Reporting From A Bar In Brooklyn

Reflecting on the FIFA World Cup 2014

The FIFA World Cup 2014 is currently taking place in Brazil for this summer month. It touches the emotions of the entire world. Where to watch it? The venues are endless in Park Slope. The place, however, doesn’t matter.

Where to play it? It can very well be Prospect Park or Red Hook where Mexican street vendors offer us tacos and enchiladas… I remember growing up amid the Andean range in Cusco, Peru. No, we didn’t care if it was freezing cold or about the high altitude. We didn’t understand that concept. We were convinced that we had more red blood cells than other humans and were built physically to cope with those minor intangibles. We loved the game and were brought up understanding that it was the only game that really made mattered.

Recently I watched a movie titled The Cup. It was about two young Tibetan refugees arriving at a monastery, which was a kind of boarding school. The young monks were determined to watch the World Cup. After various comedic circumstances to achieve their goal, their leader, the Lama, is perplexed about the young monks seeming to move away from the teachings of Buddha.

Growing up around the Andean landscape, we did likewise. I remember the Spanish literature teacher doing her best to teach us Don Quixote. The knight-errant was, nonetheless, irrelevant for us. If Don Quixote was a dreamer inventing his own world, we were likewise, dreamers trying to escape the confines of the school and watch the games. Don Quixote?   No. we didn’t care much about his own perceived foes. They weren’t ours. Furthermore, the poor fool was for us a perceived hero in his own mind, and the plot of the story was boring as well. No we weren’t ready yet to understand at that young age the existential and philosophical teachings of this knight-errant who rode an old horse called Rocinante. We were just ordinary children moving through the streets, creating mischief, and learning on the streets what was real and what was fantasy. We would, of course, find in the end a place to watch the World Cup. We were delighted and happy until someone would expel us from the place.

According to David Whelan from the Belfast Daily Telegraph “A street in west Belfast has caught the attention of passers-by after residents hung the flags of all thirty-two nations competing in Rio from their homes—even the St George’s Cross of old enemy England.” Likewise, most folks around the Andes will never root for Spain…it was an old colonizing enemy. We knew as children what they had done to us as colonizers—not only destroying the previous religious faith (sun worship), but using the existing temples to build their own churches.

Reality for the protesters against the World Cup in Brazil is also different. They do not see the World Cup benefiting the folks living in the “favelas,” where living conditions counter the happiness surrounding the World Cup. The real world that surrounds us remains uneven, not flat (full of Starbucks) as a book has suggested.

The World Cup in Brazil does not cure the wounds of the past and those of the present as Franklyn Foer explains in his book How Soccer Explains the World. It has indeed become a religion for many around the world. Thus, the World Cup 2014 unites us briefly, and in a tribal way we carry our national jerseys. But, is it all real or a distraction for a world being constantly engineered and controlled? The tribes of the world, in that context, are allowed this moment to unite for a month and around their flags and national anthems. Is it all an illusion that we have created? Like that of Don Quixote?

The movie The Cup makes me also wonder about the team the two monks where rooting for. Was it Brazil? Do Tibetan children have a team to root for? Like those two young monks, we children in the Andes cheered for Brazil. I am sure about it. We wanted them to win it…but why? It was because Brazil was a tribe closer to our own and their game wasn’t mechanical. It was more Pina Bausch dancers than that of Twyla Tharp. It was Sergio Mendes’ “Mas Que Nada”, not Wagner’s “Valkyries.” The Brazilian game had more heart than brain in its movement.  We children understood that. It was knowledge by observing. We related to that kind of game.

So now, many years later I understand the young teacher’s agony (Teresa was her name) in wanting us to understand the meaning of illusions and dreams through the life of a knight-errant and his tag-along Sancho. A knight-errant determined to fight his own dreams. I understand the teacher’s agony, but ours was to escape the confines of the school and live another dream…the dream was the World Cup. It was the only game that made sense in our young lives.

The account of the Storyteller of Shimokitazawa continues in Park Slope, Brooklyn: The Sock Man

Two detectives, one a Sufi mystical Muslim and the other a Zen Buddhist, find themselves together searching for a criminal who has murdered a number of speleologists inside caves of London and Tokyo respectively. The criminal whose name is Bertrand Folville eludes the detectives in Tokyo (read Part 1 in Issue 46) and escapes to the seedy streets of Park Slope, Brooklyn…

The two detectives realized that they had to go to the caves north of Tokyo where the Hyakuana tombs are located. There, they found the dead bodies of two speleologists. An avalanche of rocks had fallen on them. They were members of the French Federation of Speleology. One of them, Olivier Gaultier was related to Eduard- Alfred Martel, the father of modern speleology. Olivier’s deceased partner, Vincent Roux,was a well-known caver. He had no academic credentials in the field, but he had created an impressive cave cartography of the Cloaca Maxima in Rome.

Detective Nishiyama asked de Ockam if he had seen the drawing on the wall next to the dead bodies. De Ockam said he had. The drawing was of eight apples. Two of them had been erased. They immediately realized that the apple referred to New York City. There were now six speleologists alive and one of them was the criminal. The walls of the cave also had an “enso” symbol. After making arrangements with New York City Police Department, they flew to New York where they met detective Éamon Borchard de Valera who gave them tips about the Park Slope underworld, including Jackie’s bar.

During the flight from Tokyo to NYC the two detectives learned that they were both avid readers of detective stories. They pondered about the meaning of good and evil and discussed the meaning of evil as far as: Moriarty from the Final problem, Barabbas from the Jew from Malta, Claudius from Hamlet, Mr. Kurtz from the Heart of Darkness. They also discussed Yoji Shimadas and his book, The Tokyo Zodiac Murders. Both agreed that deductive reasoning would always lead to a logical solution. Death and the Compass by Borges proved otherwise, said Nishiyama. The end of Borges’ story always vexed him. De Ockam also confessed that he was autistic. He told Nishiyama that he used words he only understood. Words like: goree, shomping kot, shalupu, peeku, pumpy, bumpy, beeku. Shomping kot, for instance, was a word meant to re-create a situation, to make an arrest or to confuse or distract.

Jackie’s bar in Park Slope was out of step with the times and the changing neighborhood. The bar’s patrons also knew this. One of them was Docteur Edouard Colson, an eminent French scholar who had been deported to the United States. His crime was exposing in Les Temps Modernes that the French government was spying on its citizens. He also accused the French government of making Paris a Disneyworld for tourists. His punishment was expulsion from France, and they condemned him to sell baguettes for the rest of his life in one of the French cafes in Park Slope. The doctor acquiesced without complaint. On his free days he was allowed by the DCRI (French police) to go to Jackie’s bar, where he would sit with a bucket of a dozen “pony” beers that were on sale for ten dollars. As part of his sentence, he wasn’t allowed to attend what the neighborhood called “nice” restaurants, like Café Dada, Al Di La, Convivium, Fonda, Talde, Applewood, Stone Park Café, or Palo Santo. McDonald’s was acceptable and so was Le Pain Quotidien, where he was allowed to eat out on weekends, including Bastille day. On those days he wrote a satire (his vindication) to describe the people he saw moving to Park Slope. It was titled the “Trust Fund Babies and their Search for the Perfect Brie and Baguette.” His satire was also about changes happening in Paris where his beloved café, Les Deux Magots, had been hijacked by tourists.

Roberto Grimaldi was also another regular at Jackie’s. Roberto was a tall man who had an “intellectual” look about him. He was not an intellectual even though he frequently carried a book along with him. He was a former rodeo clown in Monaco, but Roberto had illusions about being a gigolo in New York City. Now in Brooklyn, he thought being a gigolo would help him escape from what he called “a rat’s life.” Born in Monaco, he never progressed beyond being a petty thief. At Jackie’s he kept his past to himself and dreamed about a wealthy American woman who would help him get a green card to a better life. The regulars at Jackie’s listened to him but never understood the difference between Monaco and Morocco. To make things worse, Docteur Edouard called Monaco a big Atlantic City with yachts. Roberto’s dates usually ended with him sitting alone at Jackie’s or eating a burger at 4 a.m. at 7th Avenue Donuts & Luncheonette.

Both detectives walked down 5th Avenue and found Jackie’s. This is what the detectives saw at the bar: Docteur Edouard was talking to Roberto. A woman called Stacy was sitting holding hands with a man named Peter. Both of them had scars in their faces and looked uncomfortable when they noticed the two detectives. The regulars sitting at the bar counter had names like Shane, Steve, Justin, Pat, Alma, Finnette, Sophia, Luisa . . .there was also a woman sitting alone named Hanna who appeared to be rehearsing for a play. A Mexican man was also drinking a beer and a shot of tequila at the same time. His name was Mictlantecuhtli. People at the bar called him Miguel. According to rumors, Miguel never talked because he lost his tongue in a knife fight back in his native Tlaxcala. A woman named Kristin was singing a Latin song titled “Sali Porque Sali.” A bartender, whose name was Cristobal Queens, had a few fingers missing, looked at the detectives, and spat on the floor. He asked them in a hostile voice what they wanted. De Ockam asked for a shot of whisky, and Nishiyama asked for a Pony beer. They sat down next to a table where two men were playing chess. One was Jason Mavromoustafakis-Banakas—The Sock Man—but was also called a techie for a series of cloud computing thefts he had committed. For that, he had spent thirty years in jail. Now he sold socks and knew the Park Slope underworld better than anyone. He looked to be in his seventies, fragile and shaky. He lived by the Gowanus Canal and alleged that the folks at Jackie’s were mutated fish who had emerged from its contaminated waters. Their mission was to conquer the world. Jason was playing The Professor, a name given to him for the theft he had committed at a Boston Art Museum. The Professor and his partner Pat “The Weasel” Robles were counterfeit art criminals specializing in selling online fake Picassos, Dalis, and Vermeers.

The game between the professor and Jason was, according to Nishiyama, identical to the game of Capablanca vs. Lasker, a classic Queen’s gambit declined, 1. d4 d5 2. c4 e6 . . . “Never have fear in your heart,” one of the players said. The Professor suddenly made a gesture to his partner Pat that was noticed by the tongueless man. Pat was indeed trying to help his friend, The Professor. The tongueles guy, who was a friend of The Sock Man, took a dagger as a woman entered the bar. She told the tongueless guy, “Tranquilo.” She was a beautiful woman who looked like a model. Her name was Sophie but known by the Gowanus Canal mutant fish as La Muñeca Diabolica. Sophie spoke fluent Spanish, Catalan, and French. She was reputed to be a high-class French prostitute, drug dealer, and poet. She recited a poem written by Sor Juana Ines de la Cruz (1651-1695), “Silly, you men—so very adept/at wrongly faulting womankind/ not seeing you’re alone to blame for faults you plant in woman’s mind.” The tongueless man was one of her bodyguards.

Nishiyama took advantage of the situation and told The Sock Man that he was a detective looking for a one-eyed man named Bertrand Folville. After buying all the remaining socks and paying some extra money, he got some information. Folville was a regular at Jackie’s. As the detectives left the bar, Kristin was singing an old song titled “encadenados.” Docteur Edouard looked pensive. Roberto, who was reading a book titled How the French Invented Love by Marilyn Yalom Hanna, was laughing out loud. La Muñeca was dancing, and a woman named Emily K—another mutant fi sh— was reciting her own poem: “Th ere has been enough torture with the sword, at the cusp/a girl’s mirage hanging in a tin bedroom, also world. Th e bedroom is made of tin to stop the lid closing, breathing-in fucking velvet way, no wings. Flies stick, stoning/ Th eir black thin arms rub like prayers/or eating death caressed by soap-bar, cares/All ungrateful weirdos, stick, un-bitch:/In gift s there is unbeaten foam, rich for cleansing mouth.”

Based on the information given by the sock man, the detectives decided to travel to the caves called the Howe Caverns. When they got there they found three people dead, shot at point-blank range. One speleologist murdered was the famous Lithuanian scholar named Giedrius Vytautas, who had written articles proving that women were pioneers as ancient cave painters. Vytautas studies were based on research done in Spain’s caves of Altamira, El Castillo, and Tito Bustillo. Th e other two cave scholars were Wayra Anslot-Deschanel who had conducted extensive research in La Chincana Grande in Cusco, Peru. Th e other man was a South African speleologist named Frikkie Saartjie who was writing a defi nitive work about the infl uence of South Africa’s Sterkfontein Caves on our understanding of early human remains. Th e meaning of hominid evolution was at the center of his studies. Th e enso symbol was also on one of the walls as well as the word chincana.

Nishiyama knew the meaning of the word chincana. It was a cave near the place where he was born. A plane took the detectives to Cusco, Perú.

It is located in the Roppongi section of Tokyo, known for its night club scene.  On the second floor of an old building is Geronimo, a bar that has not much to offer except for few wooden communal tables for expats who mingle in the bar.

The etiquette for drinking sake is complicated, so I asked the waitress if she knew. She gave me a cup called sakazuki and offered me a brand of sake that is called Kunshu which is popular among foreigners.

The man sitting next to me explained how sake is made from steamed rice.

Thanking the man, I sipped my sake and started thinking about writing a short story connecting the summer drummers who play in Prospect Park, Brooklyn with the Taiko drummers of Japan. I will write a story that takes place in Tokyo—a detective story full of drum beats and music and a clever assassin. Geronimo will be where some of the action takes place.

“Are you from Indonesia?”  He asked with a heavy English accent. His name was Toni.

“South of the border,” I replied, “meaning south of the United States—I am just a tourist in this beautiful city.” He agreed, but was extremely  inquisitive about my background.  I told him that my mother spoke the Inca language called Quechua and drunk chicha which is made of fermented corn.  “How about you, what do you do?” I asked him. He said he was an Englishman who lived in Brooklyn, New York.  “I also live in Brooklyn,” I said as he looked at me attentively.  “What do you do in Tokyo?” I asked.

“I am a speleologist, interested in the famous caves north of Tokyo. They are called the Hyakuana tombs.” He highlighted that there were only eight people in the world who could compare their cave knowledge with his.

“The cave is the first habitat of mankind?” I asked.

“Yes,” he said and went onto explain how cave paintings, for instance, say much about ourselves.

“Do people die or get lost in caves?” I asked because I had read about several speleologists who were found dead outside of a cave in England.

“Look me in the eye,” he said. One of his eyes was glass, so I asked him about it. He explained that it was due to an accident that happened in a cave … “Yes. People die in caves,” he replied.

“Nice meeting you. I have to get up very early to see the biggest wholesale fish market in the world,” I said.

“Do you mean the Tsukiji Market?”

I explained that I was planning to photograph the market and write something about two distant neighborhoods: Tokyo’s Shimokitazawa and Park Slope, Brooklyn.

“Park Slope?”  Toni jumped out of his seat.  “That is my neighborhood in Brooklyn.”  He asked me to sit down and ordered a whiskey for both of us. He mentioned a story dealing with the Brooklyn Academy of Music.

I left the bar at midnight, which coincided with rush hour in Tokyo. I took the Hibiya line to Shibuya and went to Shimokitazawa, a lovely neighborhood in Tokyo. Once there, I felt at home passing through the many narrow streets and many restaurants of the neighborhood. I kept on thinking about the story I wanted to write. A story where sake, a criminal on the loose, drums, samurais, and geishas would all be part of the plot.  The story would include a detective investigating a number of murders that had taken place inside a cave in England. The suspect was now living in Tokyo.  The London detective in charge of the case was Mubasher de Ockam, who was a well-known psychologist and semiologist.  Mubasher was in Tokyo to locate a suspect … a speleologist who had a long criminal record.

The account starts with Mubasher sitting at Café Mogambo in the Roppongi District. The music in the background is that of Danzón No. 2 , conducted by Gustavo Dudamel.  Detective Nishiyama finally arrived. As a former sumo wrestler, he was now somewhat overweight.  He arrived with a book titled Los Detectives Salvajes.  De Ockam looked at Nishiyama and told him that the name of the English criminal they were after was Bertrand Folville. Nishiyama smiled and made a note of it on a napkin. De Ockam stared at Nishiyama and asked him if he believed in mirrors, compasses, maps, labyrinths, and infinity.  Nishiyama smiled at de Ockam and said that he believed in dreams, which according to him is the infinity that mirrors life and is a map to observe unknown places that a compass may or may not show us.  Nishiyama asked de Ockam if he believed in colors. He told detective Nishiyama he was in Tokyo to solve several murders, not to talk about colors.  Nishiyama smiled and told de Ockam that he believed in the color green.

“Green?” asked de Ockam.

“Because the peace, serenity, and tranquility it brings to life,” replied Nishiyama.

“What is wrong with a colorful forest with reds and blues?” asked de Ockam.

“A colorful forest is beautiful but not serene … colors alter our senses,” Nishiyama responded.

The two detectives were intellectually and physically different. The one from England was short and stocky with olive skin and very inquisitive black eyes. Mubasher’s father was from Pakistan and his mother was a direct descendant of the well-known philosopher and theologian, William de Ockham. Nishiyama’s background was also unique. He was born in Peru but went to Japan during his early teens. He read and spoke many languages. including Spanish. The two of them knew the dangers of the mission, and they also knew intuitively that the famous caves north of Tokyo were just the beginning of a puzzle that would lead them to other murders. De Ockam asked detective Nishiyama if he agreed that inside a cave one was unable to see reality as it is outside.

“Mr. De Ockam, for a Zen Buddhist the hand pointing to the moon is not the moon,” replied Nishiyama.

Nishiyama gave de Ockam a letter that had arrived at the police headquarters in Shimokitazawa. De Ockam opened the letter. There was a drawing of a circle like an O in it. It was sent by Bertrand Folville.

“What is the meaning of an O?” de Ockam asked.

“The circle is not a character, but a symbol.  It is the circle of enlightenment known as enso. It is the way of Zen…”  Nishiyama responded.

Read Part 2 in Issue 48

This bar is in Park Slope, Brooklyn and it is called The Black Horse Pub. I went there to watch a soccer game which is a qualifier for the World Cup to take place in Brazil in 2014. Everyone in the world is playing soccer in order to be one of the thirty-two qualifiers. It is a big thing.

I noticed a fellow who was talking with one of the female bartenders. He looked familiar so I sat next to him. We recognized each other. His name was Tony and he lives in Park Slope. “Are you here for the games?” I asked him.

“I am here for the babes,” he replied.

“Well, I’m here to watch Peru vs Ecuador” I said.

Then our conversation took a different course. I began to talk about Sepp Blatter who is head of FIFA, the governing body of soccer. I compared him to the Pope because of the amount of power he has when designating heads of soccer federations around the world, just as the Pope designates cardinals. “They, in effect, control the way the game is played.”

Tony responded by talking about the women in the bar, or “the babes” as he called them. He said his desire was to seduce one of the female bartenders as he had done before in a different bar. He then talked about his desire to become an international bar gigolo.Meanwhile, I watched the screen and paid attention to the Argentina vs Colombia game. “Messi is not playing,” I said.

Then Tony tried to enlighten me about where these bartenders lived. “Most of these female bartenders are from Bay Ridge…they are very friendly.”

“Falcao almost scored, for Colombia,” I said.

“The ladies from Bay Ridge are less complicated than the ones from Park Slope,” Tony continued, just as Gonzalo Higuain from Argentina was expelled from the game. Tony looked at me and said “Cuatro,” a name given to me in another bar. “Cuatro…do you think I can be an international bar gigolo?”

I took a bite of my Cuban sandwich. I sipped my Corona and said loudly (because a number of Colombian fans were screaming goal!): “Look Tony, you have the looks to be one, but if you are dating someone from Bay Ridge, you have already become an international bar gigolo—you don’t need to go to Peru.”

The Argentina vs Colombia game ended scoreless. Peru beat Ecuador one to nothing, but that was a game I watched in another bar in Brooklyn. At least it wasn’t Nevada Smith, where they pour beer on your head after a team scores.