Magic P@$$y

“ZERO!” I shouted at the heavyset bartender, in a circle of sweaty strippers.

It just happened, that was the exact moment the club’s techno music paused before another repetitive drop. The entire bar heard me with crystal clarity. When the beat continued its Gameboy-sounding drone, a few moments later, it was accompanied by the groans and angry sighs of the staff, shocked at my apparent audacity. Our bill was $4000. Allegedly.

The first time I attended Magic Pussy I thought it’d definitely be my last time. That was 15 years ago. I was young meat, only nineteen, and had purchased a plane ticket to Thailand on a whim. A lot of things about Bangkok had changed, but the bars in its Red Light district hadn’t changed a bit —not even the tacky red carpets. In fact, I doubt they even vacuumed. In the evening shadows, artistic-looking stains stood out, as if each had the ghost of Jackson Pollock. I held them responsible for the slightly nauseating sour aroma.

I was lucky the first time I attended Magic Pussy. I was in the awkward company of a dozen middle-aged white ladies —members of my tour group. Within their protective sphere, I safely watched the exotic shenanigans of strippers performing pussy-parlor tricks: lifting objects, opening beer bottles and the infamous Ping Pong routine. It
catered to crowds that came in thinking “Vaginas can’t grip pencils!” and then when they see it, exclaim “…but surely they can’t write anything!” But they can. In between these freaky acts, they dance as if it is any other strip-club. I pretended to be impressed with their dance skills. I didn’t want my entourage to think I was creepy. This time, however, Magic Pussy was a different beast. My girlfriend and I were led into the premise by a street promoter, like two innocent kittens coaxed up the stairwell with a can of tuna. To my delight, my girlfriend failed to identify what that fishy smell actually was.

Upon entering, and realizing it was the same bat cave I attended several years before, we were directed to our ringside seats. The street promoter, a ragged hustler in her fifties, asked if I’d buy her a beer, for her efforts. I gave her a look of annoyance and she scurried away like a rat exiting a maze, across the red carpet and down the stairwell. Despite being reassured by her that we were only committing to the price of our beers, two waitresses came over with their own shot-glasses and the four of us drank a quick toast.

Apparently, that service contributed to our $4000 tab.

What followed was the same series of schticks I was familiar with.

My girlfriend was horrified. Like a circus show, we watched a duet of dancers take turns popping balloons with a dart, shot across the room —thrown without using their hands. After a few rounds of this, we soon became aware of an argument ensuing between the staff and a nearby tourist group. The only other tourist group. That should have been our warning. Instead, we returned our Clockwork Orange eyes to the tigers onstage. One of them was seductively
pulling a rainbow-colored string of flags out of her mysterious moon canyon. Her Jaws-of-Life. The string grew surprisingly long until it stretched the perimeter of the entire stage. “Where was it all coming from?” one would reasonably ask oneself. It was as if a little leprechaun, behind her lip curtains, was quickly stitching the fabric
together. Unbeknownst to us, someone was adding that horror-show to our tab, too.

After the other tourist group stormed across the carpet and out the exit, we were the last remaining patrons enjoying the sights (and smells) of Magic Pussy. Without a word, one of the waitresses casually placed a ping-pong paddle on our table. Next, she retrieved a bowl of ping pong balls and placed it before a stripper who lay towards us. On her back and elbows, with legs outstretched, she looked as if preparing to give birth. The orange balls floated in water —or what I assumed was water.

“PPPPOP!”

Almost as soon as I picked up the paddle, an orange ball emerged like lightning from her Black-Hole and was headed directly towards us. Like an asteroid, it was followed by a tail of trailing water —or what I assumed was water. We watched it in slow motion for a few moments until my instincts took control and I plunged toward the incoming threat with my paddle. As I hit it (with an award-winning overhand, I might add), I turned to see my poor friend getting
soaked by water –or what I thought was water. I got wet by some of the collateral damage, too. I just hoped none of it got into my mouth. At any rate, the feeling of victory gave me the courage I needed to meet the next task: departing the premise without being ripped off. The truth was, we didn’t have any surplus cash to afford being scammed. We didn’t want to explain that to any Red Light district gangsters or police authorities, who may not speak English. With the exact amount of the price of our beers, we proceeded towards the bartender to close our business.

By that point, we’d already been challenged by various taxi drivers and food vendors with silly bills, so we were quite familiar with the cultural custom. This time would be no different. The bartender showed us the $4000 amount and the accompanying price-list as if the cheaply laminated paper was the supreme authority. Of course, we immediately challenged its validity, suggesting there must have been a mistake. She feigned confusion and admitted it was in Thailand dollars, which was significantly lower. Still, our drinks were only $200. This was when the cheesy techno beat began to build.

The bartender, hereafter called the Queen Hen, continued to calculate and recalculate the math for us. Her stripper chicks began to flock and gather under her wings. Ruffling each other’s feathers, they gave each other moral support, pecking at the drama like chicken pellets. The Queen Hen returned to the outstanding total on the paper but her math skills didn’t impress us. I insisted that the lady assured us we were only responsible for our drinks: our verbal
contract.

“I don’t know what woman you’re talking about…” the Queen Hen countered, with a confident smirk. That was when the beauty of the scam was revealed to me: she had plausible deniability. By then, of course, the street hustler would be gone. She undoubtedly worked for the bar, recruiting patrons on false promises and, as part of her job description, would conveniently vanish. If I was drunker or completely ignorant to contract law, it probably would have worked,
too.

Instead, the Queen Hen and I locked eyes. She didn’t waver, nor avert her attention. I felt the ping pong water slowly drip off the tip of my chin. I hoped it was water. The music began ping-ponging its electronic popcorn, indicating a coming climax. As if on cue, a fresh batch of tourists wandered up the stairwell and waited on the red carpet. I looked to see if the same street recruiter accompanied them, but she wasn’t. Instinctively, a flock of waitresses swarmed to them, like decapitated chickens.

“It doesn’t matter what price that woman said…” the Queen Hen repeated, returning to our confrontation, “I don’t know her.” She passed me the liability, like a hot potato –or ping pong ball. She pretended all the burden was ours. But it wasn’t, unless of course, we agreed to it, under the rules of negotiation. She was waiting for me to state a lower price and thus, accept responsibility for the tab.

Onstage, just over the Queen Hen’s shoulder, a dancer was elegantly smoking a cigarette with her vagina. As the menthol smoke was inhaled, held for a moment, and exhaled, it reminded me to take a deep breath.

“So, who are you?!” I asked.
“I’m the owner.”
“So…you own the onus of showing your prices?”
“You’re supposed to ask…”
“We asked for two beers. Where were you?”

The verbal exchange continued this way, each side responding to the other like a legal ping-pong match. With all things considered, it was much more magical than the physical skills onstage. When I say magic, I mean the ancient concept of controlling supernatural forces and influence reality. Those feats onstage were just tricks, the surface meaning of magic. At best, they were illusions: the appearance of what’s impossible, in a world where contradictions
don’t exist. This scam, on the other hand, was a lie.

Underneath the smoke and mirrors, however, was the real magic of contract law. The Queen Hen wasn’t stupid. Like a defendant standing before a courtroom magistrate, or a medieval witch practicing Majik, she was baiting me to say the wrong thing, or make me lose my temper (to prove I’m belligerent, that is, an enemy combatant, justifying police action). I kept thinking how a legal dictionary is not much different from an updated book of charms and hexes. The Queen Hen and I were literally casting spells at each other. And she was clever. If I made an error (if I misspelled
something), my reality would unmistakably be influenced by her police thugs.

Duking it out with the Queen Hen made me wonder how many tourists folded under her pressure, paid the tab as victims of witchcraft, becoming magic pussies, themselves. In the end, we did pay for our drinks and left unscathed. After failing more attempts to coax us into giving our consent, the Queen Hen finally cut her losses and asked,

“How much are you offering to pay?!”

I won! Coincidently, that was the exact moment, the music
momentarily paused…