9. Strange Things

Quite a number of strange things have happened to me recently.

For my most recent assignment I chose to investigate sex addiction. I went to a couple of meetings of Sex and Love Addicts Anonymous – S.L.A.A. The open meetings take place at 7.30 in the morning, in the Mission district. A inconspicuous red door opens and self-confessed sex addicts start to arrive – quite possibly a number of them stop off during the matutinal walk of shame.

Once everyone is gathered around the table, the leader of the group reads out the 12 steps on which S.L.A.A. is founded (it is based on the Alcoholics Anonymous model). I was surprised by the spiritual nature of these 12 steps – at least 6 of them make direct reference to ‘a power greater than ourselves’ termed God. However, it is entirely non-denominational. Thereafter an egg timer is passed around and addicts introduce themselves and air whatever concerns they have for 3 minutes. They will say something like: ‘Hi, my name is Brad, I am a sex and love addict and I have not used pornography for a month.’ Brad’s introduction will be greeted with a volley of ‘Hi Brad’, a pattern which is repeated – somewhat disconcertingly – every time Brad speaks.

The main problem to emerge was the unhealthy nature of relationships. From the male point of view, both gay and straight, relationships often appeared to be variations on the Madonna – Whore complex. A number of sex addicts said that the men and women they were sexually attracted to were not ones they could ever conceive of having a normal, healthy relationship with. And they were not sexually attracted to those people they could have healthy relationships with – ie their partners or spouses. This was a big theme.

After the first meeting I asked the group leader why pornography was deemed such a problem. Personally I would have thought that pornography would be beneficial – a harmless way of temporarily exhausting sexual desire and hence avoiding destructive relationships. However, the group leader explained that addicts might go online at night and watch pornography solidly for 12 hours. Often they would masturbate to the point of self harm. That is the compulsive aspect of addiction.

As I was leaving the second meeting, a gay sex addict slipped me a piece of paper with his name and number on it. His name? Randy. I promise.


I have a Spanish friend staying with me. Last Friday we drove to Napa and went to do a wine-tasting at the Joseph Phelps vineyard. One of the ‘wine educators’ was a friendly silver-haired gentleman. He spoke some Catalan though he was himself Swiss. I told him that I had booked dinner that evening in a Swiss fondue restaurant in San Francisco called ‘The Matterhorn’. He asked me to pass on his regards to the Swiss owners, friends of his. Then he asked me where I was from. When I told him my name he proceeded to lecture me on my family history. Impressive people, wine educators.

That evening we ate at the fondue restaurant, then went on to a small bar called ‘Black Magic Voodoo Lounge’. I was standing outside when I thought I recognized a tall man in his forties. He had a German accent. I asked him if we had met before; he said no. Then I remembered having spoken to him in a lift descending from the Top of the Mark hotel, 9 months previously (when I was in San Francisco over Easter). I had briefly spoken to him on that occasion because of his accent, and because he reminded me of a friend of my father’s. When I told him about our first meeting he did recall it. Then he introduced himself: his name was Claus, and he was originally from Salzburg.

At this point a punk rocker standing next to us joined the conversation. He had a slight accent too. When I asked him about it he said he was originally from Germany but had been living in Brixton, near the Windmill, for the last 6 years.

I promise that I have relayed this with absolute fidelity. It is extraordinary.

We drank quite heavily that night, on my part to still the sense that I was in my own private Truman Show.

On the morning my Spanish friend had to leave, we went for an early morning swim in the bay, just as the fog was beginning to lift. The water was cold and we spent a while warming up in the sauna afterwards. There we met another German. He was a baker (no ‘n’) in the Richmond district, and an authority on Heidegger.

At a Schnapps and vodka tasting in the St.Geroge's distillery a few weeks ago, I met a charming Brazilian confectioner who has set up her own artisanal confectionary business - www.kikastreats.com She invited me to the inaugural International Body Music Festival - www.crosspulse.com - where a Brazilian troupe was due to perform. Body Music is essentially a form of physical percussion – making music using different parts of the body. It combines tap dance, singing, beat-box, slapping, clapping and using the mouth as a sort of human drum. What I saw at this festival fairly blew my mind.

The first performance was by two very beautiful Inuit Eskimo girls. They stood pressed together in the middle of the stage, holding each others hips and giggling girlishly. Both wore jeans and tight t-shirts and bright red boots. I was half expecting some Sapphic nose-rubbing when the most bizarre noises began to fill the auditorium – reminiscent of didgeridoos and tropical frog ponds. The program says:

From Northern Canada, these cousins perform the ancient art of Inuit throat-singing (katatjaq). Two women stand close together, using each others mouths as resonators, producing guttural vocal sounds through voice manipulation and breathing techniques, often ending in laughter.

The next perfomers were Oakland’s Slammin All-Body Band, led by the festival organizer, Keith Terry. Again using no more than their own bodies, they produced a Jazz/Funk symphony replete with haunting saxophone sounds. Beats were achieved by foot work and body slapping which was reminiscent of Austrian Schuplattler.

However, the Brazilian troupe truly stole the show. I had not thought it possible for them to be any more inventive than their precursors, but they were. What is more, they were led by the most extraordinary individual I have possibly ever seen. He was short, fat and ugly with huge lips and squashed nose, and a bizarre tonsure of unruly orange hair. He strutted onto the stage in pink trousers that were much too short even for his stumpy legs. He looked for all the world as if he had just wandered in off the streets. He made his way through the sylph-like dancers to the microphone. He began to make a few noises which sounded initially like farts and belches – he smiled leeringly at this – but soon the noises became lower and deeper until the auditorium reverberated with bass sounds so deep they made your body shake. Then he seized the microphone and stomped up and down spitting and rapping in Brazilian. He was phenomenal, better than anyone I have ever heard.

Later I realized that he was the incarnation of Silenus –

The Silenoi (Σειληνοί) were followers of Dionysus. They were drunks, and were usually bald and fat with thick lips and squat noses, and had the legs of a human. Later, the plural "silenoi" went out of use and the only references were to one individual named Silenus, the teacher and faithful companion of the wine-god Dionysus. A notorious consumer of wine, he was usually drunk and had to be supported by satyrs or carried by a donkey. Silenus was described as the oldest, wisest and most drunken of the followers of Dionysus, and was said in Orphic hymns to be the young god's tutor. This puts him in a company of phallic or half-animal tutors of the gods.
(from Wikipedia)

The Brazilian band is called Barbatuques. This does not do him justice, but watch Silenus here -

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_E0EJLRkysM