A Drinker's Guide to St. Tropez: Day 6

---

With the crushing hangover of the previous day fresh in my mind, I was in no rush to throw myself back into circulation. I slept until probably 3 in the afternoon and was planning on a final low key day before heading to Monte Carlo the next morning. I went down to the pool, grabbed a perrier, the herald tribune, a lounge chair and settled in for a boring afternoon. In a nearly unprecedented move, clouds started rolling in and I was shocked when it started to drizzle. It NEVER rains on the Riviera in summer and it is rare that it's even cloudy. I grabbed my stuff and took a table under the awning by the pool bar. I ordered a club sandwich and continued to read the paper. By the time I had finished lunch, the rain had stopped, the sun was back and according to my watch it was still early enough for the beach clubs. I said the crushing hangover was fresh in my mind, but it was apparently not front and center. I took the shuttle to Nikki and settled in at the bar with a screwdriver and some marlboro lights. After three or four screwdrivers I saw someone I knew and went over to their table/bed/whatever you want to call the loungers. I didn't stay long though as this awful woman who was part of the group , Russian (but kept saying she didn't count as Russian because her family was Lebanese and she lived in Milan) and very very drunk would not shut up about how much she hated America. She would be like "just so you know, I hate America...you know that Europe thinks America is shit right?...did I mention I HATE America." I just kept nodding politely and trying to ignore her and she'd be like "Right, this is not a good thing to talk about right? Let's not talk about this ok?" and i'd be like whatever you say you boozed up mess then 30 seconds later "but I just have to say that I hate America and I don't agree with your policies." I didn't feel like explaining to this old lush that America's policies are not "my" policies and believe it or not each and every American does not determine our countries foreign policy personally and *gasp* some people actually disagree with things the gov't does! Without being sent to GULAG's even! I very nearly lost it when she started harping on the U.S. involvement in Afghanistan. She kept getting exasperated and being like "why do you do this? There is no reason to be there...it isn't right." I was very tempted to ask her why exactly her country thought it was OK to occupy Afghanistan for roughly 10 years, or perhaps that didn't count because America wasn't at fault. At least we initially went there because of the terrorist attacks on our country that Afghanistan helped make possible, what exactly was the Soviet Union's rationale for invading? Oh well, who wanted to compete in the 1980 Summer Olympics in Moscow anyway right? I called Eric to see if he and Roland were out but they were not up for beach clubs. A note on the beach clubs, topless tanning is totally OK and many girls do so, but they try to do so discretely not make exhibitionist spectacles of themselves. This one Brazilian girl kept walking back and forth across the length of the beach club topless, clearly looking for the attention her daddy or boyfriend or whoever did not give her. Then, come 5:30 pm guess who is drunk, dancing on top of the bar in nothing but her bikini bottoms and trying to coax her seemingly less drunk friend to pull her top off as well (she rolled it up to expose midrift but wouldn't take it off, using her better judgment). Some of the guys witnessing this took pictures or videos on their phone which I thought was incredibly tacky and in bad taste. I suppose it's one thing to make a stupid decision like that on vacation, but I can only imagine the horror her family would feel if they ever saw behavior like that. Anyway, I took off close to 7 and started working on dinner plans. Eric and Roland were out. I had sent Fred a facebook message earlier and he called me saying he was in for dinner with Eduardo and some random Russian girls (I know what you're thinking, but these were not even close to pretty enough to be hookers) they had met during lunch at Cinquant Cinq. I called the concierge and we got a reservation for 6 at Villa Romana (Sunday not so tough it seems) then called Fred back to let him know. As usual we agreed to meet at the pool bar. In addition to Fred, Eduardo, the Russians and I, Fred also invited brunette Georgie from the other night (it was here that we would learn of the hand slicing debacle that led to her early exit on Sat.) and this other guy from LA (I can't remember his name) who Fred and Eduardo knew. When we got to our table (now for 7) there were two girls at a table for 2 maybe a few inches from our larger table. They shot us a pretty venomous look when we tumbled into our seats and I took them for Germans. Once we started into our drinks, we invited the two of them to slide their table over and join ours. They were actually surprisingly nice and decided to join us. They were both from Turkey and though they would be in Bodrum (on the coast in Turkey) when I was to be in Istanbul, they wrote me an e-mail detailing restaurants and clubs to hit and promised to put me in contact with their friends. There were no helmets or silly hats at dinner this time, but there were many drinks. It came up that somehow Fred or Eduardo had inadvertently told Alex (one of the British) that in addition to the table he had on the dancefloor at VIP they should book a second table next to it for us. I was set to leave for Monaco in the morning and Fred and Eduardo were to be on a 10:30 am flight from Nice back to NY. They planned on drinking all night until flight time and Fred was due into the office later that very afternoon. I spent much of dinner trying to convince them to cancel their flight and come to Monte Carlo. Eduardo has his own company so he was totally down, Fred kept getting to the point where he was just about to go for it but then when Eduardo would get the phone out to call the airline Fred's better judgment would kick in and he would note how his boss would not be pleased if he blew off a week of work to continue drinking. After dinner it was 1am or later again so it was right to VIP. Our table was pretty rad and since we had 2 tables instead of one, there was ample space to stand/dance on the banquette. I think we had just a magnum of grey goose but details get hazy and I chipped in euros (of unknown quantity) towards the final bill so I have no credit card slip to help me piece it together. I forgot to mention earlier, but I was flush with Euros for some reason. I woke up one morning to find 700 or 800 euros in my pocket, not really sure of where they came from. I suppose it's possible I went to an ATM drunk and took out a ton of euros but I don't see why since I almost never use cash. Anyway, I started to tire out around 5 and LA guy and I decided to bail and see how Les Caves was. He spoke no French so I had to purchase us some bottled waters from a stand during the stumble back. Les Caves was totally dead and near closing. We each got a drink, LA guy went to the bathroom then bailed. I finished most of my drink then stopped on the way out to talk to the bouncer who remembers me every year. It turns out he's from Virginia, weird place for a Virginian to end up I suppose. I thought it was bed time, but Fred showed up out of nowhere and suggested we go to LA guy's room and take the bottle of champagne he had so we could keep drinking. I forget his name now, but Fred knew LA guy's name so we asked the desk which room "insert last name" was in. This proved tricky, as LA guy and his sister were in one room and his parents were in another. The desk didn't know who was in which room so we had to choose wisely because we didn't want to bang on his parent's door at 5am. I had a beer I must have gotten from somewhere, so we decided to bang on his door and re-enact the saturday champagne attack with the half a corona I had...oh how the mighty have fallen. He guessed right and LA guy appeared at the door. He was not amused with the beer spray and kept telling us to keep it down lest we wake his sister. He would not give us the bottle, he did not want to continue partying, the night was probably over. It was close to 6 now, my car was coming at noon and Fred's flight left in less than 5 hours, not to mention he had to pack, get a car and get from St. Tropez to Nice which is at least 1.5 hours even early in the morning. He was still locked out of his room, as Eduardo had slyly vanished from VIP with both Russian girls, so he decided he would call Georgie and see if he could go to her house. I told him I was going to bed and to call me if he missed his flight or decided to skip it to stay, otherwise catch you on the flip side back in NY. I was sad to be leaving as St. Tropez is an remains one of my favorite vacation spots. It was an absolutely fantastic week. Met a bunch of great new friends, had a lot of drinks and got started on a tan. Not as tan as i'd like to be (one day at Voile Rouge after being told I was pale I would turn every 5-10 minutes and ask "am I tan yet?") but a start. I passed out and slept well.

---