The Beat September 2002

Call me a butterfly, but today is Friday and I can‘t handle not yet having plans for the evening. Tentative ideas with various friends are certainly in the works, but the problem with tonight is, well, I‘m feeling quite lost. The moribund relationship with the guy I dig will end when he goes home in a couple of weeks. My best friend flew back to Canada at 11:00 this morning, and 12 other people I‘ve been quite close with have vanished over the course of this month. Where the hell is everybody???

Not 6 weeks ago, I was fitfully blubbering away in the lap of my friend after an all-nighter with the gang on Gwanganli. ’Sob and sniff‘ I snorted, “Everyone I know is leaving! I‘m going to be all alone!”

She said that I needn‘t worry, that we‘d be friends forever, we‘ll see each other in Canada, yada yada, and I sucked back some sadness with another tallboy. I knew all she said was true; it is the harsh reality of leaving loved ones behind, and outlasting the people you come to care about here.

It‘s been a helluva lot more than the chance encounter with Mr. Wonderful at Incheon Airport on a 4-hour layover. It‘s spending even a few encounters with interesting and wonderful people, only to learn they‘re taking off in a matter of weeks. It‘s the friend you‘ve known for 6 months that suddenly does a midnight run. People flit by like trees when I barrel down a highway. The speed and suddenness with which people make the “final exit” back to the motherland makes me want to create lasting impressions on almost everyone I know, whether they‘re my best friend or an occasional drinking buddy at the Rodeo.

The meat of the problem is that most of my friends here don‘t come from anywhere near me. Many of them aren‘t even from the same country as I. Now it‘s a matter of jumping a bus or the subway across town to hook up. But when I leave, I too will be leaving friends that I may never see again. Somehow, I don‘t think that unemployment or minimum wage work back home will fund my trip to visit my buddies in Australia or South Africa. The same goes for them I guess.

Now I start to think of all the friends I left back home. Most of them don‘t have a computer or an email address, so correspondence happens when I get around to calling. Most of them have never been outside Ontario, let alone Canada. They‘re running farms, raising kids, serving tables, or working for the Man. They really have no concept of the life I‘m leading over here, and sadly, I don‘t think they really care.

When I call and say “What‘s new?” it‘s usually something like, “So and so wrote off his pickup,” or a report on Monday night‘s game, or “Went to Ottawa for the weekend.” I feel awkward when they ask, ”What‘s new in your world?” and I say, ”Oh you know, I went to Cambodia…” I love those people as I have all my life, but I no longer have much in common with them except a love for Jamiroquai, John Player‘s Special and beer (any flavour).

The friends I‘ve met here are more fun and interesting than anyone I‘ve ever met. Back home in the sticks, the good ol‘ boys like to sit around and clean their shotguns and talk about heifers and Dodge Rams. The people I hang with here talk about art, culture, literature and politics. The thought of going back to the land of John Deere tractors and Winchester 30-odd-30‘s sends yet another shudder through my spine…

…but so does the prospect of opening my e-mail to receive one more letter saying, “I made it home safe and man, the Molson tastes good.”