Cigarettes and Alcohol: Confessions of a Stag Weekend (2 page)

Chapter
Three: A Carton Of Ciggies

Two of the other lads have drifted out of the bar into the duty free shop of crud. They want to avoid pint number three that is currently being shipped in, even though it’s still silly o’ clock on Friday morning.

Boys
will be boys. Standing by a huge display of cartons of cigarettes they start squabbling like a couple of school kids, which they were not too long ago.

Kid
C starts winding Kid D up big time saying ‘Do you see that pack of 200 smokes over there?….They are fronting you out. They are proper staring at you.’

‘What
are you talking about you plum?’ Kid D replies, sick of the conversation already.

‘That
carton reckons that you couldn’t get through the whole lot in one weekend like a real man would.’ Laughs Kid C.

‘But
I don’t even smoke, you know I just ponce the occasional one. It’s cheaper as I don’t buy my own and it’s better for my health as I convince myself that I’m a non-smoker. I’m not some desperate addict like you. Besides to smoke 200 cigarettes in less than 72 hours I’m going to need to have the nicotine intake of a chimp in a test laboratory. What’s the point? Is this some new sports event, the 5,000 metre inhale or what?’ moans Kid D.

‘Come
on,’ says Kid C, ‘let’s get amongst it. Are we going on a stag do or an OAP’s coach trip to Margate? Let’s buy this carton and you can smoke the fuck out of it by Sunday night. It’ll be an achievement you can be proud of and tell your grandkids about.’

‘That
amount of ciggies is going shrink me to four foot nothing and besides what about the damage to my lungs?’ worries Kid D.

‘Fella,
with the litres of booze going down your screech this weekender, I wouldn’t be concerned about it. Your liver will pack up way before your chest does. Trust me, I’ve got a medical background, I’ve been up the STD clinic. Shit, did I just say that out loud? Anyway I’m buying the carton and you is smoking the ‘kin lot. You cool with this?’ asks Kid C knowing he’s won.

‘Does
James Brown get down? Ship ‘em in and I’ll get smoking hard!!’ Kid D relents.

So
fags get bought. The lads wander outside the store and crack open the carton. There’s something about the smell of a new pack of cigs and the way you tear out the silver paper that makes you want to waste a shit load of cash on them over the years you use the deadly coffin sticks.

Kid
D lights one up, breathes in the vapours and even a casual passer-by gets a free lungful as well, lush! Peer pressure is a wonderful thing.

CIGARETTES
SMOKED IN THIS CHAPTER: 1…..199 TO GO

BOOZE
BINGED IN THIS CHAPTER: NADA

Chapter Four: Puff Pants & Torture Chambers

After sinking a few more beers on the plane, we finally land at Schiphol Airport, wobble over to the station and catch the first train into Amsterdam city centre. Being Friday morning the place is packed with average Joe commuters on their way to work. Now we’re racing. Bring it on. Beer, Drugs, Smokes and Hookers - result!

This
being a lad’s weekend away we obviously haven’t sorted anywhere to stay, but we know we’ll be fine as we have that alcohol-fuelled confidence that all is going to be Rock N Roll. Besides we’re not here to sleep. Drop some pills and all will be well.

On
the train one of the guys - Kid E - stands up and puts his hand down his pants. Has a rummage about for a minute or so and comes up with a big lump of black cannabis resin.

‘What
the fuck?’ we all pipe up amazed. It’s a better trick than a crap magician pulling a rabbit out of his hat at a five year olds birthday party. ‘Where did that gear come from?’

‘My
puff pants,’ beams kid E proudly.

‘Your
what? Explain yourself man!’ Deviant Boy shouts.

‘Puff
Pants! I had my Mum, bless her, sew a little pocket into the seat of my pants in between my balls and my arsehole.’

‘What
near your gisp you mean?’ says Deviant. ‘That area is known in medical circles as the stinky ridge but I believe on a woman it can be called the chin rest!’

‘Yeah
that’s where,’ laughs Kid E. ‘I wrap the gear up in cling film put it in the pocket, spray it with aftershave and then the natural whiff of my bollocks and bum hole do the rest. I’m telling you lot, no sniffer dog or customs officer is going to beat the Puff Pants fellas. Let’s get some joints skinned up pronto!!’

Cigarettes,
Rizla’s and lighters fly his way and he gets building the first jazz fags of the trip.

With
my head in my hands I say to him, ‘Bro, you do realise that drugs are as good as legal here in Holland don’t you?’

Kid
E stops what he’s doing and says ‘Shit I thought we were in Cologne.’

‘What
made you think we were going to Cologne you bell end? You’ve just smuggled an illegal substance from the UK into Amsterdam. You are now officially the most shit Drugs Mule on the face of the planet!’

The
whole gang piss themselves with laughter and Kid E is now known forever after, as Mule. We then passed around the joints and started puffing hard, all a bit uneasy that not moments before the gear had been nestling in Mule’s genital area: it’s a well-known fact that the back of his pants have more skid marks than the flight deck of an aircraft carrier but we don’t care to dwell on that.

A
nice high floats in as the train carries us into Centraal Station.

We
stagger out of the station and walk along one of the main roads leading off to Dam Square. It’s not even ten o’clock yet on a Friday morning and half of us are half-pissed and the other half are totally stoned (try to calculate the maths in that statement!)

Laughing
and joking we wander along a street that would win any game of Scrabble hands down: Nieuwezijds Voorburgwal. It’s pretty surreal reeling around at this time of day and we probably look like some sort of homeless convention as we shamble our way up the road.

We
pass a few hotels that look a bit pricey so carry on looking for a pit for the night. One of the boys spots a sign in the window of a kebab shop down one of the side streets with a sign in the window saying ROOMS FOR RENT. Although it’s still early in the morning the kebab shop is already packed with hungry customers.

‘This
will do,’ someone yells and we bowl into the shop to see if they’ve got room enough for the lot of us.

‘Hi
guys!’ bellows the Turkish shish kebab seller behind the counter. ‘You English? You want rooms? You like Man United in the football? Here for a stag do, the ladies, the hash hish…….Come on in, I’ll sort you out!’

The
fella says he has six large rooms available and that we’ll all squeeze in just fine. He takes us through a side door and up the steepest set of stairs known to man. It’s like climbing the North Face of The Eiger only instead of being battered by evil snow storms and deadly ice falls we are assaulted by the thick smell of grease and burnt meat.

The
walls are tacky with grime and haven’t seen a lick of paint in a few decades at least.

On
the first floor he opens a door into the first of the bedrooms. It looks like someone’s been using it as an abattoir, there’s blood and what looks suspiciously like shit smeared up the walls. There’s no doubt that the food you can buy downstairs was slaughtered up here.

The
carpets are crawling with mites, covered in dodgy white stains and have not seen a vacuum cleaner, since, well, probably ever. The beds must have come from the nearest maximum security prison, with the thinnest, rankest mattresses with springs popping through. I don’t want to think about the other bodily fluids that this thing pretending to be a bed has been marinated in, let alone kip in it!

We
then get shown the bathroom and the lavatory. One room is an open sewer; the other is an open sewer with a shower head above it. The stench is worse than Satan’s arse with a very bad case of the trots. To get rid of the stink we can just have a smoke going all the time even when we are asleep, there’s nothing to worry about because there’s no chance of anything catching fire under a layer of rancid animal fat.

‘We
can’t stay here. This is someone’s torture chamber. We’re gonna end up as a headless torso floating in the canal or under a big bag of lime in a forest by tomorrow,’ worries Kid D.

‘I
don’t fancy getting buggered and flayed alive, I’m out of here,’ he continues whining.

‘Well
I love the place,’ pipes up Deviant Boy. ‘What’s the damage chief?’ he asks the owner/ mass murderer of backpackers and daft English stags.

‘It’s
ten Guilders each per night,’ says the kebab man, overjoyed he has some new guests or potential victims staying in The Hotel of Doom.

‘Tell
you what mate, chuck in a free doner each per night and you’ve got yourself a deal my friend!’ and with that the accommodation and our fates are sealed.

The
guy has the front to make us promise that we would not smash the rooms up and that we will leave them in the state that we found them. No worries friend. They can’t get any worse.

Bags
get dumped, armpits sprayed, hair gelled and out we go to see how messed up we can get in The Dam.

CIGARETTES
SMOKED IN THIS CHAPTER: 11…..188 TO GO

BOOZE
BINGED IN THIS CHAPTER: 1 PINT, 2 BOTTLES OF LAGER AND A LIMONCELLO

Chapter Five: The Amsterdam Whore Equation

It’s Friday afternoon and we’ve stumbled on a fantastic bar off one of the canals near the red light area. It’s got some cool snake theme thing going on and the beer pumps are chrome cobra shaped and look well cool. This bar is ticking all the boxes needed for a top stag do:

-
Cold Beer

-
A top shelf loaded with Spirits

-
Pool Table

-
Juke Box (With Banging Top Tunes)

-
Fruit Machines

-
Food

-
Drugs

In
the drugs category they have a dealer in the corner sitting behind a counter chock full of gear. It’s like being in a sweet shop for adults and offers the best ‘pick and mix’ on the planet.

They
serve grass, resin, skunk, super skunk and some trippy ultra-strong variety of weed called purple haze. The local Dutch lads take their drug smoking seriously and sit with a coffee and enjoy their buzz. They know alcohol + spliff = game over.

The
mad English attack the Stella Artois and the gear together. This is not a good idea and will only result in a state of unconsciousness. It’s a fatal mistake to ask the dealer to ‘give me the strongest shit you’ve got man.’ He will and you will regret it. Probably some weed with LSD mixed in it which will massively mess your noggin up for the next week.

Also
on offer in this most excellent establishment are ‘space cakes’, brownies baked with cannabis resin in them for the non-smoking wimps amongst us. These are a major error again because they are super strength and will send you into a coma before you know what hits you.

They
also sell cannabis teabags to enable you to eat a ‘space cake’, drink cannabis tea and smoke a joint all at once. This will definitely get you hospitalised so make sure you’ve bought some fully comprehensive travel insurance.

We
all skin up and start puffing hard. This is a ‘brown bar’ as you are allowed to smoke gear in it. Why they are called ‘brown’ is beyond me as the walls are yellow with nicotine and the place reeks of the sickly sweet smell of the grass.

But
we love it. The tunes are pumping out the juke box and the pool table is seeing some hustler action. This is the life. I’ve got a massive buzz on, the chat is racy and the laughter comes thick and fast: I’ve not got a care in the world. It’s fair to say that not a single gram of fuck will be given today.

Meanwhile
Kid H has been looking at Kid I for a while and says ‘I know you. I recognise you now.’

‘Course
you recognise him you plum you’ve been drinking with him all day, he’s Kid G’s cousin,’ Kid C mutters.

‘No
,’ Kid H continues ‘I know you from before the weekender.’

He
is staring hard at Kid I who says he has not got a clue as to where they might have met before.

‘You
live in the village and you drive a silver 4 x 4 thingy don’t you?’ Kid H asks of Kid I.

‘Yeah
that’s right but I am sure that our paths have not crossed before.’

‘You
must recognise me. Have a really good shifty at my picture. Is my face ringing any bells yet?’

Kid
I has not got the faintest idea what Kid H is banging on about. In total frustration Kid H stands up, drops to the floor and starts rolling about making horrible noises. He is holding his arm at a weird angle and screaming in pretend agony.

‘Recognise
me now you tit?!’ he yells while writhing about on the floor looking like an earth worm who is just coming up on an E.

Kid
H looks like he is having some sort of seizure or fit of some sort but none of the locals seem to bat an eyelid. Suddenly the penny drops for Kid I. You can almost see the light bulb that starts to glow above his canister. PING!

‘Oh
Shit. Kid H I’m sorry mate. You’re the fella that I knocked off his bike a couple of months ago. I did not recognise you without your Lycra budgie smugglers on. Got to apologise but I’m sure the accident was your fault anyway!’ exclaims Kid I.

‘How
do you work that out? I was coming down the hill on my bike on the way to work and you just pulled out of a side street without looking. I hit the front side of your car and went straight over the bonnet and cattle trucked my arm when I hit the ground. How was that my fault?’ questions Kid H as he gets up off the floor.

‘Well,
if you had been driving in a car I would have seen you for sure. Anyway I did stop and check that you were OK. You said all was good, no damage to you or the bike and we shook hands. No harm done. However there is the small matter of the dent and scratch your bike put in the side of my jam jar though, but buy me a pint to call it quits.’

Kid
H can’t believe the gall of Kid I. They eye each other up warily and then crack up laughing.

‘Fuck
me. It is a small world huh. I was almost killed by Kid G’s cousin. Is that how you find new mate’s is it? By running them off the road you crazy fool?’

At
that moment Kid H becomes ‘Hit’ and Kid I is nicknamed ‘Run.’

The
‘Hit & Run’ lads are still good mates today, nearly two decades later and the story has become so embellished by now that Hit’s head actually came clean off as the bike went straight through Run’s engine block causing a massive explosion. After all, what is a bit of exaggeration between friends?

“
PISSED
UP
CONVERSATION
#
1
: ‘
Let’s
open
up
a
bar
exactly
like
this
one
when
we
get
home
,
it’ll
be
the
mutts
nuts
!
’
shouts
one
of
the
lads
,
Kid
F
.

‘
Well
two
things
are
going
to
knacker
that
idea
straight
away
,
’
says
Mule
. ‘
First
we’d
drink
all
the
profits
and
second
drugs
are
illegal
back
home
.
Don’t
think
the
local
police
are
going
to
be
too
happy
about
a
bar
full
of
kids
stoned
outta
their
heads
.
’

‘
But
everyone
would
be
so
chilled
out
that
they
wouldn’t
be
arsed
about
fighting
.
Check
it
out
here
in
Amsters
.
It’s
only
the
English
acting
up
and
getting
out
of
control
.
’

‘
Yeah
the
English
disease
they
call
it
.
Can’t
handle
our
mind
altering
substances
or
our
drink
,
cool
ain’t
it
?
Get
another
round
in
son
.” END OF CONVERSATION….

Although
it’s only early afternoon, two of the single guys in the stag party have disappeared off to the red light area for a bit of window shopping and maybe [this means definitely] sample a bit of the old ‘in and out.’

For
the record I have never paid for sex although I have the sort of boat race that would suggest that I have to.

The
ladies always look red hot all togged up in their full kit and webbing but I just can’t indulge because of the mathematics of the game as follows:

Let’s
be generous, very generous in most cases and say the average bloke’s penis is six inches [half a foot] long when erect.

Say
Hooker X entertains eight clients during each working day, 8 x 6 inches, this is four feet of cock per day.

Suppose
she works five days a week this becomes, 4 x 5 = 20 feet. After three weeks work in the month, due to nature, this becomes, 20 x 3 equals 60 feet of nadger each month.

So
the grand total of nob in one year, would be 60 feet x 12 months = a massive 720 feet of man meat.

To
put that into perspective Nelson’s Column in Trafalgar Square in London, England is only 169 feet tall. Therefore your average brass gets four times as much ‘Man Column’ over the year than Lord Nelson!!

That’s
what puts me right off and why I don’t join the two lads on their jolly. They have convinced themselves that by going on a Friday afternoon they will end up on top of a cracking bit of MILF (Mum I’d Like to Fuck) who only works while her nippers are at school.

She
only shags a few select punters during the daylight hours and then disappears off back to her ideal home, hubbie and 2.5 children of an evening.

This
idea is the exact opposite of the ‘go ugly early’ theory when out on the pull in your local night club.

If
you’re into a bit of Hermann Goering [Whoring] fair enough, I’m not the shag police, just rubber up and dive on in!

I’m
certainly not disrespecting Prostitution as a career choice. It is the oldest profession on Earth and hookers are clearly doing something right by providing a most pleasurable experience. It’s just not my cannabis-laced cup of tea.

Back at the snake bar, we’ve got chatting to a great bunch of local girls and lads. They can’t believe the state we are all in so early in the day and are ripping the piss out of us daft English mad dogs.

The
banters flying back and forth, there’s a brilliant laid back vibe going on. One of the ladies is an absolute cracker. Long wavy blonde hair, a great body and a razor sharp tongue on her. She is giving out a load of stick and knows who to pick on in the group to get the maximum laughs.

She
told us that her name is Kristall, not like crystal the gem but spelt with a K, an I and two L’s. Her English is excellent, which is a right result, as none of us speak a word of Dutch and most of us are currently only speaking Pissed. She tells us she has five big brothers at home, so is used to hanging around with a herd of crazy males.

I
suspect she also tells us this to let us know that any unwanted funny business could be met with a pretty severe kicking. She has also skived off work early to grab a few beers, seems they celebrate POETS day here as well. You know ‘Piss Off Early Tomorrow’s Saturday’. Avoiding work to go out drinking is the same in any country it seems.

Kristall
just may be the perfect woman. You can see that most of the firm have got their eyes on her but don’t have a chance of pulling really, not until they become half sober at least.

She’s
telling us how great Amsterdam is and where all the cool clubs, bars and cheap but cheerful restaurants are. ‘You’ve got to visit Anne Frank’s House, see the trendy art in The Rijksmuseum, take a bicycle tour along the canals, it’s just amazing.’

Kid
C interrupts, ‘You must be joking love, none of this lot have got any culture whatsoever and apart from the freely available drugs, the only Touristy thing we might go and see is The Museum of Sexy Time!’

‘Wow
I love that place!’ says Kris, ‘Let’s go there right now.’ With that she rustles up a few of the lads and a couple of her girlie mates come along for the stroll. Some of the boys are not keen to leave the snake bar until chucking out time, which will be very late doors.

Back
home the pubs still close at three in the afternoon and don’t reopen until seven. It’s like living in the Stone Age. Being here in Amsterdam, somewhere more civilised that allows all day opening is an opportunity not to be missed, certainly not to go to a museum.