T A B L E_T A L K

What's the best way to visit Mexico? Go south of the border in the Wanderlust area of Table Talk

Naples in a new light
By Deb Fellner
An island encounter transforms a wanderer's impressions
(04/27/98)

Mondo Weirdo
Toilet tricks in Asia; aircraft flambé in Toronto
(04/24/98)

Africa Solo
By Kevin Kertscher
A filmmaker learns a lesson about giving from three small children in the heart of West Africa
(04/23/98)

Absinthe makes the heart grow
By Taras Grescoe
On a pilgrimage in Barcelona's bohemian barrio
(04/22/98)

Seduced and sated in Costa Rica
By J. Kingston Pierce
From morphos and macaws to coatimundi and poison-arrow frogs, this tiny Central American country offers a mind-altering overabundance of wildlife
(04/21/98)

__THE MYSTICAL HIGH CHURCH OF LUCK .|. PAGE 2 OF 2

Drinking contraband Pabst Blue Ribbon in the Circus Circus casino is not nearly as entertaining as it sounds, so Jeff and I backtracked down the Strip looking to slum poolside at one of the glitzy hotels.

Unfortunately, security at places like the Luxor and the MGM Grand is comparable to that of the White House, so we had to settle for the outdoor veranda at the golf-themed Sheraton Desert Inn. Sitting in our underwear in an outdoor jacuzzi, we drank the rest of our Pabst and smiled dumbly as the cleated retirees clicked by on their way to the adjoining golf course. Somewhere in there we caught a buzz and elected to gamble our remaining $2 away.

Damp and smelling of chlorine, Jeff and I trudged over to our dream casino: a nickel-slot joint that advertised 18 doughnuts for $1.50. We reasoned that if we had any luck at all on the nickel slots, we could cash out in doughnuts and ride triumphantly out of Las Vegas.

We weren't there five minutes when I hit a jackpot and won $30 in nickels.

Somewhere high up in heaven -- in what was no doubt their most thrilling pissing contest since Job -- God and the devil put down a wager on me. This time the devil won.

I took the $30, gave half of it to Jeff, swaggered into the Mirage casino and set up camp at the quarter video-poker machines. Inexplicably, my streak of good fortune continued. Full house. Flush. Three of a kind. The quarters kept showering down into my tray. Chowderhead that I am, I metamorphosed into an obnoxious winner, yelling loudly and slapping high fives with Jeff. As if on cue, a seductively clad barmaid showed up to offer me free drinks. Somewhere around my third or fourth Heineken, I hit a straight flush, turning four quarters into $50 worth of change. By overall Vegas standards, my jackpot was jack squat, but I celebrated like a high roller.

A couple cocktails later, I was sitting at the dollar video-poker machines at the Treasure Island casino, shoving my last token into the slot. It had taken me about 10 minutes to lose everything I'd won at the quarter and nickel machines.

Still, I had been born again hard into the Mystical High Church of Luck. I was convinced of my immortality. When my last token bore no fruit, I haughtily denounced the Treasure Island, reloaded to the tune of $100 at the conveniently located ATM, and took a tram to Caesar's Palace. I was broke again after about 15 minutes.

Jeff steered me away from another conveniently located ATM and took me to the bar for a cappuccino. Sipping our coffee, we exchanged what we hoped were meaningful glances with a couple of girls across the bar. We didn't have the courage to actually go and talk to them, since we weren't up for explaining how "our place" was parked in the Hacienda lot. Plus we still smelled like chlorine.

Sobriety heightened my sense of moral indignation at what I'd become. Too proud to blame myself, I started to spout bitter rhetoric about Las Vegas.

"Where does all this money go?" I asked an uninterested Jeff. "Do people live here? How much does the guy dressed as Caesar get paid? Or what about that guy with the unicycle at Circus Circus? Where did he come from? Did he dream of being the Circus Circus unicycle guy as a kid? Is this self-actualization for him? Is there a hierarchy for unicycle guys in Las Vegas? Do they belong to a labor union? Is there really all that much difference between going to work every day to do tricks on a unicycle and stocking food in a supermarket?

"Have you ever looked at a photo of those chorus girls? Where do they come from? Why do they all look alike? Are they clones? Is there some town out in North Dakota that breeds chorus girls specifically for Las Vegas? Are chorus girls classified as livestock in Nevada? And why are there so many performers who impersonate dead people in this town? Why not do a celebrity impersonation of me? Or you? Or those girls over there? Why this obsession with dead people? Is this heaven? Hell? If so, where are the normal dead people? Where are my ancestors? Is there anything original or alive in this entire city? Is everything here nostalgia? Are we supposed to be already feeling nostalgic about tonight? Was I supposed to feel nostalgic when I was saying that?

"I want a casino where the bartenders wear T-shirts and rubber flip-flop sandals and give you warm beer in cans, and the barmaids dress up in cut-off jeans and fuzzy bedroom slippers and bring you Halloween candy as a consolation when you go on a losing streak, and everyone who wants to gamble has to first go up to a microphone and tell the story of their first kiss, and people only get free drinks if they make ironical allusions to the laws of entropy or the Articles of Confederation or the Pauline definition of love. Shit, Jeff. Let's open the place up ourselves. We'll call it Jeff's. Or better yet, we'll just hang an electronic reader-board out front, and whenever a customer wants to change the name of the place, we'll change it. What do you think, man?"

Jeff didn't even pause. "I think it's time we left Las Vegas."
SALON | April 28, 1998

Rolf Potts teaches English at Dong-Eui College in Pusan, South Korea.