agreement.
“I am tired. It’s ok, Mr. Saru, you can show me around another time” I say.
“C’mon, you’re not tired. Let’s go. Let me show you around Tumon” he says.
“No, thank you, but really, you don’t have to show me around tonight.” I say.
“Nonsense, you are new to the island and I am going to show you around. You don’t want to sit alone in that hotel room. C’mon, let’s go down to Tumon” he says in a demanding tone.
One of his sons asks Mr. Saru if he is going to ‘see her’, a question which quickly answers with a nervous laugh.
“No, no, daddy will be home later” but as he says this Elisa notices that I am paying close attention and she looks away.
With all the neon and tall buildings, Tumon reminds me of a small scale version of Waikiki. But that is not what Mr. Saru meant when he said that “Tumon is like Waikiki.” As he describes it, Tumon is the place on Guam with the resort hotels and most of the tourist attractions.
“I chair the board of the Guam Tourism Authority” he says.
I pretend like this is news to me although Alan, the government driver already told me that last night. Mr. Saru continues; “You know, Guam has many great tourist attractions and we get more tourism than most of the beach resorts in the mainland USA. We compete with Hawaii for tourism too. Guam is only a three hour flight from Japan, Hong Kong, Korea and the Philippines whereas it takes at least seven hours to travel from any of those destinations to Hawaii” he says.
I notice that we are passing a Hard Rock Café, a Planet Hollywood and a Gameworks. There are resort hotels and restaurants, pool halls and strip clubs, lots of strip clubs. There is even a Duty Free Shopping mall next to a Louis Vuitton store. Mr. Saru is narrating the tour and as we pass one of the clubs, a club with a sign proclaiming it as ‘The World Famous Club G Spot’ he asks me if I like strip clubs.
“Strip clubs? Sure, they are ok.” I say.
“They don’t do anything for me, it’s a big rip-off!” he says. “I would rather stay home with my wife than go to a strip club. I don’t want to pay for sex. Those girls are not worth it.”
I nod in agreement but what the fuck? What was that about? I hope he isn’t taking me to a strip club.
“Over there is the Tumon Sling Shot, a ride where people are strapped to a seat inside a caged ball and then shot into the atmosphere. Japanese tourists love that thing” He says, continuing the tour.
Driving past another row of bars Mr. Saru points out and says; “Those are hostess bars. You know, buy me drinky bars. Are you familiar with that?” Before I can answer he continues; “there are these girls that work there, hostesses, and they will sit next to you and say ‘buy me drinky’. The girls make a commission on the drinks it’s another damn rip off but they do a hell of a lot of business.”
We finally pull into a crowded parking lot. There are a few nightclubs, but the one with the loud live band and a long line out the door is a club called ‘Casa’. But we aren’t going to Casa. Instead Mr. Saru leads me towards a bar named Kitano Zaka. Fuck, it’s a karaoke bar and I hope he isn’t going to spend the night singing. As soon as we step inside we are greeted by several hostesses and seated in a private section at the front of the club. Everyone here seems to know Mr. Saru. The bartender comes over to our section to greet us and Mr. Saru introduces the bartender, Omar, to me. An older Asian woman wearing a kimono comes to our table and greets Mr. Saru. He introduces her as the Mamason, the owner of the bar. Mamason leaves our table and comes back with four girls; none of them look like they are older than twenty five. The one girl sitting next to me is holding a song book to choose karaoke songs, Japanese, Tagalog, English, Korean, Thai and even English. Her name is Mai and she is asking me to sing a song. Paging through the book surprises me, they have a lot of recent pop songs, songs that are currently hits on MTV and top forty radio. One of the girls sitting by Mr. Saru has chosen a song. Mai says that it’s a popular Thai song. Mimi takes our drink orders, I ask for a diet Coke, Mr. Saru asks for a blend of lychee, papaya and pineapple juice.
“I don’t drink alcohol” he says to me. “Never acquired the taste for it, you?”
“I like to drink sometimes. I drank a lot when I was in college, but the novelty has worn off. Besides, I am more health conscious now.” I say.
The bar girls are taking turns with the karaoke. Two of them are entertaining us by singing a duet of Say, Say, Say, the Paul McCartney, Michael Jackson collaboration which is fairly entertaining. Mr. Saru leans close to me, as if he has some very important, very private news to share.
“Chamorro have different traditions then mainland Americans; he says. “We have different cultures and languages.” I nod to show that I understand but where the hell is he going with this?
“We have a word ‘achatma’ that means girlfriend or mistress but it’s not a very nice word. But having an achatma is acceptable and in fact, admirable. But that word, ‘achatma’ is considered derogatory to the woman. They like to be called a girlfriend or fiancée.”
Okay, so he is teaching me a new word, a Chamorro word, achatma.
“So a mistress is an achatma?” I ask.
“No, no, not like a mistress. An achatma is a legitimate girlfriend.”
Amused and confused by his distinction but distracted by the bar girl who is singing the song “Mickey” and waving pom-poms in the air, my mouth is agape. Looking around at each booth there are men, older, well dressed men with several young women. It also seems like the girls of the Kitano Zaka are required to sing.
“Have you been to any of the hostess bars in Honolulu?” Mr. Saru asks.
“You mean the ‘buy-me-drinky bars?” I say with a laugh, “Yes, I have been to a few. And I understand about mistresses. I mean, not mistresses, but girlfriends. I understand the distinction between wives and girlfriends.”
Mr. Saru is smiling at my attempted empathy. Mamason escorts a chubby young woman to our booth and Mr. Saru introduces her as Adipo and tells her that I am the new general manager of Tropics Gym. Her chubby face suddenly flushes with anger.
“How can you do this to him?” Adipo asks. “Why did you bring him?”
Mr. Saru calmly responds; “I needed him as an excuse to get out.”
Adipo smiles at me and politely extends her hand.
I take her hand and say “It’s nice to meet you, Adipo.”
“Welcome to Guam” she says before turning back to Mr. Saru and asking; “Why did you bring him here? Why are you exposing him to this?”
“We already had this argument.” He turns to me and laughs, “She and I already had this argument earlier but I was right about you. You aren’t going to be bothered by my relationships. I bet this is somewhat familiar to you.” He turns to face Adipo and says “He has been around the block. He understands this part of our culture.”
Adipo turns away and begins browsing through one of the song books, obviously irritated. This is uncomfortable and I realize that this must be the woman that his son asked about back at the restaurant, she must be his atchatma. Mai, one of the bar girls, sits down next to me placing a drink in front of me. “It Diet Coke” she says. “He order for you, he say you don’t drink.”
“Thank you.” I say.
Adipo has a microphone and she is starting to sing as Chamorro words scroll across the screen overhead.
“I love when she sings this song” Mr. Saru says, “It’s a Chamorro love song. Adipo has been my achatma, my girlfriend for three years. She is my soul mate.”
Sitting here in the Kitano Zaka, my mind wanders back to the days I spent as a personal trainer at the prestigious Honolulu Club. Some years ago I was the personal trainer