I am a dirty, crusty, unwashed, patchouli-stank hippie. Given my blonde dreads, my penchant for roots reggae, and my total desire to understand, but complete ignorance of, the black man’s struggle, most would call me a “trust-afarian”. Which is totally true…..my parents have my bank account on speed-dial to send me the money I need to continue my lazy, mooching, backpacking lifestyle. In keeping with my general habit of cultural appropriation, all I have to say is, “Don’t hate the player, hate the game!”
But this story isn’t about me. This story is about the only class of person more hated than rich, white kids who like to pretend that they’re poor: the foreign expat. Like most STDs and fungi, they tend to sprout up in warm, moist regions. They lead a fun-loving lifestyle of swilling sugary alcoholic drinks, sitting hand in wrinkly skinned hand with their live-in boyfriend/girlfriend, who is also in their later years (life is too much fun for commitments), and regaling anyone around with their tales of this one secluded, beautiful beach they know on the Mosquito Coast or that one bar in Panama with the world’s best Mai Tai.
Just as there is a key to being a hipster (the unyielding denial of their hipsterdom), the calling card of a true expat is found when asking about their adopted country: a banner-carrying expat talks out of both sides of the mouth, at once glorifying their carefree lifestyle there while at once disparaging the natives of said country and generalizing about their flawed “national characteristics”, so primitive when compared to the ways of the First World.
The only flaw here is the weather. And this dude RUINING my picture.
Nadia was one such expat. I met her and her live-in boyfriend, Vlad, on the beach in one of my usual Caribbean beachside haunts. After a few hours, they invited me to stay with them, and since they had a cabana right near the beach, I graciously accepted. See, I had pissed Dad off the day before, and he had made one of his usually-empty threats to cut off my cashflow. He’d eventually come around, but for the moment, I was broke.
Over more and more drinks (and about 2 joints), I got to know my hosts. With Vlad, I really just observed him because he didn’t talk much. He preferred to chain-smoke cigarettes and sip Cuba Libres.
Nadia was truly the chatty one, and this increased as she grew more and more intoxicated. Her back story really wasn’t clear, but with expats, they never are. She was originally from Moscow, which I had already guessed by her accent, working for years as a Russian language teacher to save up enough for the escape to her tropical paradise. She had a grown son my age back in Russia, who would visit here and there.
The front porch….where all good chats are had.
Listening to her, shit just didn’t add up. She had saved all this money to retire around the age of 50 on a teacher’s salary?! She had also had kids (a huge expense as Dad loves to tell me), and beyond that, let’s just say she lived an extravagant lifestyle. Vlad actually oftentimes called her a “raven” when she pissed him off taking too long to get ready. This moniker came from folk knowledge they had acquired from a childhood in the non-Western world: ravens like shiny things, and Nadia definitely liked herself some flashy jewels.
Once Nadia passed out, which I learned was her MO over the following days, I got to know Vlad over a Cuba Libre and another joint. Based on what I could gather, Nadia appeared to be more of a companion than a soulmate. As she slept, Vlad seemed to seethe with vituperative contempt towards his expat wifey. He grew up behind the Iron Curtain, but not in Russia, and he noticeably suffered silently at Nadia’s superior country microaggressions. “These fuckers still look at us like their slaves, like we are all just dumb peasants. Even people like her. They just don’t notice it.”
Not a bad place to nap.
When I would say a sincere word in her defense, Vlad would take a long drag of his cigarette, stare intensely into my eyes, and with a quickly-cracked half-smile, shake his head slightly and say, “No, man. You apparently don’t know her.” He soon proved to be right….I really didn’t know her.
Soon I got a taste. First, let’s start with the fact that she took getting stealthily fucked up (and the ensuing belligerence) to a level of artistry. Vlad hated when she would get too drunk because she would always get loud, do something stupid, or be downright mean. While Vlad seemed to be able to regulate her intake while around her, she was unfazed, waiting until he went to the store for cigarettes to pop some prescription meds and take a quarter-bottle of rum to the neck.
After this she would promptly go to sleep in ways that were hilariously comical for me, yet infuriating for Vlad. One time I found her upstairs on the bed, passed out sideways, still in her miniskirt and with both stilettoed feet solidly on the ground next to the bed. Another time she got fucked up and strung her hammock across the living room. For hours she lay, rolled up in the hammock, with Vlad and I having to walk around her ass to do anything.
Later I found that Nadia asleep was preferable to Nadia awake. Passed out, at least she was quiet. Awake, she morphed into a vicious Harpy. She would praise her glorious nation in front of Vlad, who came from a place where Russia had done some serious damage. She would speak to Vlad only in Russian, yet his stony face would never betray his pure hatred for having been forced as a child to learn the language of his oppressors.
Worst of all, it soon became obvious that Nadia’s inebriation goal was always to chip away at Vlad until she got some kind of reaction. This was a sure thing since the night almost always ended in an ad hominem attack against him. Vlad had not had much luck with a series of business ventures outside of his home country, and this was her favorite topic.
To add insult to injury, she would call him “Vova”, the Russian nickname for Vladimir, which is not used in his country. This one moniker was the epitome of her manipulation: at once cutesy as well as putting Vlad in his place next to her glorious heritage. Russia to her was supreme, and Vlad as the inferior would have to submit to her “cultural capital”. Each night she spewed this poison, the rum-drenched droplets sprinkling Vlad’s expressionless face.
Here’s a nice picture. Before shit gets real.
Inevitably she would have one too many, and start going on and on. As she would near an acute level of shit-facery, suddenly her body’s computer would boot up from standby mode, executing the command to turn her bitch knob to 1000. “Voooovaaaa! You….are a FUCKING…FAILURE!!!!! You FAIL at EVERYTHING you do!!!!!!”
Hearing this, I almost spit out my drink. Vlad was a cool guy, and although his hands were large and not very aerodynamic, he looked adept at the pimp-smack, surely causing the perfect jingling sound with every link of the thick, gold bracelet wrapped around his hairy, Eastern arm.
Fully preparing myself to witness some light domestic violence, my face started to get hot as I wondered should I get involved, should I call the police, should I leave first THEN call the police…….and so on and so forth. Suffice it to say, I was silently freaking the fuck out. Vlad’s eyelids dulled with his characteristic sleepy rage, and he took a long drag of his cigarette.
They say eyes are a window to a man’s soul, but if I had a stopwatch, the length of time Vlad sucked each puff on his cigarette was telltale. Scientists would be able to predict Vlad’s degree of rancor as accurately as they predict lunar eclipses.
After expelling what appeared to be a garbage bag’s volume of thick smoke, his eyes narrowed even more. In the quiet, measured voice of a doctor informing a patient that they have cancer, and a quick come-hither motion with an open hand, he said, “Keep talking….you keep talking.” Move over Iceberg Slim, Vlad don’t let lip stand, but never ruffle the wrist band strong on the pimp hand.
And that was that…..for now.
To Be Continued…
Tip #23: People can turn wicked when inebriated. Nobody wants to go to a foreign hospital because of a stray punch. Oh, and don’t hit people…no matter what.
–Jaden (32), Weston, MA, staying never ashy, always classy in the Belize Cayes