Feb 4, 2008
You never know, as the Public Trust will assure you, what life will throw at you.
An entomological friend of ours was ill advised enough to take his wife with him on an insect collecting trip to Rarotonga. To his surprise she quickly wearied of scrambling through orchards and jungle after traces of drab and tiny insects, and found sunbathing on the beach more to her taste. There she found good company with a couple of young men of the gay persuasion and they became firm enough friends for her to be invited by them to attend a big fancy dress party that they were planning in Auckland on their return. Her husband was disinclined to go, and she was disinclined to take him. So we got invited.
Neither homosexuality nor fancy dress was obligatory, but I had bought an arab cloak as a souvenir when I was in Syria, complete with the tea towel thing that you drape over your head, and the rope made of camel hair that holds it in place. As it seemed unlikely that I should ever have another occasion to wear it, I thought it might as well serve on this occasion. In the event it didn't stand out among the elaborate costumes that some of the poofs had hired, and in fact it attracted more attention when we pulled up at traffic lights on our way to the party. Osama bin Laden was not well known in those days, but motorists were nevertheless taken aback to see Ibn Saud or Lawrence of Arabia sharing the traffic ways with them. These days they would have called the anti terrorist squad.
The organisers of the party were clearly quite a cultured lot. It was held in a stately old home whose great hall was diffused by soft music from a small orchestra, and which was tastefully decorated with bells and pompoms and soft coloured lights. We were ushered onto a fine carpet which led to a kind of double throne arrangement from which the presiding couple, dressed as king and queen, smiled us a welcome from a raised dais. Then we were handed a drink and we made light conversation until all the guests were assembled, when his majesty made a brief speech of welcome and the royal couple led us through to a sumptuous buffet.
Most of the guests had gone to significant trouble and expense with their costumes, so the hall was aglitter with pierrots and gladiators, knights and cavaliers, in all manner of silks and finery. One of the guests, who must have known something about Islam, asked me in passing if I was a sunny or a shite, and another, observing me devouring a slice of ham asked "And how are you enjoying the pig flesh, Efendi?" They were a cheerful lot.
As the evening wore on the music increased in volume and urgency, and the and the party took on more of the atmosphere of a slave market. Those on offer would prance up onto a central table and disport themselves in time to the music, so as best to display their charms, until an onlooker was sufficiently aroused, or perhaps until he was driven to distraction, when he would gather up the performer, and bear him away out into the great outdoors. One young Perseus, in golden helmet and green and golden cloak, was chatting amicably to us, when quite suddenly the fit took him and he pranced up onto the table where he executed a few elegant steps and pirouettes, before throwing off his cloak to reveal a finely wrought young body clad only in a G string, and painted from top to toe entirely in green.
Needless to say he was grabbed almost immediately by a big fellow who hoisted him on his shoulder and bore him away, his green legs kicking rather half heartedly I must say, into the darkness.
Little by little the numbers dwindled and the guests dispersed, some it would seem being taken home by their mothers that had brought them. And we went home too, bidding a gracious farewell to the king and queen.
No, you never know what life will throw at you.