The Hamam Diaries Continued

by Sebastian J Stone

  August 27, 2011:

  Carla left today. She spent every evening with us and took Shahzad to the beach. She is a Greco-German, a nursery nurse, long haired and 40, but looks 28 and she is quite tall. She is very well put together and though not good looking she is very attractive and gives the impression of being gorgeous. In retrospect, she is over confident of her attractiveness but her body is outstanding. Shahzad has stopped eating peach pie, I think he ate too much one night to amuse Novak and it made him ill. Shahzad doesn’t know that I am aware that he’s exchanging messages with Carla in secret, under his bed covers.

  September 5, 2011:

  Tonight, I got home after selling CDs only to find that Shahzad had eaten all the curry, I think he is getting giddy on freedom and popularity with the girls. Vincent unlike Shahzad has a deep instinct to care for and protect me. Novak and Shahzad became close while I was in England and Novak is telling me of their conversations. It seems that Shahzad’s family is very worried and they disapproved of him staying in bed all day. He didn’t want to help on the farm and he was always dreaming of becoming a model. His brother’s resorted to beating him but to no avail. Shahzad is the youngest and was always indulged. Novak thinks that Shahzad’s father sent him to Europe to force him to accept responsibility and find independence.

  September 6, 2011:

  Today I fell in the street again for no reason. I have no instinctive reactions to save myself; I just topple like a tree. Shahzad’s HIV test is clear and he is also free of TB.

  I think Vincent shits once only every three days. For unknown reasons the water toilet has a concrete floor in the pedestal, making it impossible for anything but the slimmest of turds to escape. Novak resorted to chopping his turds into slices. Vincent doesn’t seem to notice that he leaves a three-day dump for somebody else to clear. I keep a bucket of water in the toilet to assist the flush. Shahzad is appalled by Vincent’s behavior, but his own turds present no problem.

  September 10, 2011:

  Today we went to the beach together by bus. I pressed the bell in good time but because we were not standing, the driver failed to stop. So, I pressed the bell again with the words, ‘Are you going to stop the fucking bus or what? I am seventy-five years old and too old to walk back.’ We stood up only when the bus had come to a stop.

  September 12, 2011:

  Last night while selling CDs, I met an American professor. My comments that usually leave people confused or argumentative caused him to respond with quotes and comprehension. He has studied many subjects that qualified him for nothing, including comparative religions, philosophy, various arts and some aspects of psychology to mention but a few. He has been studying for years. When I mentioned my theory on paradox and the outcome usually being opposite to the one intended, he remarked that all action has its reaction.

  My ideas regarding the nature of God caused him to show interest. So, I continued, “I see the presence of God everywhere but not necessarily his hand” he nodded without comment so I continued, “Evolution is, I have deduce, more about the evolution of God than of life” and he remained unfazed and he believes that religion is man’s greatest invention.

  After he had gone, the thought crossed my mind; religion is God’s attempt to be manifest in human terms and understanding. It is a continuation of the thought that God would have little chance of realizing poetry with the Dinosaurs. Poetry had to await not only the evolution of mankind but also the evolution of language developing beyond communication to metaphor and thoughts defining the indefinable. Since becoming a writer, everyday has been a revelation of the power and subtlety of language and therefor concepts. Whether the American professor agreed or disagreed is irrelevant it was his understanding, acceptance, participation and comprehension that gratified me and I realized that my book will have a far wider audience than the gay porn market.

  He is 53, but looks and sounds no older than 30, and he insisted on giving me his card. I have spent my life feeling stupid because I have always been surrounded by incomprehension, until I meet this American professor by chance. He has studied nothing useful but understands a great deal, this is a significant observation on the nature of education and the educated. I grasped the basis of my frustrations teaching and I was also reminded of my deep concern regarding the world we live in and the future.

  Shahzad was supposed to renew his red card last Friday but because the immigration office is only open on Mondays, Tuesdays and Wednesdays, we went this Monday. We were too late; they had cancelled his application. We have contacted an English lawyer who we visited last November. The immigration department only says that it’s closed on the door and we are supposed to knock. This is so typical of Greeks; they have no concept of other people’s perception. The lawyer has reapplied on our behalf; it is involving vast amounts of paper work. They must have been very quick of the Mark with the cancellation. I have never known anything being done in Greece, let alone on time.

  Shahzad is exercising and getting broad shouldered and very handsome. What I want from a partner is loyalty and consideration not just a sexy boy. I think Shahzad is making satisfactory progress and I am starting to fall in love but I have been too obliging and it is a sad truth that it is usually abused. It will be interesting to see if my consideration is honored or abuse

  The piano is advertised on the internet and Novak found me the web site. They have used the photograph of my piano from a previous auction that was some time ago when it did not sell. Their last auction was very successful and they cleared over one million pounds on one hundred pianos. Since the average piano is worth between eight to twelve hundred pounds some of the Steinways must have cleared over the hundred thousand mark. This coming auction seems to have attracted numerous Steinways and most of them decorated. There is one comparable to mine but totally untouched and original. It is valued at fifty to eighty thousand pounds. It has even been photographed and used in books on the history of pianos, but mine’s bigger.

  I have been in touch with the auction house and they are changing the photograph on the internet, it’s too late to alter the catalogue. The man I spoke with had compiled the catalogue himself and he was very apologetic. He contacted the organizer and asked, “How did Mr. Stone’s Steinway look and were the legs inlaid?” the organizer replied, “Yes I think they were, it looked pretty good.” Very disconcerted he replied, “Then why didn’t you tell me?” That small oversight will probably cost me a fortune.

  September 21, 2011:

  Cousin Pat has arrived on the Island. We spent the day together but Claire was having a very bad cat day. I was being pleasant and charming and that always makes me tired. In addition, I had to cope with Claire on the telephone.

  Some time ago Claire set a friend on to take a street cat to the vet. She gave very precise instructions to her friend for the vet. The cat had cancer of one ear and catching it had been a major problem. The instructions for the vet had been very simple. “This is a street cat and it has not eaten since last night.” The vet asked the friend about the cat and he said, “It is Claire’s cat and I don’t know if it has eaten or not.”

  The cat was return with the instructions, “bring the cat back after fasting it for twelve hours.” The cat could not be caught again and it has lived in excruciating pain for the last two months. The cat went missing last week and this morning Claire found it on her bathroom floor dying, with its head full of maggots. As always she set some body on to do her job. I did not tell Pat anything about the cat and it eventually died in Claire’s arms. Cousin Pat would not have been interested and I am learning to not involve people in matters that don’t concern them.

  Cousin Pat was with a friend called Marlene, an intelligent capable woman with common sense. She listens to what people are saying before contributing her own thoughts. I find this ability very rare especially in the lower classes. Pat’s husband is dead and Marlene is divorced. They travel together with other older women in similar circumstances; they find offers for che
ap holidays on the internet. They were all in Las Vegas only a few weeks ago.

  Shahzad woke up about mid-day and Marlene fell in love on sight. While he was washing, Pat asked, ‘Is he a man’s man or a women’s man’ slightly surprised I answered, ‘I don’t know, I suspect he would like to be a lady’s man. He spends all night in the clubs and I don’t have a clue what he gets up to. I don’t think he’s very interested in sex.’ Pat drinks Vodka and tonic and Shahzad organized the drinks and ice. We ate peach pie and plum pie under my pomegranate tree. Considering that only one year ago Shahzad was too embarrassed to even talk to a woman, he is now the party boy, posing for photographs laughing and charming all ladies. He was looking to self-conscious and nice, so I shouted, ‘For fucks sake, think kiss my ass and look sexy.’ for a second he looked menacingly in my direction and very sexy and Pat got it on camera, she said, ‘Did you see his eyes.’

  We discussed immigration and they both volunteered to help and Marlene said, ‘Can I swop him for my son, he’s a bastard’ they both thought he could be a model and I said, ‘He has no chance with those legs.’ Pat asked, ‘Where did you find him?’--- ‘In the park, it was starting to get cold, I could hardly leave him there’ Marlene said, ‘Can you find me one?’

  Vincent called to say good bye, he didn’t have time to play for us and they both looked horrified. After Vincent, had gone Marlene asked for the toilet and Shahzad jumped up saying ‘Vincent’ and ran to check the toilet. Marlene said, ‘Wet seat?’ I didn’t enlighten her. Shahzad fascinated them and impressed me, he handles himself very well in company and his slow English with his expressive eyes is entrancing.

  When I first met Marlene at Pat’s home she found my domestic situation hard to comprehend. That I should have lived with my mother and then continued living with my brother seemed not only unusual but wrong. In modern small homes, plus the importance of sex these days it is only inadequate people who stay at home. The driving force for independence is sex. In farming circles, because the houses are usually large it is still acceptable to stay at home until married but my sister-in-law had no intentions of enduring an extended family.

  I reminded Marlene of her dismay at me living with my Mother and gave her the photograph album of my life and home. For an ordinary working class woman, she recognized and understood the quality of my home and my life. She fully accepted my situation and understood that my sister-in-law had destroyed something that was not within her rights to change and had also deprived me of my home.

  Marlene likes having fun, she claims that on holiday she likes to take on a ‘persona’ and she wanted to be a sort of ‘fem-fatal’, Shahzad, much to my amusement and dismay joined in and they were trying to find her a suitable name, Shahzad made many suggestions, reeling off all the names outside the houses in the red-light district. Pat said ‘Auntie Yolande looked like a film star’ and Marlene thought she was ‘lovely.’

  September 23, 2011:

  Now I discover that Saki has been talking seriously about sex to Shahzad. He once confronted Shahzad with the words, “You are living with an Englishman” and he told Shahzad that he was living with an old Greek doctor. Saki has explained how he met his friend and they live together, they sleep in the same bed and they have sex. Saki also said that he likes sex and we must do what we must do because we only live once. Shahzad then admitted to Saki “Sebastian is just a little bit more than my friend.” Now I understand why Shahzad has been more honest and relaxed about our relationship.

  At first Shahzad was very happy about our relationship but I think mixing with his Pakistani friends and talking to Novak made him uncertain, because he found it necessary to lie. Since meeting Saki, Shahzad has also been much happier about house work. Saki has lived with his friend for six years, he likes life in the west, alcohol, going to discos and meeting girls. He’s happy about his sexual relationship with his doctor but this is because he gets an allowance. Shahzad has stopped mixing with his lower-class friends and he and Saki meet nearly every day. Saki also met Carla and all three went for a drink. Lucky girl, she probably thought she was in heaven but obviously had no idea of the reality, two boys in relationships with men out on the town with a girl.

  September 28, 2011:

  Claire returned from England today and Stuart tells me that every inhabitant of Greece is in debt to Europe for 250, 000 euros each. I fail to understand. There is no evidence of money having been spent in Greece and the welfare system is minimal. I have the strong feeling that they need Mrs. Thatcher to instruct them on running a country on the principal of household expenses.

  One clue came from a story by Savas. “One old Greek Queen borrowed one thousand euros from each of three separate banks and spent it all on Albanian rent boys. When the banks asked for their loans to be paid back, the old Queen replied, “I don’t have any money” and when the banks objected, he said, “you gave me the money and what can you do about it?” and he is now paying his debts off at one euro a month. So, the economic power of Germany is contributing to the welfare of rent boys and the massive debts are being paid back at one euro a month.

  Claire is the only person who can win my court case for me because she witnessed everything including the drugging but she is now trying to claim that John was just a holiday fling and she hardly knows him. Also, her memory is very selective. I believe that she would make a dangerous witness; she is always defensive. It is a disturbing situation when one feels that the only person who knows the truth can’t be trusted or relied on.

  Shahzad is telling me about the boys he has loved. He was once laughing to himself and I asked, “What’s amusing you” and he told me this story. “We were in the buffalo house and we had one gay boy and we were smoking Hashish and touching him. The boy took his trousers off and I put my trousers down and was fucking him. Then an old woman shouted, ‘I will tell the police’ I pulled my trousers up but the boy ran away. He looked so funny Sebastian running down the road with no trousers.”

  Yesterday he told me about the time when he was in love at School. His slow English and shining eyes paint a beautiful picture. He told me, “I once loved a boy at school. My father said that I could leave school so I got up very early every morning and went to school to be with my friend. I had loved my friend so much that another friend helped me to put a spell on him, to make him love me. My friend wrote my name on a piece of paper and we put the paper into a can of fruit juice and then gave it to the boy to drink. One week later the boy loved me and we were always together on our bicycles, laughing and being happy”. I asked, “Did you ever kiss your friend or touch him” ---“Oh no, we were just very happy, he was so very, very, beautiful” all his stories about Pakistan are about unrequited love or boys being raped and men going to prison.

  He told me another story, “One group of boys loved one very beautiful rich boy. They asked him to be their friend and then they all fucked him and he had to go to hospital. The boy’s brother came home from Karachi and he beat all the boys and they went to prison for twenty years.”

  Shahzad told me about one girl who was always walking passed his house and he often saw her from his roof, “One day we met by chance. She wanted to meet me in secret. So, we planned to meet and she asked me, “Am I not beautiful?” I agreed that she was beautiful and so she asked me, “Then why don’t you make love to me”. ‘The police and both families were searching for us. When I got home my father demanded to know what had happened’---, “We just talk and nothing happened Father. I smoked too much Hashish and I couldn’t do anything”.

  Pakistan sounds like a world obsessed with forbidden desires. Shahzad told me about a boy and girl who fell in love and they ran away together. Both families found them and shot the girl and chopped the boy’s ears, nose and dick off. Girls are always held responsible, because it is accepted that it is a man’s nature to try and seduce a female. It is for this reason that girls must not attract the attention of men because girls must always protect the honor of their family.

/>   October 1, 2011:

  The Gypsies are leaving and returning to Athens. Their children beg all summer and they survived the winter in Athens, probably dealing in scrap. They are all small but beautiful. The girls of one family give money to Novak just for a laugh, usually foreign coins. The children are confident, strong and well-coordinated. Boys as young as eight, swagger with their shirts off flirting because they are aware that their bodies will one day be objects of desire. There is one ‘family that seems to be more honest and their children are very gifted. The eldest girl has, over the summer, developed from a girl into a beautiful woman. She takes care of all her brothers and sisters with consummate ease. They have very big families and the children are successful at begging and stealing.

  I once saw a Gypsy mother with a table cloth spread on the floor under the trees above the rocky gay beach. She seemed to be offering coffee to all the gays and in addition, her sons. The boys from six years upwards were on top of the cliff waving to the gays below, bending down and pointing at their assess. Nobody was interested. It was probably a scam anyway; an enraged Gypsy father would probably appear demanding money.

  October 5, 2011:

  Novak checked the internet and my piano sold for 18,500 pounds, just one bid above the reserve. This is the nature of the Art market. It is possible that the Chinese did not bid and the dealers had made previous arrangements between themselves. Novak mentioned that none of the Steinway made money and the untouched superb example did not sell. He did not think to check properly and make a note of the prices. I asked him but he didn’t bother, he is so very obliging yet lacking in awareness.