The Golden Cock: Keep Your Hand on Your Dong

Motorcycles are sexy-fying, don't you think?

An acronym. What are we? Children? Virgins? Or Prudes?

Not exactly the sort of "table" I was expecting to see in a gay bar...

Hanoi has a kickass drinking scene. The previous night saw me competing against Grace, a lesbian expat who works in an NGO, on who could finish his / her bia hoi tower first.

Now, "bia hoi" means fresh beer usually made in the back room of the bars that sell them. They're light, easy to drink and dirt-cheap. Each "tower" has its own tap and can usually fill up to four large pints.

Grace won.

"Is this 'The Hyperactive Gay Boy' we've all heard so much about?" Bryce, a ruggedly handsome South African NGO consultant teased.

I was horrified and humiliated, then disappointed and all-out depressed. My reputation in Hanoi collapsed before it could even take off.

So you can just imagine how excited I was to restore some of my pride when our little group (Chris, myself and a boisterous bunch of fun, loud, opinionated, easygoing, thoughtful, generous expats plus their partners / exes / friends-with-benefits) agreed to meet the next night in Hanoi's only gay bar, The Golden Cock. Between street cock sellers and an all-out penis-referencing homo hangout, Hanoi seems to have figured out how money is made. It's good to see.

A pool table greeted me upon entering The Golden Cock. Makes sense, I thought. After all, gay boys like dark places, flat surfaces, long sticks, balls and a hole in every corner. 

Our group immediately pairs up, matches are registered on the blackboard - and lo and behold - I am once again pitted against Grace. I feel sweat gather in my armpits. I put on my bravest, most beatific I'm-not-worried-at-all-so-bitch-get-ready-to-lose smile.

Hanoi is even more sloshed than Hong Kong. It seemed as though beers kept getting thrust into my fist even before I could finish my bottle. I had to keep up because another drink for one means another round for everyone. We were, in effect, drinking as fast as our group's fastest drinker. I had automatically assumed it'd always be me, but look what happened the previous night.

When finally it came to my and Grace's turn to play, the music stopped abruptly and The Golden Cock was plunged into complete darkness. 

"Brownout," I smiled to myself, somewhat relieved that power outages, which are commonplace in the Philippines, happen in Vietnam, too. Only difference was, nobody seemed in a hurry to find torches or switch on emergency lamps. In fact, it was eerily quiet. 

I was half-expecting to hear telltale, rhythmic slapping sounds that inadvertently punctuate the silence where total darkness and gay boys are present. Instead, there was only a thick and tense absence of sound. Kind of what I always imagined being in a soundproof booth in a beauty pageant would be like during the final Q&A. Nobody even dares to breathe. 

Blades of light from outside sliced through the drawn curtains and crevices. People instinctively squeezed themselves into tighter masses of dark invisibility. I suddenly realized what this was all about.

Curfew.

I felt around for the familiar comfort of Chris' hand, which, thankfully, I found. He gave my hand a little squeeze.

A few minutes later, the music faded in slowly and (very dim) light started bleeding through the bulbs yet again. The door and the blinds stayed shut.

I played against Grace.

And I got clobbered yet again.

She marched towards the blackboard and gleefully crossed my name out, like the name of all unlucky players before me.

She winked, then bought me another beer.     

Lebian = 2, Hyperactive Gay Boy = 0.