Let's Go Mad

by Rob Binkley

  It was a foreboding start to our magical journey. After a week of complete LA insanity, I still didn’t know if Brian was some kind of modern-day prophet or an escaped lunatic on a mission to drag me to hell with him.

  Maybe we were both losing our minds.

  We called a cab to take us to the airport. Our plane was supposedly leaving in a few hours. By this time I was having serious second (and third and fourth) thoughts about putting my life into the hands of this loose cannon, so I told the cabbie to just keep driving down Santa Monica Boulevard, all the way to the beach. I needed a moment to reassess my future.

  I gave the cabbie money to keep the meter running. “Just wait for us, we’ll only be a few minutes.” We made our way down to the water. Was I going to catch this plane or not? It was decision time.

  Brian had sobered up and regained some of his composure. “That beating jarred loose some bad memories, man.”

  “To be perfectly honest, you don’t look or sound mentally prepared for this trip. Maybe we should just call this whole thing off?? My concern is you could easily get us killed over there—wherever ‘over there’ is.”

  “Why so negative? I’m the one who just got my ass kicked!”

  “Where are we even going?”

  “That’s the fun of it; we’ll decide at the airport. We can go anywhere!”

  “So, there’s no plane in two hours?”

  “There could be. Our tickets become valid in two hours. Why waste time? We only have a year to fly. C’mon, don’t get cold feet on me now.”

  “Just, let me think…. You’re nuts, you know that?”

  “I’ve been told.”

  We sat in silence on the beach and listened to the ocean. The sun was coming up. Brian began frowning at his cell phone while mine kept buzzing; my battery was on life support. After a long silence, he came back to life. “You know, wherever we’re going, we don’t need these slave machines. They must be silenced.”

  He snatched my cell phone and threw it into the ocean. I watched in horror as it skipped over the water and sank to the bottom of the Pacific. “Noo! I never got insurance!” Brian kissed his giant cell phone then launched it into the ocean, too. As he watched his phone sink, he gave it a final salute.

  “That’s that….”

  Believe it or not, this is the moment I finally had my satori about Brian—on the beach at dawn watching our cell phones sink to the bottom of the ocean. All my feelings of fear over this trip somehow morphed into an overwhelming sense of freedom. I said, “That was the most symbolic move I’ve witnessed by a human since the fall of the Berlin Wall.”

  Brian laughed. “You need to get out more.”

  I got up and motioned him toward the cab. “C’mon man. We got a plane to catch.”

  “You mean you’re in?” He put his arm on my shoulder as we walked back to the parking lot. “You know, you’re gonna miss your court date. There’ll be a warrant.”

  I laughed. “Wouldn’t have it any other way.”

  We hopped in the taxi and told the cabbie to drive us to LAX, and step on it.

  While we drove down the 405 at dawn, my heart raced. I couldn’t believe I was actually doing this. I started listing things we forgot to do. “We forgot to call our moms, we forgot to call our friends, we forgot our immunization shots! We might catch malaria or gonorrhea—”

  Brian looked at me. “Or monkey herpes.”

  We howled like two monkeys into the rising sun.

  Five hours later, I awoke on a Singapore Airlines 757 with the worst hangover of my life.

  Where am I? … Who am I? The world was spinning. What just happened? For the first time in 169 hours, my blood alcohol level dipped below toxic levels. Flashes of my epic truancy came rushing back in a sickening blur. I knew I just made a grave mistake.

  When Brian’s face came into focus, the only thought that raced through my mind was, It’s that guy’s fault! I lunged for his throat. “What have you done to my life?” I scared the old guy sitting in front of us. Brian fended me off.

  “It’s for your own good! Here … have a cookie. They’re fresh.”

  My life was ruined. My best friend had systematically, over the course of a month, brainwashed then shanghaied me. I wanted to jump out of the airplane. Brian ate my cookie. “Save your rage. It’s a long flight to Singapore. I suggest you order a drink.”

  There was no turning back. I ordered a drink.

  I wouldn’t speak to Brian again for another two hours. I plotted to kill him as soon as we got off the plane, and die in one of those Singapore prisons. It was a small price to pay. I downed a Crown and Coke and faded (back) to black, with an anvil on my head and a sickness in my heart.

  I awoke from my epic slumber to a flight attendant checking to see if I was still breathing. It finally dawned on me we were seated in first class. Brian told me the world tickets gives you free upgrades when available.

  In a daze, I stared slack-jawed at the full moon as it rose over the Pacific. I had a terrifying thought; I had just committed to marrying a lunatic for an entire year. It was going to be worse than marriage: During a typical marriage, everyone has to work or do something during the day, right? This trip was going to be much worse.

  After four more Crown and Cokes, I rationalized blowing up my life on a whim. I looked at my kidnapper chatting up an old lady and realized that Brian shanghaiing me was his way of saying, “I love you so much I’ll be with you twenty-four seven for the next year.”

  I was resigned to traveling with this maniac. I made up reasons we would travel well together:

  1. We shared the most important traits of good backpackers—wanderlust.

  2. Brian was an expert at corralling the beverage cart so it always sat next to us in the aisle while the rest of the plane slept.

  3. I couldn’t think of a third reason.

  While the normal passengers slumbered we helped ourselves to booze off the cart, watched movies, and plotted our adventure. Drunk on an assortment of exotic beers (at three in the morning in some time zone), we became co-conspirators again. We agreed to immerse ourselves in the raw, unfiltered world, just like Thompson and Kerouac, and learn about ourselves while testing our conditioned beliefs on everything.

  We celebrated unplugging from the American grid. Brian had finally won me over for good; I was all in, no longer worrying about anything but experience. Not our safety (although that would be a major problem along the way)—not anything.

  Brian would eventually have me speaking in proverbs like him as I re-learned how to live in the moment, all the stuff I had denied after graduate school when we both sold our souls to “God money.” I had no idea what was ahead but I knew it was going to get weird … very weird. So many things were going to get broken. We didn’t care if we got mugged in Indonesia, desecrated in Australia, cuffed and stuffed in Thailand, or punched in the face by Buddhist monks in Tibet—I wanted to have a “personal renaissance.” I needed it. We both did, before we became two more doomed assholes with a mortgage to pay.

  And that was how this whole bizarre adventure began. The tales of debauchery and spiritual enlightenment to come are too fantastic not to tell. I thirsted for experience and Brian was my ticket to the promised land. In my madness I bought the ticket; I took the ride. I needed to live. I needed to suffer.

  I had to go.

  2

  Wanderlust in Bali

  STOCKHOLM SYNDROME IS REAL. I never believed it until it happened to me. After a twenty-hour flight over the Pacific, I was one with my deranged captor. I was never going home. Brian had blown enough LA sunshine (and moonshine) up my ass that I was no longer concerned with the facts, with tomorrow, or with reality.

  All I cared about was the possibility of the now.

  I was still in a dream state when we touched down in Singapore. I needed to get off the plane before I truly believed we weren’t landing back at LAX after some crazy circuitous joy ride where Brian had paid the pilot to do aerial donuts al
l over the Pacific for a day just to screw with my head.

  The first sign we weren’t in Kansas anymore was when the captain spoke to us in three languages (Mandarin, Malay, and English). Brian informed me we had a short layover before flying to our first official stop: the island country of Indonesia.

  “Where are we again?” I asked.

  Brian pointed to the Singapore Air logo. “Singapore is our hub to all of the Orient.”

  “Don’t say Orient.”

  “Why?”

  “It’s imperialist-speak.”

  “But it sounds so cool.”

  “Just trust me.”

  The only thing I knew about Singapore was that it’s an extremely controlled, law-abiding society. Brian knew this too, so he was already dreaming about getting jailed in an exotic land. “Never been caned in a foreign country, have you?” Brian asked. “Might be a learning experience for you, Rob.”

  “How about we don’t? Although, now that you mention it, I think I dreamt that the second we got off this plane I put your head on a spike and paraded you through Singapore while chewing gum.”

  “May want to wait till we get to Indonesia for that. The canings here are intense.”

  We lumbered our bones off the plane and onto terra firma. It felt good to be on the ground again. Brian rambled through the airport with his sleep mask dangling from his neck.

  “How can I still be hungover?”

  “It may take a week to detox,” I said.

  “We don’t have time for that.” Rather than checking ourselves into rehab during our layover, we decided to sneak in a few drinks with Eric, our medical student friend from Canada, who was in Singapore working on a sex study involving monkeys.

  Eric’s company was inventing some new Viagra—but you couldn’t mention the word Viagra around him, or he got angry. He told us the poor monkeys didn’t even get to co-mingle while they were shot up with the sex drug. “Cruel and unusual punishment,” I said.

  “All in the name of fornication!” Brian laughed.

  Five hours later, we were lubed up and airborne again on our way to Bali, Indonesia. Brian zonked out immediately. Bored, I messed with him as he slept; I inched my stinky foot over and rubbed on his chin—perverse male bonding.

  Brian didn’t think it was funny. The flight attendant saw us “foot canoodling” and quietly asked if we were on our honeymoon. “We have champagne for newlyweds,” she gestured to her cart. This would be the second of many occasions where we would be mistaken for a gay couple.

  “Why, yes—yes we are. How kind of you to notice.” I drank the split of champagne by myself while Brian snored. Afterward I slept, too, but not well. I dreamt I was following Elena’s moans through some sun-drenched city street that had ever-present samba music in the air. Two sounds I’d rather not hear ever again.

  I was jarred awake when we touched down in Denpasar, Bali. The jailbreak was complete. The fugitives had arrived. Brian and I were on a faraway island in a faraway land with no extradition laws—a comforting perk I researched at an Internet café in the Singapore airport. It was to be our home for the next month.

  We stepped onto the tarmac and into a blanket of intense heat. “Where should we go first?” I asked. “Whatever we do, I say we stay a while and relax.”

  Brian announced he was getting into Taoism. “I want to make a concerted effort to think less to open up more space for nothingness.” This meant he was nursing a jet-lagged hangover so I was in charge of the planning.

  During our flight over the Pacific, we made a drunken pact not to act like typical American tourists who frequented spots like Cancun to see how much they could drink in a week. Though it was in our California DNA to party like maniacs, we were on a mission to evolve into something more by learning about life and the real world outside of America.

  To hell with tourists, we were to be backpackers—totally mobile travelers who immersed ourselves in foreign cultures and new bohemian adventures.

  Of course, the second we stepped off the plane our grand plans went out the window, and we headed straight to Kuta Beach. (A total cop-out I know.) Kuta is not a travelers’ paradise; it’s more like the undisputed party capital of Indonesia, like a watered-down Waikiki. But young American men looking for a good time had to start somewhere, right??

  Whatever we were trying to do, we were doing it our first day in Kuta, evolving very, very slowly. Brian was dying for a drink; the prospect of getting one got him bantering again. “Rob Binkley, misunderstood by many … envied by many. You take the overwhelming and turn it into a one-hour time slot.”

  “Compliment or insult?” He didn’t answer.

  I checked Lonely Planet for tips. A religion among backpackers, it’s the best travel guide in the world. Published by a couple who began traveling around the world in the 1970s, Lonely Planet doesn’t tell you what Hilton to stay at—it teaches you how to travel off the beaten path and see things inexpensively by giving tips on the hostels, bars, and best ways to get around. To backpackers like us on an extreme budget, the Book can extend a trip by months.

  “Why read about a place we’re about to see?” Brian saw my nose in the Book. “Why not just see it, then form your own opinion?”

  “Are you taking a stand against reading?”

  “You’ll miss life with your head down, all’s I’m saying.”

  I ignored him. The Book advised us not to take a taxi or shuttle; instead, it suggested we “walk out of the airport to the freeway and flag down a city bus,” which we did. It saved us a few rupiah (which is Indonesian money). I waved the Book in his face. “You’ll thank me when you don’t end up penniless in the jungle somewhere.”

  “Whatever you say … You’re the king of your own world.”

  We arrived at Kuta Beach and checked in at the Palm Gardens guesthouse for twelve dollars a night, or six dollars each. The Book claimed this was expensive but after twenty-plus hours at thirty thousand feet in the air, we splurged. Brian was happy with the amenities: “Ceiling fan, toilet—this place is great!”

  We collapsed in a heap of exhaustion and took a quick nap that somehow lasted eight hours. At three in the morning, we awoke to a thundering rainstorm, not knowing who or where we were. The thunder was so loud I caught Brian doing some form of praying in the dark. Our room didn’t have electricity, so I could only see him in bursts during the lightning show. When the storm passed, I fell back asleep watching the largest bug I had ever seen nest on our open window. Life was good.

  On our first full day at Kuta Beach, we got up early, excited to experience everything. There was much to see. Bali is a gorgeous patch of archipelagic nirvana sunning itself along the equator in the Oceania region of South East Asia. The beaches were white, the mountains were green, and the valleys were endless. I fled America in search of a Utopian alterna-reality, and this place certainly looked the part.

  According to the Book, only a third of the 17,508 Indonesian islands were populated by humans. I wanted to see them all. Brian wanted 17,508 beers, stat. We strolled past the street vendors selling their wares. Kuta was compact and full of mysterious little alleys called “gangs” with restaurants, hotels, and bars just off the beach.

  “Crazy,” I said. “This place has been plundered by a neverending stream of marauding invaders over the years—from Java Man and Flores Man, two of Bali’s pre-historic co-founders, to the Hindu and Buddhist kingdoms of the early centuries, to the seventeenth century European colonialists, to the Javanese ethnic majority of today—Indonesia’s been passed around like a doobie for its location and resources since the seventh century.”

  “Fascinating.” Brian selectively listened to every fourteenth word I said. “We need to buy some pot…. Now those are ample bosoms.”

  Brian had his eyes on some sunbathers. I kept reading from the Book: “Though Indonesia is the most populated Muslim country in the world, here in Kuta “Bacchus,” the god of wine, reigns supreme.”

  I looked up; I was talking
to a palm tree. Brian had wandered off to see two topless sunbathers. I strutted up to the ladies and gave them my “cool face.” “So, we’re new in town, meine fraus.” Brian was in the middle of busting an awkward move on two German bikini girls who spoke no English. “I hear there’s a very rambunctious nightlife here. Can you point us in direction of the Jell-O shot store?”

  The topless girls squirted him with a water gun full of suntan oil and laughed. I jumped in to save him. “What my foolish friend is trying to say is, ‘Ich bin ein Berliners.’” The girls kept laughing, though I’m not sure they got the reference. Probably not.

  Brian whispered in my ear, “How do you say ‘I want to oil your breasts’ in German?”

  I winked at the girls through my sunglasses. “I have no idea, but let’s grab these fraus and go visit a temple! It could be a romantic setting.”

  “And put more clothes on them??” Brian had a point.

  When we turned back to the girls, their boyfriends suddenly appeared from nowhere. Game over. We gave the bikini fraus the “call me” hand signal and kept on strolling. “Oh, our flirting has just begun.” I turned to Brian and smiled. “Body language has no language barriers. Now what should we do?“

  “Dude.” Brian stopped me to explain he wasn’t interested in sightseeing; he’d rather meet people than things. “I realize I don’t know what I’m doing and that can be infuriating to smart people like you. Just do me a favor and don’t tell me where I’m going next. It’ll ruin the surprise.”

  “So you’re saying we should just—”

  “Go with the flow and see where it takes us. The first step is get a few drinks in you—and unleash the beast.” He was referring to my alter ego. Legend has it, “he” comes out after my blood alcohol level reaches a certain level of toxicity. (I’ve never met the guy myself, but I hear he’s a charming fellow.)

  I put away the Book and just let the day flow. After seeing the talent on the beach, I knew our hormones were not going to let us go culture hunting no matter how hard my brain tried.