Zouk Out '08

There are many reasons why I’ve never been fond of Zouk Out and my attendance, other than fundamental commitments, is kept buoyant by one indispensible bracket; babes in bikini.

And I use them inextricably because and one can turn up in a bikini but yet not contribute positively to my visual indulgence. I know this because I saw half of Ocean World turn up in bikinis. There was this one particular Whale who was so fat, her left breast weighed more than a Nissan March. I was pretty sure her bikini qualified as a hammock.

Then there was that group of ladyboys who were walking about in their bikini top with half their areola exposed. And only ladyboys can be so proud of it under all that convivial disposition. You just got to love them.

That aside, here are the other things I hate.

1. Finding friends.

There is never an event where you might actually consider having everyone be bound together by a rope. Nothing beats trying to find your friend in the midst of 26,000 people. You might actually have a better chance of finding that hammock Whale's asshole with a compass.

Then imagine you did manage to contact them and they tell you that they are at bar 12and you are stuck at bar 1. By the time you walk over, you might just be in time for the Siloso beach new year countdown party.

Which brings me to the next point.

2. Walking distance

Do you know how fucking far you have to walk? It’s like a cross country training session every time you decide to move from one stage to the other. And if you were at this Zouk Out and you love Trance, you will severe all ties with anyone who likes Hip Hop, unless of course you are prepared to have 2 inches of pure muscles added to your calves.

3. Toilets

It’s not that I have issues with portable toilets because God bless them when you are having out-field military exercises, but like 50 units for 26,000 is just about the same ratio as running shoes to Kenyans. And this ultimately equates to a 20 minute waiting time to use the toilet. Who the fuck anticipates peeing 20 minutes later?

Those aside, this year’s Zouk Out had been relatively pleasant, largely because I didn’t have to worry about running out of drinks, or queuing up for that matter. And yet even those came at a price of fatigue.

8.20pm: Pappy, CK, RedBug and I start drinking at the Singtel tent. The lure of an open bar is too hard to resist for lesser humans like us.

8.35pm: RedBug introduces me to her Caucasian male friend who takes well to my jokes. He thinks I’m hilarious and proceeds to proclaim his love for me, in the best way he knew how.

Him: “I love this guy!” (to RedBug)

8.40pm: Half convinced that I will be able to find a female to love me instead, I start drinking faster.

8.50pm: 5 vodka Red Bulls in me later. I decide to put the journey to inebriation on hold and slot in other trivialities like responsible drinking and work commitments.

9.40pm: I have not taken a drop of alcohol for almost an hour. I am not happy. Instead, I am riding around in the Buggy.
9.45pm: I bump into Jun and she tells me MissFebruary is at Zouk Out. This is the best news I’ve heard all night.

10.40pm: CokeWhore and Muthu arrive. We do two quick rounds of vodka Red Bull.

10.50pm: I tell the very cute bar maid at bar 4 that she only needs to pour me one consistent drink of vodka Red Bull all night for all my orders. I no longer need to queue for drinks. I am the envy of thirsty men.

11.30pm: My proficiency in binge drinking now puts me 13 cups. I start eyeing my slippers with contempt. Another 10 more and I will be accusing sand of trying to give me blisters.

Somewhere along the way Eve showed up with Yua. Reznor gestured for someone to come over with his hands and I said,

Me: “That doesn’t always work..”
Reznor: “Cos I’m not you right? Hahaha.”
Yua: “…”
Me: [to Yua] “You are not allowed to comment, because that worked on you.”

Apparently, 13 cups is sufficient to bring assholism out into contention for dominant character trait of the night.

12.40am: I need to pee. The toilet queue looks like the audition day for American Idol. My feet is protesting against walking out of the beach to the hotel to pee, so I poke my bladder once to see if I might survive the wait.

12.42am: Nisa offers to accompany me while I wait. I have a true friend.
12.43am: Sherri offers to help me jump to the front of the queue. I have a better friend in Sherri. I no longer need Nisa.

12.44am: Sherri goes to talk to the girl at the front of the queue and waves for me to come over as soon as the girl agrees.

12.45am: The girl starts kicking up a fuss about having two people jump her queue. I reassure that calculative bitch that only one person is doing the peeing. She shuts up and the Indian man behind her picks up from where she left.

Guy: “Hey man, dat is nort cool. You get aye girl to cut queue for you. Dat is nort cool I tell you.”

And he repeated this over and over again, it was like a Subaru radio ad. He kept going on and on about being -in his thick Indian accent - ‘not cool’ because I got some girl to jump the queue for me and it was well, ‘not cool’ too.

I tried to ignore him because I was primarily focused on holding the bladder, but he was relentless in policing the ‘cool’ factor to me. It eventually bothered him so much that he stepped out of the queue to nag in my ear.

Me: “Whatever.”
Guy: “Young man. You do nort tell me whatever. It is nort cool I tell you.”

I didn’t know whether to laugh or pee in my pants, because I knew that for the duration that I was going to be waiting for the cubicle, Mama Cool was not going to let it rest and it was amusing to see someone get so worked up over waiting 30 seconds more to pee.

When I finally got in to pee, I was so fast that I came out even before anyone else did and there stood the Indian guy, still staring at me in contempt. So I did what I presumed cool people like him would do; I smiled at him. And he waved his finger at me,

Guy: “That is nort cool.”

I can’t imagine what would happen if I stole his parking lot.

1.35am: J comes to find me. I am on my 20th cup of vodka Red Bull. Not a good idea.

Me: “Do you have a light?”
J: “My sis doesn’t know I smoke.”
Me: “What?! I hope she knows you’ve had pre-marital sex.”
J: “Shut up!”

I remembered meeting a bunch of you guys, and I remembered only because you guys called me, Butterfly. And majority of you have the same opening line.

XXX: “Butterfly! I know you! You are Butterfly!”

No shit Sherlock. And I don’t know why most of you have a pre-conceived notion that my conversational prowess is limited only to crude and mean remarks, because at least one of you said, “are you going to say something mean?”

Like seriously people..

2.10am: I finally find LB, who is still sober. I turn to see the line of drinks awaiting them and secretly make a quick prayer for him.

2.20am: I do another 2 round of binge drinking with Iko. I don’t know if it’s the long intervals between drinks or that all the walking is keeping me sober. I tell the barmaid to make mine a double shot from here on out.

2.40am: I see two men making out behind the tents while trying to find a spot to rest. I tell the random guy next to me, “How much have those two been drinking? I hope they know it’s a guy”. He ignores me anyway.

By the time it got to 5am, I was more tired from the full day’s activities than I was even remotely high and this was despite the 29 cups of vodka in me. I also had so many drinks spilled on my arm that I was convinced it qualified as a flammable product.

There was nothing comparatively interesting this time around because last year I witnessed a girl tripping and crashing head first into the toilet cubicle and getting knocked out cold as a result, and that’s a hard thing to top.

The only thing I was looking forward to was Above and Beyond, but barely a half hour into their set, I surrendered myself to fatigue. It was a submission I quite gladly bowed to even before the trio had any chance to play their famed Trance anthems.

I looked to LB and we both knew that the night was done. Somewhere, some place, some other time, another party will be conquered, but this one would just have to be spared.