Camping!

Camping was fun. I mean, I've only ever been on school camps or karate camps before - all of which were organised to the point of tedium. You know, it gets annoying when there's a planned activity for every single minute of your day. 

Not that I'm saying I don't like doing things when I'm camping - but the fact that school camps have activities that are compulsory just sucks. Karate camp, I actually didn't mind so much, because the activity was training - and I looked forward to that. But school was always some crappy, team-building thing. Snore.

Anyway, this camp was good. It was just a bunch of teenagers, and a lot of fun. Everyone brought stuff and we had everything we needed - which wasn't really good planning, but rather the fact that we had packed a million things and some of them came in handy.

We were in a national park that was right on the beach, which was awesome. Really nice to hear the waves while you're drifting off - kinda reminds me of home, in Cape Town.

We were there for about four nights, which was, in my opinion, the best amount of time. By the fourth night, I was totally ready to go home. It went nicely though. On the first two nights, we got really drunk. On the third night, we went to a restaurant in a nearby town (It was only about 20 minutes driving distance). And on the last night, we went to the nearby town again, to see a movie - Kick-Ass, which is absolutely AWESOME, btw.

Anyway, it was cool. I feel like it got me closer to my cousin, and a couple of her friends.

I spent the second night in one of the tents with the gay guy that she's friends with. No - not that kind of night, in case you're thinking that. He still doesn't know I'm gay, because I haven't told her (My cousin) yet. We talked tho. He's really cool, and not just because he's cute. (Although I'm not going to deny that that is a factor) And he just broke up with his boyfriend, so... yeah... maybe...

But, anyway, I had lots of fun. Although it was a bit weird dealing with people for that extended period of time. And speaking of that, I've developed a new drinking game:

The Socially Awkward Drinking Game!

Here are the rules:

1) If confronted by an awkward silence - take a swig of your drink.

2) If sitting in a group, and you have gone the last 3 minutes without so much as contributing one word - take a swig of your drink.

3) If someone tells an inside joke that you don't understand - take a swig of your drink.

4) If you tell a joke, and no one laughs - take a swig of your drink.

4a) If you end up being the only one laughing at your own joke - make that swig a double one.

I'm working on more rules, but I'll think about them later, next time I'm drinking in social situations. It's quite a nice game. You have to be socially awkward to play, but it works out well - the drunker you get (as a result of the game) the less awkward you become, hence the less you drink - so it definitely burns itself out.

Anyway, that's that. One more thing about camp - it helped me come to an important realisation:

I don't need to be here, in Aus, as desperately as I thought I did. I really wanted to study here and end up living here, but I've realised that that's just due to envy of my cousins life. And, even if I do end up living here, it definitely won't be like her life - she's got a pair of stable parents to back up, which I don't. 

But my parents aren't going to change, wherever I choose to be in the world. So, wherever I choose can be anyway - America, The UK, whatever. Sure, Aus may end up being the best - Like America but smarter, Like the UK but warmer and nicer. But, even if I do end up here, that shouldn't mean I shouldn't got to the other places, and spend time there.

Anyway, done blogging.

OB:

Spelling/Grammar/Clarity. I still play the socially awkward drinking game. I'm pretty much world champ, at this point.

Clubbing

Yeah, well, I was thinking about this last night, while I was out doing - guess what - CLUBBING!

I went out with a whole group of people, because it was my cousin's friend's 18th, so yeah. It... well, it was clubbing. I'm not a huge fan. Don't get me wrong, the excitement of it all was good enough. You know, going out, seeing the city, socialising.

I think one of the main issues is that I should be out of the closet, and gay clubbing - I'd probably enjoy that a lot more. Because clubbing seems to focus, mostly, on sex. Okay, not exclusively, but I don't get why you'd want to dance to horrible boom-boom-boom-BOOM music if you're not planning on getting laid (with varying degrees of success.) 

It makes zero sense otherwise. Sure, it's nice to dance... nice-ish. And to drink. But, meh, they aren't that fun, aren't they? Not when you remove the possibility of sex.

My cousin openly hates clubbing. And maybe that's good - maybe I should be more like that. Because I really pretend to have a lot more fun then I actually do, which is probably not good...

All I know is that when I'm out clubbing, I'm not always having this "AWESOME TIME" people seem to talk about. For most of the night I just feel awkward... and... meh. It's like I'll always be the little fat kid with acne and glasses that the other little boys laugh at because he doesn't play sports....

Anyway, let me not reminisce about my disappointing childhood...

But, yeah, the point seems to be this: Get drunk, get laid. Tada. That's it. The dancing is just more of a facilitator of getting laid. So, naturally, at a straight club, it wouldn't hold any appeal for me. Although, I've never been to a gay club, so I wouldn't know, at this point, whether I'd find it just as annoying and pointless.

Anyway, to be less vague, this "city" is Sydney, and we were in Kings Cross - the red light district - woo-hoo. I'm shocked, actually - you come to Aus, and there are all these rules and regulations, ad nauseam, and then I go on a tour and: "This is Kings Cross, the red light district, where prostitution is legal." WILD.

Anyway, before we went clubbing, we went to a strip club. God, I've got to come out - not that it'll prevent me from being dragged places like that - the gay guy in the group still got dragged to it. But, yeah, at least I'll stop wondering if I should maybe pretend that I like it stuff like that.

Because I really don't.

Luckily tho, I was spared the trouble by the strip club being ABSOLUTELY HILARIOUS.

It was basically just this row of benches in front of a single stage, and there was one dancer... a youngish girl. Anyway, the reason her act was funny, and not sexy, was that she had like 5 moves... and she just did them over and over and over...

1)She'd do that thing (that strippers do) where she'd swing around the pole, legs in the air (so basically like holding on to the pole with her arms and... I dunno... clamping on it with her... legs, I hope)

2)Then she'd turn upside down, and do a hand-stand for about a full minute...

3)Then she'd come to the front of the stage, lie down (crotch facing the crowd) and stick her legs up in the air and.... gyrate... for a couple of minutes...

4)Then she'd come into the isle between the benches, and shake her... stuff... all around... again, for another couple of minutes....

5)Then she'd.... Go back to the stage and start over!

And, to top it all off, she had this look of abject boredom on her face the whole time.

It was so funny. Yet, at the same time, I was almost as bored as she looked. I think I would have felt that way, even if I was straight.

But, yeah.... it was also kind of sad. Sure, I'm all for strippers rights. And I'm of the opinion that it's only degrading if you let it be. And.... from what I saw... what that girl was doing, was degrading.

Seriously, if I was going to be a stripper... even a male one... I know it's a long shot, but just follow me on this one... I'm sure the last thing I'd feel is boredom. Yes, you can feel nervous, or terribly depressed that you have to resort to it, or you can even embrace it - as an expression of your freedom and independence etc... But, meh, to get bored while you're doing it. That actually breaks my heart a little bit.

Otherwise, the night was good. I wore fancy-assed shoes, that I really shouldn't have, because I was the ONLY ONE wearing fancy-assed shoes, and they KILLED my feet.

Hmmmm, well, that concludes my blog for today. I'm going camping soon - and I'm hoping to write something about that once I'm back in the land of interwebz and eklektricity. I'm so proud of me, for writing this soon after my other post. I'm going to try and keep this up. It's really therapeutic.

And a little shout-out to my hater, who has nothing better to do than "Looking forward to reading [my] blog to see if this(the email he sent me about my story - which he read the latest chapter of, even after "writing it off" as a "lost cause") makes it [here]." Congrats - you've got a mention in my blog now. Asshole.

Probably would have been better to not have said anything at all... but then, I dunno, it might seem like I've seen his message, been hurt by his words, and INTENTIONALLY left him out of my blog.... So I decided to err on the side of bitchiness.

And I fear this may turn into a mud-slinging match, depending on his nature - yes, his and not mine, because if it was purely up to my nature - it's would definitely turn into a huge mudslinging match. 

And now I'm really done blogging.

OB:

Spelling/Grammar/Clarity/Embarrassment Management. Apologies for the stripper thing. I really feel like sex workers deserve a lot more respect than they currently get from society. But it was a poignant moment for me - to realise that a job like that can, at the end of the day, just be a job.