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September 20, 2007

Cocaina

There are some days when I am just not that aware of the way I look. I have heard more than a few times in my life, "gee Jordan, you clean up real good." Never in my life would I have imagined to look like a drug addict.

The city of Logroño does a good job of hiding the real problems of the world beneath a veneer of old people sitting on park benches, bull fighting, and good cheap red wine. People aren't as readily assorted into groups of savory and unsavory. To the uninitiated such as myself all people just sort of look "Euro": they've all got fancy glasses and modern piercings.

Luis is a work-a-holic. I imbibe greatly from the font of occupation, but Luis must have gills. Here in the city, there is one dinner service during the week. If you don't find your one place to eat by 11:00p you likely are going for cold cuts and stale bread. I didn't want any more cold cuts and stale bread.

The boss of the office had told us of a place that serves great "kebabs" late in town. A "kebab" is actually a shwarma or gyro sandwich (sometimes I've even just seen them referred to as a türk!) We received walking directions and set out at about 11:30p.

We had no luck in finding the "kebab" heaven we were promised. We walked a little farther than we thought we should of and ended up on a quiet street in a "kebab" stall with a Latin American man badly shaving pale strips of gyro onto a greasy pita. No thanks. We left and figured that we must have got the wrong place and I offered to stop a local who to inquire which way to the good "kebabs."

The first guy I stopped looked reasonable enough: tall thin, not badly dressed, 20s. I started slowly in Spanish but it seemed he wasn't really listening to me. Were those bags under his eyes? he put his finger to his nose and said, "¿Quires?" He made a little snorting sound.

I thought he had a little tick or something. I responded, "uh, quiero a comer un bueno kebab. ¿Donde...?" I didn't even get to "donde" before he interrupted me and this time more loudly saying, "¿Quires?" while touching his nose and making the funny little snort.

Luis broke in and explained in rapid-fire Spanish that we really just wanted a "kebab" but the guy wasn't having it. All I caught was "quires...cocaina" and Luis saying "no, gracias!" The man shrugged his little European shrug and slinked on.

I laughed all the way up the street. Ha ha ha! Cocaine? Do we look like we use cocaine?

Giving up on "kebabs" we stopped at a little bar that served paella. We ordered and sat down. I was still chuckling about our encounter. Luis said to me, "maybe he thought you wanted cocaine because you look really terrible...really sick or something."

I stood up and looked at myself in the mirror. It was true! I looked awful. My hair was unkempt, I had a bright red nose and dark bags under my eyes. It was the face of a terrible head cold, but it might have well been the face of a coke addict with a terrible head cold. I needed drugs, but not narcotics.

Today I look marginally better. Thank goodness nobody has stopped me and asked me if I need anything elicit!

Posted by jordanh at September 20, 2007 6:39 PM

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