The only man: Crashing a gay Ecuadorian beach party.
Thursday, February 1st, 2007It is morning in the coastal town of Salinas, Ecuador, but we have no sense of time, banging our palms, fists, on the metal door of the second-floor apartment, calling the phone for the fourth time or so, listening to it ring inside. We are standing on the ledge, literally and figuratively, like purgatory, like waiting at a stop light in the middle of nowhere.
The party kept us up all night, and one of us has a bad case of chuchaki, or hangover. It is he who raps on the door loudest, with his angry female knock. Finally, from inside, the little one, “la fuerte”, opens the door and wordlessly clambers back to bed.
The three of us say nothing, collect our things, say goodbye to the host, and return to saying nothing as we walk to the bus station. The warm sun on our backs, the golden sunrise and the fresh sea air add to the somnolence, dull our irritation.
I can think of nothing but how strange it is that I would be here, making a game of dodging the bottle caps stamped into the dirt road, the only gringo, the only heterosexual male, in the aftermath of an Ecuadorian gay party, walking down a dirt road to who knows where.
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Aaron Baldassare