
year till this, not all of them good and not all of them happy.
Yet I always had you guys there, in the back of my mind as a kind of
refuge that I could mentally go to for sanity.
If there was one single driving force keeping me going it was knowing
that I would see you guys again. You
made it all worth itthe scrimping and saving, the budgeting, the 13 hour
flight, everthing.
One final big, big thank you to Denny and Diane. Before
I met you guys, I didnt know that I could have this much fun on a vacation.
Thank you for bringing us all together so that we could make friends
and enjoy each others company.
Thanks everybody. Same time next year?
Dan Nakagawa (the danimal)