A Good Night: Story

On my penultimate day in Christchurch, I reach Bosco, the Black Forest pirate from Mana/Fiji. He moved to New Zealand a few months ago. He’s been pretty cold since then. In the middle of New Zealand’s midsummer, he drops by my hostel in the evening wearing a thick fur jacket. I greet him warmly from the 100 people I met on the trip. Bosco is probably something of a legend among world travellers.

I’m pleased to see that he’s doing well. Apparently he doesn’t drink quite as much as he did on Mana. We change this habit on the spot. After a few rounds of pre-drinking, we stroll into the city centre. First club: Dux de Lux. Beer garden, bar and concert. The seven boys from Retrodelic Funk Machine really heat things up. The whole room is steaming.

Unfortunately, the Dux closes just as we’re starting to get going. The nightly philosophers’ round therefore has to be moved to a nearby Irish pub. We sit outside and sip Guinness. Bosco the first of his life. A girl from the next table says: “Hi, don’t you remember me?” If she knew me, she would know about my face memory.

After one sentence, the penny drops: Oh yes, that’s the strip dancer from Edinburgh. We were travelling with some people in Invercargill. A few weeks ago, she had thrown a beer in the face of a somewhat rude waitress in Christchurch. Sober, as she emphasised. I wonder what would happen if you went out with her for real. The whole thing went to court. The hearing was today and it ended up costing her NZ$150. That’s 157 if you include the wasted beer.

We continue around one o’clock. A sad street musician plays a very nice song on the guitar. I don’t know him, so I ask: “Who’s it by?”. He replies: “From me. My girlfriend left me last week.”. Now he plays out his sorrow. I think it’s a very progressive way of dealing with pain. Part of the song: “Strangers to lovers and lovers to strangers”. I recommend changing it to “Strangers to love and lovers to strangers”, which I think he quite likes.

On the way to the next bar, we discuss why there are more strip clubs and massage parlours than bars in Christchurch and come to the conclusion that neither of us has ever been to one. Just at that moment, a night creature hands us two free tickets. Should I believe in signs? Or stick to my principle that food is still for eating, not for looking at?

In the next bar, another band is rocking their hearts out. Not particularly good, but it’s an Irish pub again, so nobody will notice at this level anyway. We bounce around a bit, but somehow I’m pretty exhausted by around three. Bosco’s wife had promised to pick him up, she lives a few kilometres away. Well… she couldn’t have known that it would be after three. Nobody picks up.

So we’re sitting in Cathedral Square. Three policemen take a drunk 14-year-old into custody. A couple of kids are skating and doing their best hip hop poses. The bums are sleeping. A man in military uniform talks about his court hearing for a fight. The strangest thing that night: I chat to a couple of Brits at three o’clock. They were still sober.

I love good night stories.