To Hellholes and Back Read online

  “Human footprints leading away from camp!” the Teutonic Sherlock Holmes shouted in red-hot English. “Who could have made these tracks?”

  Icy glares shot round the safari vehicle, as though there was really any question about whose size-eleven REI boot prints were clearly visible marching down the dirt road. A terrible accusatory silence followed. I’ve never had to face the media after my steroids test came back positive or my bathroom tryst in an international airport had been publicly betrayed by my gay prostitute-lover, but believe me you’ve never been marked for shame until a truckful of Germans have indicted you with the collective tonnage of their implied Aryan opprobrium.

  “I guess it wasn’t as windy last night as I thought,” I cracked from the back row of the Land Rover in a cavalier fashion I hoped might leave a little wiggle room for plausible denial. When that didn’t get any laughs, I went with halfhearted admission. “Those do look a lot like my shoe prints.”

  “As a reminder to all, it is strictly forbidden to walk alone away from the camp!” Thilo shouted loudly enough to be heard in Dachau.

  Tension hung over the safari all day. In the afternoon, I found out why. Far from going unnoticed, my impromptu walkabout the night before had become camp scuttlebutt even before I’d stumbled upon my holy impala communion. I’d been foolish to underestimate Tebo, of course, a man who’d already demonstrated that he was capable of spotting scorpions hiding beneath logs in the pitch dark from twenty paces. He’d detected my absence from camp right away. The subsequent head count he conducted had created quite a stir, especially with Thilo, who’d apparently spent the entire night seething in his tent in anticipation of teaching me a lesson in German scorn.

  The most interesting revelation, however, was that in the early morning after my now infamous walk, Tebo had followed my tracks all the way to the clearing where the impala had been. When he returned he told Thilo—who told one of the Germans who relayed the news to the group—that leading back in the direction of camp, my footprints had been shadowed step for step by a set of lion tracks.

  It was the Italian couple who confided all of this to me, though only after swearing me to a silence that I’ve not broken until now. (Thompson Travel Rule Number One: even if they live thousands of miles away, don’t take blood oaths with Italians lightly.) Apparently, there had been much unhappy camp discussion about my unauthorized foray into the bush. On the assumption that keeping a lid on conversation would stifle the spread of resentment, Tebo had issued a camp-wide gag order. I was to be allowed to go on believing that all was well, that the entire group wasn’t on the verge of lynching my reckless, self-centered, rule-flaunting, dipshit, no-regard-for-consequences American ass.

  Thus chastened and sworn to secrecy, I never felt comfortable enough to get confirmation of the story from Tebo himself. I suppose it’s possible that he added the lion-stalking detail for instructive emphasis, but Tebo was the straight-shooting type, and even if the addition of the prowling cat sounds a little theatrical, I have no reason to doubt the story’s veracity. Not least because the following day we came across a pride of lions with bloated bellies, sleeping away the morning less than a mile from our camp.

  Lion or not, public disgrace or not, the walk remains for me a far more elating than frightening or troubling memory. Yes, bad things were lurking out there, but I would have to have been damned lucky to find them. The numbers on disaster simply don’t support paranoia, especially when compared to the exhilaration of exploration.

  I’m pretty sure this is why Tebo didn’t come after me as soon as he discovered that I’d cut away from the group, even though he could easily have caught up to me and hauled me back to camp. Professional that he was—and I’ve never met a man I’d feel more comfortable putting in charge of the rifles and hardtack—it’s a fair bet that he was as bored with the herd as I was, as disenchanted by the predictability and complacency, and more than a little curious to find out how far a stranger might be willing to travel down a forbidding road with no idea what foreign terror might emerge along the way. Tebo wasn’t stupid. But, like me, I’m certain he didn’t see the point of being afraid, no matter how unpleasant the outside world might look from beside the illusory comfort of a flickering fire.

  Also by Chuck Thompson

  Smile When You’re Lying

  The 25 Best World War II Sites: European Theater

  The 25 Best World War II Sites: Pacific Theater

  Acknowledgments

  Mankind’s fear of the unknown or foreign isn’t exactly breaking news, but the phenomenon works in a peculiar way for travelers. Some years ago while traveling around the Philippine island of Mindanao—infamous center of Islamic unrest—I found myself repeatedly warned of nearby dangers from friendly, helpful locals.

  “Our village is perfectly safe,” they would tell me. “But you must not dare go to the village ten kilometers up the road. It is a very bad place. There are many criminals and murderers who will surely make you a target.”

  A visit the following day to the supposed death village up the road invariably produced the same exchange. “Our village is peaceful,” I would be assured. “But the village ten kilometers down the road is filled with thieves, drug dealers, and murderers.” I’ve spoken with travelers around the world who report the same experiences from Kamchatka to Brazil.

  Because the elastic balance between trust and paranoia seems fundamental to human affairs, the first acknowledgment here goes to the anonymous hundreds who inadvertently contributed to this book by showing me both incredible generosity and a little home-fried mistrust during my travels.

  Specific thanks are extended to Judy DeHaas for generously sharing her Africa contacts. Since leaving Africa, not a day has gone by that I haven’t thought of the indubitable Tebo and eternal optimist Kap. I’m also grateful to Henri and Team Congo, despite it all.

  Ajay Anand, Baiju Kuriakos, Suketu Mehta, Dr. P. V. Joseph, Dr. Akhilesh Gupta, and Patrick and Rani Thompson and kids are sincerely thanked for invaluable help prior to and during travel in India. Without Anjan Das and Laura Silverman, Joyce and I would probably still be sitting in a train station somewhere in Rajasthan wondering how the hell we were going to get to home, and I would have missed the two best people out of the millions in Bombay.

  David Lida, Gabriel Chaparro Estrada, and the dauntless Shanghai Bob, Blackguard of the Orient, Man of Indiscreet Solutions, were invaluable in Mexico City. Roberto Orellana provided much-appreciated on-call Spanish translations. Marty McLennan and Ruth Mandujano deserve special recognition for everything from helping me choose the correct mole with chicken enchiladas to escorting me to soccer games to negotiating my scalped ticket (for face value, no less) to a sold-out Lila Downs concert.

  Disney I did pretty much on my own, though Jon Wilde’s insider contact was indispensable and that puce and coral time-share was obtained through the typically boundless generosity of my mother and Uncle Jim.

  The line in the Africa section about two rats fucking in a wool sock was borrowed from, of all sources, Japanese baseball enigma Ichiro Suzuki. I don’t know if it originated with him, but he’s the one I first saw it attributed to. The always funny Sean Cunningham inadvertently directed me to the Apu quote on America’s dangerous underpopulation. Thanks to smirkingchimp.com for that timeless Bush moniker, and to Jeff Foxworthy for my attempt at a “You might be a redneck” joke in the Disney chapter.

  Continuing gratitude to the U.S. Department of Homeland Security and Citizenship and Immigration Services for steadfastly refusing to explain or resolve the red flag on my passport that gets me searched, questioned, detained, and nearly missing connecting flights every goddamn time I reenter the country.

  I paid for all services and products received during travel for this book—specific references to restaurants, hotels, and other commercial establishments were included simply because I thought they enlivened the copy or deserved to be mentioned.

  Thanks to Allan Lazo for ongoing Website aid
.

  The steady-handed support of my agent Joëlle Delbourgo made this book possible. Without Sarah Knight’s enthusiasm and unfailing professionalism, it would never have gotten past page 1.

  The keen eye and stalwart sensibility of Lindsay Ross saved me from myself on numerous occasions and made this a far better book than it ever would have been without her. Jason Liebman’s Web and tech expertise have been invaluable. The support of Dan Farley, Marjorie Braman, Maggie Richards, Nicole Dewey, Theresa Giacopos, Ashley Pattison, Rita Quintas, Lisa Fyfe, Kelly Too, Christine Kopprasch, and everyone at Henry Holt has been consistently gratifying—if only the entire world operated with such consistently high standards.

  Thanks and love as always to Mom, Mike, Carlene, and Amy.

  The one and only Joyce sacrificed a beach cabana for a tour of Thar Desert villages at the height of a punishing Indian summer. She nevertheless claims to have no regrets about hitching her wagon to mine. Needless to say, neither do I.

  Notes

  1 I love idiomatic British-English. Deep fakking bongo. Properly not kidding. Discussions with people who talk like this always make me feel about ten IQ points smarter. I easily would have been one of the hillbilly rustics suckered in by the Duke and King in Huck Finn.

  2 During our short-lived attempt to become import/export barons, the first meeting my brother and I conducted with our supplier of hand-crafted Philippine carvings took place at an outdoor restaurant in Zambales on Good Friday. As we drank San Miguels and shook hands on our first big deal, a live Passion Play paraded by. Wearing a genuine crown of thorns and being whipped by mock Romans, the Filipino guy playing Jesus was literally gushing blood from his scalp and shoulders as he dragged his massive wooden cross through the streets. It turned out to be a powerful business auger.

  3 As though there could be any other kind. Unfair, I know, but I’m endlessly entertained by foreign English.

  4 Anybody who gets that Kevin Cronin reference without having to Google it can head down to 157 Riverside Avenue and become instant buddies with my good friend Brian Brink, who is feeling good right now with a beautiful lady by his side, a big ol’ glass of his favorite wine in one hand, and a big ol’ J in the other, to whom this long overdue joke is fondly dedicated.

  5 The workhorse of independent travelers since it came on the market in 1976, the classic, heavy-duty Jansport daypack deserves a hermetically sealed display case in the Smithsonian.

  6 Criticize my hysterics if you like, but a president who pushes fascist vocabulary like “homeland,” “axis of evil,” and “enhanced interrogation techniques” on us deserves to be remembered accordingly.

  7 I report on this reality without apology. I am not crass; bridal registries are crass.

  8 People ask all the time if I make this shit up and the answer is no.

  9 The contemporary followers of disenfranchised slave state segregationists who were forced underground after the mainstream triumph of the Civil Rights movement of the 1960s, then reemerged in Southern churches in the 1970s peddling an updated brand of the same old seditious hate, often as stridently anti-intellectual members of the Republican Party and always in the name of a hijacked Christianity, are called “KKKristians.”10

  10 By me, anyway.

  11 Yes, I know, the brilliance of Bollywood, but spend all day in a car where the only CD is the above-mentioned collection of screechy “classics” and I promise the tune you’ll be singing when it’s over won’t be “When the Mango Harvest Comes and the British Twats Are Dead, I’ll Ululate For Thee.”

  12 No one knows for sure where the expression “hotter than dick” comes from, but my money is on Rajasthan, a state where the heat is commonly described as “crippling,” “Satanic,” and “ball wilting.” In winter. The whole time I’m here, my scrotum feels like a head of rinsed romaine lettuce.

  13 This little attempt to lighten the mood falls as flat with Joyce as it’s probably falling right now, but I don’t care. I was a DJ when this abortion of Earth, Wind & Fire talent was in hot rotation at KTKU-FM, in Juneau, and playing it every two hours for an entire summer pretty much drove me out of the radio business. If the non sequitur desecration of its memory here is the only revenge I’m ever able to exact, that’s better than nothing.

  14 Few people on earth deserve more pity than Indian women seeking able dance partners. Indian men have innumerable assets—intelligence, humor, superhuman tolerance for discomfort—but there’s something so profoundly doofy about male Bollywood dancers that it makes the white man overbite boogie look positively African by comparison.

  15 You want some CHiPs-era mirror shades? Rodman/Snipes wraparounds? Plaid Pantry BluBlocker knockoffs? Dig under the seat of my car and help yourself.

  16 Bad enough to reach my sexually active years in the era of facial piercing, tramp stamps, and fake knockers without also having to live through an age in which Iron Man, Speed Racer, and the Incredible Hulk are momentous collective reference points, discussed and dissected in the pages of The New Yorker. And worse, after cannibalizing pretty much the entire canon of sixties and seventies comic books, Hollywood still hasn’t gotten around to making a Sgt. Rock movie. Note to studios: my treatment is ready!

  17 My two favorite stroller observations: One: Seeing any child more than three years old or thirty-five pounds being pushed in a stroller. Two: If you use your baby stroller as a shopping cart at the store…for beer…while your baby is still in it…you might be a redneck.

  18 It’s a vicious business and by the time you read this Cyrus may well have been forgotten, or at least replaced, by another Disney confection. Hilary Duff, anyone?

  19 For eighty years Universal clung to rights to the Disney-drawn Oswald the Lucky Rabbit before finally relinquishing them to the Walt Disney Company in 2006 in exchange for the release of sportscaster Al Michaels from his Disney/ABC contract. The “Do you believe in miracles?” icon calling Sunday Night Football games for NBC Universal is just one of many examples of Old Walt extending his cultural reach from beyond the grave.

  20 Here’s how Africans form lines. 1. Ignore the twenty or thirty people already in line. Proceed immediately to front of line and make loud demands for attention from harried clerk or official dealing with the five or ten other people engaged in step one. 2. Argue strenuously for several minutes before accepting defeat and proceeding to back of line. 3. Stand next to, never directly behind, the small group of people amassed at rear of the “line.” 4. Spend next forty-five minutes shoving forward as many places as possible before resuming argument at front of line and threatening physical harm to newcomers engaged in step one.

  21 Paradoxically, the place that reminded me least of the United States was the one that’s supposed to represent the country at its apogee: Walt Disney World.

  About the Author

  CHUCK THOMPSON, the author of Smile When You’re Lying, is a former features editor for Maxim and was the first editor in chief of Travelocity magazine. His writing and photography have appeared in The Atlantic, Esquire, Outside, Men’s Journal, National Geographic Adventure, Playboy, Spy, Escape, WWE Magazine, MTV’s The Jenny McCarthy Show, and the Los Angeles Times. He has traveled on assignment in more than fifty countries and is the author of two guidebooks, The 25 Best World War II Sites: European Theater and Pacific Theater. He’s played in a variety of professional musical groups and worked as an ESL instructor, radio DJ, deckhand, and assistant sergeant at arms in the Alaska House of Representatives. He grew up in Juneau, Alaska, and lives in the Pacific Northwest.

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  Portions of chapter 7, “Sex, Rain, and 100 Percent Cotton,”

  were previously published in a different form in Outside
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  Names and certain identifying characteristics of some people

  described in this book have been changed.

  Copyright © 2009 by Chuck Thompson

  All rights reserved.

  Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data

  Thompson, Chuck.

  To hellholes and back: bribes, lies, and the art of extreme tourism / Chuck Thompson.—1st Holt paperbacks ed. 2009.

  p. cm.

  ISBN: 978-1-4299-5474-7

  1. Voyages and travels. 2. Developing countries—Description and travel. 3. Adventure and adventurers. 4. Thompson, Chuck—Travel. I. Title.

  G465.T593 2009

  910.4—dc22

  2009014459

  What happens when Chuck Thompson travels the American South for two years, trying to determine whether secession might be the answer to all our country’s problems? Join him for the most controversial road trip of his career.

  HC: 9781451616651 • EB: 9781451616675

  AVAILABLE FROM SIMON & SCHUSTER WHEREVER BOOKS ARE SOLD.

  www.chuckthompson.com