Wanted Part-Time: Two large butt cheeks

April 22, 2012:  Ringing the door bell outside a tall gated compound at a not that early 8:15am, I woke up the woman living inside.  Letting me into her compound and giving me the speech that if anything breaks I will have to pay for it, I handed over my driver’s license and signed a paper that contained a variety of linked letters creating words…in Dutch - meaning absolutely nothing to me except for that signing it would get me the bike.

My first stop was the boat dock so that I could cross the Suriname River.  Since not many people were traveling today, I had to wait for the boat to fill up with other paying bodies.  The boatman offered to take me at an inflated “white boy” express rate.  Let the unwanted negotiation games begin, I thought.  I managed to get a 25% discount (more than half the cost of a meal at Burger King) but still too expensive for a mangy backpacker.

Deciding to wait a little bit longer I was afraid to leave thinking as soon as I left, a bunch of people would show up seconds later to share the cost.  So every 5 minutes, I would say 5 more minutes and then another 5 more minutes and another and another, with this time munching cycle continuing to take more and more of the day away from me.  I intended to log a large number of kilometers to reach my time imperative extraction point at a location far far away.  So when  nobody magically appeared, I asked the boat driver if it is possible to ride over this bridge I saw in the distance.  He lifted his shoulders and said he didn’t know – the #@$% he didn’t.  Using my keen sense to point out a liar in languages I don’t speak, I left.  Too bad my superpowers are not as good with detecting lies escaping the lips of a beautiful woman’s mouth – or maybe, most of the time I do know…it is just that I don’t want to know.

Many thousands of circular leg motions helped make it possible for me reach Peperpot to see former slave plantations and a National Reserve where the birds were so loud, that it sounded as if I walked in at some voice amplified mega-grade schools recess.  It was great hearing all of the birds, it is just too bad I couldn’t see many of them since these super mosquitoes were shredding me whenever I would make an extended stop. 
 
My last stop of the day was in town of Nieuw Amsterdam – not knowing I was riding all this distance to see a fort till I actually got there.  Dehydrated and malnourished, it made it difficult for me to walk around in a straight line – a unfortunate common practice for me.

Needing a liter or two of soda to pour down my throat before heading to the shore to start the negotiation process for a boat back to Paramaribo, I visited a Chinese Grocery store.  Here I strangely felt an instant connection with the Chinese woman behind the counter ringing me up.  Maybe it was because she too didn’t speak Dutch well or just that we were both, foreigners.

Making it to my extraction point, a boat sat there waiting for others.   Perfect timing, I thought.  Getting to the balancing beam that was being used as a dock, I slung the bike on my back and sprinted doing a circuslike balancing act.  Just seconds before reaching the boat that had space for me, the man next to him signs him to pull away.  Why!?  The man who pushed the other boat off, then so kindly informed me of his gargantuan “rob me with a smile” fee to go across.  Okay, it was getting late and I sensed that he felt as if he had me.  Little he knew that I was a man with once again, the luxury of time and that I would rather have low crawled on broken glass naked than pay him.

Over an hour went by and it was still just me waiting.  When a different boat did pull into the planks dropping off passengers, I tried to jump on it but was denied boarding his boat after the other boatman said something to him.  That was until the man waiting for me to break down and pay his fee had to briefly pull away to let another boat in.  The guy that just denied me access on his boat quickly ran to the front of the boat as he was pulling away and wanted to know how much I would pay him.  Making it a price that would be worth the potential argument with the other boatman, I was granted permission to come aboard as he rooster tailed me across the river.
 

People with big butts have it made on long bike rides like this.  By the end of the day, my buttocks hurt so bad that I had to shift my weight on the seat from right butt bone to left butt bone.  I rode my bike from 8:45am till about 4:15pm…that is a lot for someone with not much meat on their cheeks.  Clearly I need to eat more candy, ice cream and sweets if I ever want to see my full potential as a long distance bicycle rider.  As for now…wanted part-time:  Two large butt cheeks.