Thursday, January 17, 2008

"Just a man I met in the bathroom dear..." Gay Immigrant gaydar

A few times in my life I seem to have incorrectly set off people's gay immigrant gaydar. That is to say, I have sometimes been accosted by recently landed homosexual immigrants. Now, I don't know for sure that they're recent additions to the country , I'm going on the broken english for that one, but their sexual preference is pretty obvious. And I should state that I don't give a rat's ass if someone is homosexual, or not born here. We're all homo sapiens(well, most of us).

On a particularly memorable occasion my wife (girlfriend at the time) was there to help set the situation straight (straight, hehehehe). I was headed for the bathroom at the Rideau center McDonalds and this black guy leaning against the wall outside the can followed me in. I headed for the urinals and I noticed that he was in there with me by the door, back to the mirror and he's staring at me. Of course I couldn't go. I thought then that he was gonna try and mug me, cause we were all alone in there. I was way bigger than he was so I stared back at him and tried to look all quietly menacing with my fanny pack and all. Instead he starts talking to me in broken english and he wants me to come to his apartment and be friends. Still not convinced this is a not a prelude to a mugging I pretend to finish at the urinal and I ask him to get out of my way so I can get to the sink.

I still had to go to the bathroom dammitt! But the body has this way of shutting the mechanism down and say to your brain "Not now! Pee later! You might have to run! or fight!, or maybe you can do all three at the same time in a few seconds, we'll see what happens next!"

So I went to the sink closest to the door and he starts again "Just come to my place, it close, we be friends my freind, you not like, you go.." Ok.. I get it.. Relieved that there's to be no mugging I break into a smile which turns out to be a mistake because he's looking at me through the mirror and smiles too and he's got these yellow stained teeth and he think I'm considering the proposition. SO I try to get all serious "No no no, thank you, that's ok.." and I leave. But he follows. He's in step with me like we're buddies or something and he's saying "Very close and we will go ok, ok my freind??"

"No thanks" I say "I have someone waiting for me here, see you later (ack, why did I say that!)

"Later.. OK OK my freind!" He goes. "When I meet you here?" Crap! I see my girlfriend. She'll save me. I ignore the guy and meet up with her. My bathroom buddy is right beside me.

"Who's that?" she asks. Maybe she thinks it's a long lost childhood friend with bad teeth or something.

"Just a man I met in the bathroom.. He's kind of following me.." I explain. The bathroom buddy smiles again. ugg. I tell him "Bye" and we turn right. He sticks to my side and says:
"Live over there, close my freind." I stop.
"Then we're going this way, and I'm not your friend." and I take my girlfriend's hand and we walk to the left , in the opposite direction.

He says , "I Can go that way, my freind." and follows again.

So I try to spell it out. I point to my girlfreind and say, with plenty of hand actions "Me, her, together, boyfriend-girlfriend.. you GO! No friend!" and my girlfriend decides to be funny and say to me "I've never met you before in my life" and she unclasps my hand and she walks away towards the market by herself.

"Now is not the time to be funny!" I call out after her. To my bathroom friend I then said "Fuck off!" and hurried after her (in search for a different bathroom) with people beginning to stare at us.

I never saw him again. I was beginning to understand a little bit about what it was like to be a woman. Malfunctioning gay immigrant gaydar.