Eric Hansen - The Bird Man and the Lap Dancer: Close Encounters with Strangers

Praise for Eric Hansens

T HE B IRD M AN AND THE L AP D ANCER

[There is] sheer lunatic joy to be found in these essays.Hansens curiosity, ability to meet people on their own terms and willingness to try just about anything make the experience fascinating. His gentle, straightforward prose and the fact that the reader truly never knows what will happen next make Bird Man rewarding reading.

The Miami Herald

[An] inspired collection.These are heartfelt reports from the road, told with simple eloquence and gentle humor.

Seattle Post-Intelligencer

Eric Hansen is a travelers travelercurious, imaginative, subtle, and brave. The Bird Man and the Lap Dancer is the latest report from his life of adventure, told with typical style and verve. It should be read, enjoyed, and passed among friends.

William Langewiesche, author of American Ground: Unbuilding the World Trade Center

A riot.Hansen has done things worthy of awe and jealousy.

Entertainment Weekly

A real travel professional.Hansen draws out-loud guffaws.Unlike many world-wearied writers, Hansen avoids studied cynicism and forced sentimentality.

The New York Times Book Review

A fine journalist.The way hebuilds both tension and pathos, is so touching that the reader is drawn into the story.Hes so good at descriptions of place, the magic of travel, and the mystery at the edges of the world.

The Oregonian

In his range, his clarity, and his depth of understanding, Eric Hansen is the match of any travel essayist at work today. To travel well is a rare skill; to write about such travels as well as Hansen does is art.

Joe Kane, author of Savages

Moving.Hansen writes [with] a resonance and psychological depth not usually seen in more routine travel narratives.Each story combines nuanced portraits of memorable characters with lyrical descriptions of human fallibility and generosity[that make] this heartfelt collection a magical and uplifting read.

The Economist

Eric Hansens lovely book of true-life adventures is a gift. Few writers aspire to such honesty, or manage it so engagingly. A compelling read.

Bill Barich, author of Laughing in the Hills

Imagine the world of Joseph Conrad invaded by a real-life Rocky Horror Picture Show. But theres more to Hansens stories than mere weirdness and wonder. Some of them are private memories, polished by time; others conceal parables. All are simply and beautifully told.

Tim Mackintosh-Smith, author of Yemen: The Unknown Arabia

ERIC HANSEN

T HE B IRD M AN AND THE L AP D ANCER

Eric Hansen lives in San Francisco, but over the last twenty-five years he has traveled throughout Europe, the Middle East, Australia, Nepal, and Southeast Asia. He is the author of Stranger in the Forest, Motoring with Mohammed, and Orchid Fever. His articles, photographs, and reviews have appeared in The New York Times, National Geographic, Travel & Leisure, Cond Nast Traveler, and Outside magazine, among other publications worldwide.

He can be reached at ekhansen@ix.netcom.com.

ALSO BY ERIC HANSEN

Orchid Fever: A Horticultural Tale of Love, Lust, and Lunacy

Motoring with Mohammed: Journeys to Yemen and the Red Sea

Stranger in the Forest: On Foot Across Borneo

FIRST VINTAGE DEPARTURES EDITION, OCTOBER 2005

Copyright 2004 by Eric Hansen

All rights reserved. Published in the United States by Vintage Books, a division of Random House, Inc., New York, and in Canada by Random House of Canada Limited, Toronto. Originally published in hardcover in the United States by Pantheon Books, a division of Random House, Inc., New York, in 2004.

Vintage is a registered trademark and Vintage Departures and colophon are trademarks of Random House, Inc.

Lyrics from The Power Is Mine are reprinted by kind permission of Lords of Acid.

The Library of Congress has cataloged the Pantheon edition as follows:

Hansen, Eric (Eric K.)

The bird man and the lap dancer :

close encounters with strangers / Eric Hansen.

p. cm.

1. Hansen, Eric (Eric K.)Travel. 2. Voyages and travels. I. Title.

G 465. H 354 2004

910.41dc22

2004043433

Vintage ISBN-10: 0-679-77182-4

Vintage ISBN-13: 978-0-679-77182-1

Ebook ISBN9780525433453

Author photograph Dick Sonnen

www.vintagebooks.com

v4.1

a

For SMD,

and in memory of my mother

Jeannie C. Hansen, 19232001

To season ones destiny with the dust of ones folly, that is the trick.

Henry Miller

Contents

A RLETTE AND M ADAME P ERRUCHE

I T WAS A WARM SUMMER evening when I met Arlette. She was an old woman by then, but in good health. She still wore red lipstick and obviously took pleasure in dressing in a simple but elegant way. Valerie Tatiana von Braunschweig, a former dancer with the Bjart Ballet, and I were driving from Monaco to Juan-les-Pines to spend the summer of 1989. As a way to extend our meandering journey and for me to meet Arlette we decided to take her to dinner at LEstaminet des Remparts, a small, unpretentious restaurant in Mougins, which is a quaint hilltop village in the south of France. As we settled at our table on the outdoor terrace, Arlette apologized that her companion was too ill to join us. The waiter cleared away the fourth place setting and returned with a bottle of chilled ros. He poured the glasses and set the bottle on the table as Arlette began the story of how she met Madame Perruche.

For nearly forty years, Arlette had lived in a modestly furnished apartment in the hills behind Cannes. She was once a principal dancer for the Marquis de Cuevas and the Ballet Russe of Monte Carlo, where she had danced with Valeries mother fifty years earlier. But when the company failed Arlette was too old to join another company. And so she became a teacher at a local ballet school which catered to well-to-do families with young daughters of average talent. She lived in reduced circumstances as the Cannes of her youth succumbed to the traffic and featureless concrete monoliths that began to dominate the older hillside neighborhoods of summer homes covered in blooms of ancient bougainvillea. But she lived frugally and managed to get by on a modest salary from the ballet school. Arlette drove an ancient motor scooter and on most mornings she went to a small park near the train station to feed the stray cats.