I was working as night watchman in Nama Bay, on the point of the triangle were the Red Sea meets the Bay of Elat. Sorry to say for you surf monsters who read Demon Factory there were no waves in Nama Bay, or much wave action in the Red Sea to my knowledge, there was a major wave when Moses parted the fucker though. Here is a vision of insanity, a rag head with a suicide bomb duck taped to his chest on a wind surfing into Tel Aviv to become a martyr. He wants nothing more than 50 virgins (what a bloody mess, the virgins I mean). I am finding it harder to control my thought waves, mental synapse, sparking problems at the nerve ends, a jumper cable might help. Anyways, the attraction of Nama Bay was for divers, the coral is the most colorful in the world, intense blues, yellows, pinks. I went snorkeling on acid one day, dude it was like floating in a rainbow. Early pre Avatar, 30 years ahead of Avatar.
At the time, in the late 70s(before the Israelis gave the Sinai back to Egypt)the Sinai beaches on the Bay of Elat side were just one big doping, boozing and fuck fest. The geography was like Mars, treeless hills, red mud iron ore color. People lived in straw huts, module housing units and caves. My preference was sleeping on the beach. Even the Nama Bay Inn was module. For entertainment there were cafes and bars made of straw that had names like Mosha's or The Lost Oasis. They served grilled Parrot Fish, coffee, beer. I tried to put a beat joint together, I wanted to serve hash brownies and blast Coltrane and the Rolling Stones from the loud speakers. I planned to call my place "Moses Stepped Here" (who the fuck knows maybe he did part the fucking Red Sea and step into Nama Bay years ago, BC).
The Israelis new they would lose the Sinai in war or through diplomacy, so they built Nama Bay to be dislodged in the future. The scene was total primal insanity mixed with "Lost Horizons on Mars". Nama Bay was invaded by people who wanted to party and get lost. United Nations soldiers, Bedouins, Israeli soldiers, German scuba divers, nomadic hippy expats. The UN people would bring cases of Heineken and Irish Bristol Crème as well as hash. The UN dudes were unreal, they had more dope and booze than the Amsterdam Hells Angels. God knows were they got it all? If I had to venture a guess, I would say the borderless organization is and was the biggest smuggling network in the world. They move everything from Heroin to contraband Toyotas, weapons too. The Bedouins (also smugglers) would bring hash and sell it. Then the Israel Defense Force would bring more hash (the IDF puts hash in coffee to prime for battle). The hippy expats, who were broke and lost, brought nothing with them and were scammers, but would provide entertainment for handouts, food dope ,and booze. The hippy chicks and the Israeli soldier girls would show tits and ass with little provocation. When it came to tits and ass the Israeli soldier girls had the hippy chicks beat. You could get any of the girls drunk and high and you had em man. Go find a spot in the red desert and fuck like junk bunnies. Every night was a party, smells of fish cooking on grills, Pink Floyd " "Shooting the Dark Side of the Moon" also Bob Marly, Peter toss "Ja Fuck a Rasta Man" tripping till dawn, all night long baby. People would go naked during the wild evening dope parties. Guys would just pass women around , there were orgies, it was insane(I can't tell u how many blasted Israeli soldier girls I poked on the beach). The only thing that was missing was Charles Manson. I was overwhelmed as the Night Watchmen, trying to keep order, so I just joined in.
As I said I was night watchmen for the Nama Bay Inn. The guest were mostly Euros who came to scuba dive in the Red Sea. All kinds of shit went down in Nama. Bedouin fisherman would often throw hand grenades off of boats, blowing fish to the surface and harvesting them, also blowing the bi-jesus out of the beautiful Coral. The Arabs didn't give a fuck, the Coral was Israeli. I once saw a Beduin fisherman drop a hand grenade and waited. When he didn't pick it up I walked over to the grenade and grabbed it. It was stamped IDF (Israeli Defense Force)the Beduins were clever smugglers, using camels to move goods, they were famous for hiding stuff. The Beduin traded Heroin to a junky Israeli soldier for the grenade. In the day time and I was off work, of course "work" meant, partying all night. So I was hungover bad most mornings. Always needing a drink, (I am no goddamn Chinowski, but I drink and drug). So I took the grenade, and walked to the the Lost Oasis bar. The owner a Israeli, Palo, was cleaning his grill. I went up to Palo with one hand on the pin and the other on the grenade, I threatened to pull the pin if he didn't give me a bottle of Jack Daniels. He went to the bar and and threw a bottle of Jack and ran. I happily walked into the desert with my prize Jack and my grenade. Latter, dead drunk, I pulled the pin and threw the grenade at a hill thinking it was a invading tank. The grenade went off and left a crater size hole, I felt like goddamn John Wayne.
I was on my rounds and saw the Red Sea diving center on fire, it was made of straw with a separate room for filling diving tanks. The fire started in a grill left burning by divers shit faced drunk earlier. A Beduin boy passed out on the floor was suppose to be the watchmen. I connected a hose to the kitchen sink and put the fire out before it reached the scuba tank area. There would have been one major explosion if the tanks caught fire and the Beduin boy would have fried like a burnt piece of bacon. The maniac German divers would have eaten him for breakfast. The diving center was owned by a Druse dude, Rafi. In the morning I asked Rafi for a case of Macabe beer as a reward for my heroics. He drew a gun (some cheap pistol) pointed it at me, then this cheesy little fucker had the nerve to say to me. "Victor (swearing in Arabic) you probably started the fire, get out of my office" If I hadn't have set off the hand grenade earlier that day, I would have brought it to the diving center and blown up the diving tanks. The explosion would have killed Rafi with little problem, with no parts of him left to bury. He had no family and was such a wanker, the IDF would have applauded me for the job.
One night I was in the hotel kitchen with the cook, Boaz, we were eating cous-cous and falafel, washing it down with beer. When I walked out of the Inn to leave the hotel I felt a sharp pain on my lower calf. I was bitten by a Scorpion. I saw the creature dead on the sand so I picked it up and put it in a styrofoam cup. I felt a buzz but noticed in the ensuing minutes that I was not dying. I went back to the kitchen to ask Boaz what to do. Boaz said, " Victor you crazy fucker you got it all wrong, usually when u are bit by a Scorpion you die not the Scorpion "!
There was a crazy British Expat living on the Beach, Bryan. I will never forget him. He was half in the bag mentally. His only possessions were the clothes on his back, a pair of one white overalls with one pant leg cut off, slippers and a shoulder high walking stick with a plastic baby doll head (that had washed in from the Red Sea) perched on on the top of it . He was Pre Road Warrior for sure. Bryan who could have been the inspiration for “Life of Bryan" would organize poetry readings for the Israeli soldiers, he would read the same poem by Browning over and over, it was a endurance test. Byran was always preaching about something, but you couldn't understand him half the time. It was obvious he was losing his mind slowly, he enjoyed living on the edge and losing his mind. People said that he was love lost or broken hearted. He was the leader of all of the nowhere hippy expats because he was the furthest out on the edge, that counted for allot. This dude was a total speed freak, I have no idea where he scored, but people said he was screwing a Beduin transvestite for speed, the dude had it made with that Beduin punk taken care of him.
By the time I left Nama Bay to go to Greece I had slept on beaches and in the desert so often that I had trouble sleeping inside a room or in a bed. I would stay in a cheap hotel room and sleep on the floor. When I visited a Kibbutz I would go to a open field and sleep looking up at the stars on a grassy field. Finally the day came after a long time in Israel, the Immigration Service would no longer give me a visa, not being Jewish. I could have lied to stay by saying I was Jewish, but I would have taken a chance on being drafted in the Israeli Army. Being in any Army is not my idea of a good time. So I decided by default to leave Israel. When I got to the docks in Haifa to catch the ferry to Greece there was a small group (a hundred or so) of Israeli soldier girls that I had fuck there to see me off . They were weeping and pulling their hair out by the root, many holding my bastards in their arms, begging me not to go.
My plan was to take a slow boat, car or train, destination Amsterdam, dope haven of the world! I took the ferry to Olympus. As usual I sniffed out a group of German free love acid freaks in Corfu. They lived on a deserted strip of beach, naked men and women, fucking, talking, eating, doping, smoking rolled Drum tobacco with hash inside.(I puked the first time I smoked hash with tobacco) Before I knew what hit me I had been on the beach naked and shit canned for 6 months, my mind went blank, time to go North!
This is a hard story to close, because it just goes on man. But I think I will close like a true Socratic philosopher with a question. What was the purpose of two years in the middle of a fuck and dope fest? I certainly didn't leave Israel and Greece a enlightened soul. The answer is, it was a test of limits, he who can party and screw the longest and hardest before he drops, WINS!
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