Surreal San Diego

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  San Diego, California, United States
Wednesday, May 28, 2008

The return to San Diego marked the end of our whirlwind roadtrip which took in four states and a few thousand miles. Sorry global warming, I promise I'll plant some trees. Back at Jackie's a random party emerged from no where an I was introduced to 'beer pong' a college institution and yet another game designed to ensure that all players receive the maximum blow to their liver. It was fun. Along with a random assortment of San Diego crew was one of Nancy's friends Sean who had moved from New York to San Diego. He's a pretty cool guy who's doing an internship at a snowboarding company, surfing everyday and occasionally performing as a rapper around the area. It turned out that the following night he was competing in a battle in a random bar. I asked if we could come along and after a moments thought he agreed. His pause was clarified when he said with genuine concern... "you have to know that you will be the only white people there. Just so that you know, It's in a bit of a rough area". I looked to my New York ghetto hardened friends who showed little concern for Sean's comments and it was settled, we'd go check out his performance the next day.

The next day emerged a little hazy and we headed down to Pacific Beach to swim and generally laze about. I expressed concern at peoples lack of any concern for the sun, especially at two of the girls whose Irish heritage was clear beyond the shirt with a four leaf clover. They responded by mocking me as I liberally applied sunscreen to me ears. They got burnt. I didn't. Karma wins again. Sucked in them.

The evening dawned... interesting selection of words me... and we dressed up ready to get all gangsta. Which translates to me dressing in the same clothes I've been wearing since I left Perth and everyone else actually dressing up. Especially Nancy who, buoyed by the concerns of Jackie about her 'legit' ID, wanted to look of age. Namely the arbitrary 21 years old. As a side note, they can vote at 18, die for their governments absurd wars at 18, have sex at 16 but not drink until they're 21. Oh and did I mention they elected George Bush TWICE! Crazy ass Americans. I love em. Anyways... five of us piled into Jackie's car and hit the road towards the eastern suburbs of San Diego. Jackie and Tasha, our SD locals, commented that they'd never heard of the suburb we were headed to. It soon became evident why. As we drove into the suburb I noted the barred windows and doors of every building. The populace also changed and the cliche blonde haired, blue eyed white Californian was no where to be seen.

When, after a few wrong turns, we found the address of the bar and drove slowly into an expansive car park. The bar was on the corner in what looked like a side room to a dilapidated shopping center. As we drove into the carpark the amusement of a new suburb quickly turned to serious concern amongst all in the car. The discussions quickly centered around a few key comments including "I don't think this is a very good idea", "I'm really concerned about Mark" and "This really doesn't feel right". Now I'm pretty relaxed normally but the nervousness of my friends who knew what a rough neighborhood was like was starting to make me a little unsettled. It's difficult to set the scene but when we pulled up and I got out of the car the massive black guys drinking 40oz beers and smoking joints in the carpark burst out laughing. I really was the only white person there. Thankfully my exit from the car was followed by the remainder its occupancy which consisted of Ryan a tall stocky yet very American looking guy, Nancy who's half Japanese/could pass for Hispanic, Jackie who is actually Hispanic and Tasha a very white yet very American looking chick. I stood out more than all of them. Our concern quickly resulted in us all piling back into the car while Nancy called Sean to firstly see where the hell he was and secondly reprimanded him for sending us to one of the dodgeyest areas of SD. We quickly learned that he wasn't even there yet and a unanimous decision was made to get the hell out of there and to re-assess whether this 'cultural experience' was about to end in a 'hospital experience'. Just for a moment imagine every gangster film you've ever seen where the unwitting white guy, or black guy for that matter, is cut down in a hail of bullets for stepping into the wrong 'hood'. That is kind of how it felt. Contrary to the Hollywood cliche I think this was the movie where the white guy died in the opening scenes.

We drove down the street to a 'Gas station' or petrol station for the educated to buy some beer to calm the nerves. I'd have been better off speaking Spanish to the ladies behind the counter as my Australian English took some deciphering and my passport id seemed to completely throw them off. We jumped back into the car and headed to an empty carpark and parked under a light. By this stage everyone was extremely concerned about all of our safety and while I publicly said that I was up for whatever, my psychological stress had manifested to the point that my hands were shaking uncontrollably. Another phone call to Sean calmed things somewhat, more because he said he'd meet us in the carpark than from his "it'll all be cool" attitude about the situation. A few beers later Sean called and said he was there. So off we went.

Everyones nerves were on edge and as we again piled out of the car Nancy was immediately on the phone to Sean rattling off a series of  'where the f... is he?'. We spotted him near the door and our walk about 30m across the car park seemed to pass in slow motion. I was shit scared. This is when it became absolutely surreal. As we walked to the door this lovely little old black lady checked our id's and took the cover charge. When we walked into the bar and as my eyes adjusted to the lights, Nancy came over and talked me - it was all cool. Given the build up of the previous hour or so I was going to take a little more convincing... or alcohol, whichever came first. Incidental it was alcohol. Beer in hand we met Sean's girlfriend and his partner in rhyme Chad from Staten Island, New York. When I went for my next drink a big guy knocking back shots at the bar asked if i was there to compete in the rap battle... I responded with a nervous 'ah, no, people would laugh too hard, they'd think it was a comedy routine'. He laughed. I wasn't going to get shot tonight (hopefully).

Eventually we were all ushered into the backroom of this bar with a DJ booth at the front and a desk serving fried chicken at the back. I shit you not, fried chicken. The crowd hovered and a series of rappers including Sean and Chad got up and did their thing. It was absolutely surreal. You know the movie 8 Mile? I was there. Except I wasn't the white guy with rapping ability. That was Chad (Sean was Hispanic). The girls disappeared to the bar at some point and were apparently knocking back shots while I took in the rest of the performances. It was incredible. After they finished and the board of judges from a small time record label deliberated they presented the winner with some free studio time and encouraged everyone to network and 'get down wit some peeps'...

I took this opportunity to mingle and try not to get shot. I thought that the only way I could even explain slightly what this was like was to get some photos with me in them. Sean's girlfriend took no time in introducing me to some of the rappers and getting us to pose for photos. It was awesome. I ended up chatting with a few and it turns out one guy had been to Perth twice while he was serving in the military. It was weird. He also turned out to be relatively important in the hip hop world in San Diego and he insisted that the next time I was in SD that I give him a call and he'd 'hook me up'. Crazy.

After a few more beers and some mingling we headed out toward the car and were stopped by this big black guy who wanted to talk everything cliche Aussi. It started with him teaching me to talk ghetto and ended with me busting out some Hilltop Hoods rhymes while he beat-boxed (as posted on facebook). He couldn't beat-box for long because he burst out laughing. He pulled off his bling, a massive silver chain with a dollar sign on it, and put it over my head. "Yo, I don't need dis no mo. You owned that shit" he said (or something along those lines). Thanks to the hoods for that. After more playing around I returned the bling and we went on out way.

This really was one of the weirdest nights of my life. It started with probably on of the most scary experiences ever and ended up being amazing. I hardly think that my words can even convey the sense of doom or subsequent great time that we all ended up happening. After finding no bars open in SD and with early morning flights for Nancy, Ryan and myself we called it a night/early morning and headed back to Jackie's.

At some point the next morning I was awoken and driven to the airport. I bid Nancy and Ryan goodbye and proceeded through to my gate for a drunken hour and a half wait before my flight. I was off to staff training in Raleigh, North Carolina. A little tipsy and very tired but with an amazing preceding two weeks. Thanks to everyone.

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