Monkey

How'd you get so funky? Did you do the monkey, King Tut? Now, that's a good question how did he get so funky? But more apropos perhaps is what is the monkey? What exactly do you have to do to do the monkey? Is it a dance and if so how does it go?

All of this is a kind of round about way to talking about a monkey I saw once by the side of the road in the Brazilian Pantanal _ which is great big wetland that is tons more interesting than the Amazon in terms of seeing nature. Where the Amazon is mostly a vast wall of green when it isn't devastated for pasture, the Pantanal is vast flood plain chock full of wildlife. Trees hang heavy with huge storks, crocodiles fill the rivers and cute furry capivaras litter the sleepy dirt roads. At one point during my first trip to the Pantanal the photographer I was working with said to me, "I know I'm being paranoid, but I can't help but think they're putting all these animals here for our benefit." Whatever. He was paranoid that way.

But it was really an amazing trip and what was even more amazing is we must have seen only three or four other cars on the road, either coming or going, over a couple of hundred miles of driving _ in terms of people and cars it was just that empty. On the way back though we saw this black monkey standing on the side of the road looking lost, hurt and angry. I wish I had a picture but we just breezed by. At the time, it looked like the road scared the fuck out of him. His expression seemed to say, "What madness has man wrought with this?" Thinking back he also looked like he had just escaped from a massacre or something. But that didn't hit me at the time.

I thought of the monkey yesterday as I was bicycling down Prince street in Soho and glimpsed this strong, Italian-looking man with a healthy five o'clock shadow trying to take a picture with a profession looking digital camera. He exuded confidence and certainly looked the part of a famous photographer but what what he doing taking a shot of a facade in Soho. I mean where is the art in that? Soho is like so over-played now isn't it? I mean is there any art going down there any more, anyway? I remember back in the day when there were only about three restaurants and the ever present smell of baking that left tourists searching for the source after they had their Sunday brunches only to discover it came from a factory and the galleries didn't open on Sundays. I remember sitting on the scrap metal sculptures in the motorcycle park on Broome street with my friend Noel after we'd checked out the record shop over on Prince street _ forget the name of it but it might of been something like the Music Gallery, I was really into Public Image and early Clash at the time. And then Soho just kept growing and growing until it looked more like Rodeo Drive than anywhere else, more shopping, less art. Still, it's fun to bike through it on these hot spring days to see the pretty woman and men all shopping and eating in the outdoor cafes.

But the Italian photographer, he can't be real, can he? He should be in Bushwick or somewhere in Brooklyn these days, maybe even Newark or who knows the Bronx. Look at what madness man has wrought with this.