Uncertain In Greenland

I was sitting in a truly shitty bar in Godthab, Greenland, with Dirty Dick Abdallah and a midget named Rommell, when the door burst open, and an explosion of snow needles shoved an Eskimo through the door and slammed her face down on our ancient linoleum-topped table, which slammed to the floor, along with our incredibly expensive Danish beers. Blood and beer made a tarnished pink puddle on the tabletop at our feet. A dozen people jumped up to shut the door before we all froze to death, and before anyone gave the Eskimo a second look. A dozen drinkers muttered curses at the rudeness of the intruder for leaving a door open for more than a split second. It was late fall in Greenland, after all, so who could blame them?

Fall in Greenland is like a real bad winter in Fargo North Dakota.

Fully dressed for the season, which I think is most of the year, it is hard to tell the gender of an Eskimo, or anyone else up here, for that matter, until you have them pretty much unwrapped, and sometimes even then it isn't easy unless you unwrap them all the way. Somehow I knew the fur parka on the floor had a woman in it.

Once the indoor snow settled, everyone in the place stared our way.

Now, an Eskimo face down in a bar is a common sight in Greenland, especially at a table of Gringos. Booze is horribly expensive in Greenland, and it is for a reason. The indigenous folk are generally as good or bad as people anywhere else, but they lack that special European gene for dealing with booze that folk from more southern climes have so carefully nutured and evolved for eons. The Danes, who own the place, deal with rampant alcoholism by making liquor too expensive for the natives, who, generally speaking, have no cash. Free food, free housing, free heat, free everything, but no hard dinero.

More about that later. Blood in the beer on the floor, and more blood than beer, well, it is a cause for concern. It may have been as much concern for the wasted beer, to be honest, at least at first.

No one moved or spoke for a full three seconds, and then most of the handful of patrons sat down with both hands on their 15 dollar drinks in case another Eskimo came through the door and knocked their prize over. We stood there. Rommell was closest to the woman. I mean, he had no choice, being a midget and all.

Let me say now, I know you aren't supposed to say "midget" anymore, but that's what he called himself, so for now, I do too.

Rommell reached down and turned her over, and when he did, her parka hood fell open, proving my gender intuition to be right on. Her eyes were open and looking at nothing but her next stop. Rommell looked up at us and said, in his bizarre, somewhere-from-middle-Europe accent, "Well, we are now very fucked."

I had to go with him when he was right.

We weren't supposed to be here, and, in point of fact, we were illegal aliens in Greenland, although there isn't a lot of illegal alien enforcement in a place nobody in even moderate control of their senses would choose to sneak in to.

Even worse, Rommell, who had the sex drive of a goat on Viagra and always said "He who culls goes to Hell", had managed to spend many Danish colorful monies getting this very same Eskimo gal very drunk at this very same bar, at this very same table, the night before, in front of mostly the very same audience that now was staring balefully at us at this very moment. With the very same me and Dirty Dick with him.

In spite of him being Rommell, the woman had let Rommell lead her tottering and giggling out the door, like a child leading his drunk mother home, into the whiteout of the never ending sea of snow, and, doubtless, to our sad hotel room to experience his particular and embarrassing version of love.

Now, before you begin thinking that I am saying this because Rommell was, ah, height challenged, let me assure you it isn't so. It is just that he gave "little people" , and bipeds in general, a bad name. He was ill-tempered, bad natured, and didn't give personal hygiene more than an occasional passing wave. He could drink more than a normal NFL lineman, and started more fights than anyone I ever saw. He never saw a woman he didn't think wanted him, and instead of throwing out a line, he would take a bite out of his beer mug and chew it up and swallow it, looking them, all the while, dead in the eye. Mostly he ended up with hookers, of course, and hard-up hookers at that, but Greenland is different, and he loved the place as much as Dirty Dick and I hated it.

You have to know that in Greenland, there are almost no sexual taboos. A roll in the sack is more like a handshake, especially if you have the dough to buy drinks. Doesn't matter much if the girl is single, engaged or married, 16 or 66, if you can buy enough drinks, you can find someone to love, even Rommell.

I know you think I am being horrible here but consider this: when you leave the country, they give you a handful of horse pills...antibiotics, to cure their very particular version of the clap...and immigration just assumes you have it. And it is a good thing they do. And so Rommell was in heaven here.

Of course, being a progressive Danish possession, they also have telephones, and the bartender had used it. Before I could kick Rommell for living, the door exploded in again, and the snow threw in three Greenland cops. Once they got the ice off their eyeballs, they zeroed in on us, and the rat bartender, who loved us every night for having money, ran over and started singing to them like Danes do when they talk. Dirty Dick didn't look at me, but he said "Truly, we are very fucked".