2000 : A Gras Odyssey

It was the year 2000 and I was back in Sydney after more than a year away. An acquaintance barely recognised me as I crossed Taylor Square with a shaved head and pious expression.
“Where have you been?” he asked dramatically.
“At a Buddhist monastery,” I replied.
His eyes sparkled as if this was a clever gay description of a fat farm or a botox holiday. But it was true – I’d been living in a remote bushland community studying the Four Noble Truths, none of which vaguely resembled the truisms of gym workouts, Kylie videos, Gaydar memberships or low-carb shandies. How would I cope at my first Mardi Gras since becoming a naturally high, meditative vegetarian? My Taylor Square friend seemed equally apprehensive.
“If you don’t take a pill you’ll suck the life out of the party.”
“I’ll have a great time,” I assured him.
“Ever seen a Mormon at an orgy?” he winced.
Buddhists are well known for turning the other cheek, so I simply shrugged and walked off to find the nearest oxygen bar.
Since it was the millennium Mardi Gras expectations were high that Madonna would make her once-in-a-thousand-year appearance at the RHI. The other rumours flying around were only slightly less fanciful: Cher and the cast of Miss Saigon? Elton John deep throating some Vietnamese rolls?
The community newspaper was also feeling the pressure. Determined to have a letter published in the party’s aftermath, one lone voice had sent a letter of complaint the Tuesday before the event: the DJs were abominable, the drag shows were pedestrian and someone had clearfelled him on the dance floor with a hip-hop move.
Ah, the good old days.
For myself however it was a night of sudden reawakening: a whole year had passed me by at the monastery without the merest hint of a sexual encounter. Not as difficult as it might sound when your only visual stimulation entailed some chubby Thai monks and a herbal lesbian kitchen hand.
Thankfully the board of Mardi Gras had liased with Barnum Bros to provide a circus tent for the Men Only space. Once you’d negotiated a path through the chimps and the clowns it was a revelation: a seething mass of homosexual flesh punctuated only by the jangle of nipple rings and harness clips. Who could have predicted that the new handshake was the old hand job?
Pleased to meet you. Likewise I’m sure.
The other highlight of the evening was finding out that the ‘surprise’ international act was going to be a Tom Jones sing-a-like. Full marks to him though, his rendition of ‘Sex Bomb’ had more than a few mature gents flinging their underwear onto the stage. Or were they throwing them at each other? My memory becomes particularly hazy at this point, probably because someone persuaded me that smoking a joint was not only extremely vegetarian but also breathtakingly meditative.
And yes, from that point I sucked the life (and a whole lot more) out of the party.



First Published in SX #367, 7/2/08