I couldn't have asked for a better first assignment. The call came on a Thursday, a week before rent was due, and god dammit, I was already starving. My employer, a man I promised not to make known to the public in return for his promise to jump-start my career as a writer, was a man I met at a cigar lounge in Houston. Over a glass of whiskey, or eight, and two of the finest cigars I could have never afforded on my own, we bonded over an asinine story in the New York Post.
A Texas woman vanished into the ether, but was recently found in the god forsaken woodlands of Scotland, holed up with a self-proclaimed "lost tribe,” totaling in an astounding two "Scottish African Hebrews". The group was being led by some asshole named Kofi Offeh, who used to be an opera singer. The New York Post, the god awful publication that it is, offered its brief, dry, sad excuse for a report of the terrible scene, then moved on to the next victim of their exploitation.
"No substance at all. God damn, good-for-nothing, so-called 'journalists'!" I exclaimed.
"Fucking soulless generation of click-crazed vampires," said my employer, who's probably deep down, just as money hungry as the ivory tower-dwelling goblins at the Post, agreed wholeheartedly with me in this matter.
"Something has to be done," I said, as I threw back my glass of Maker's and slammed it on the table, causing heads to turn and a concerned glance from the bartender. My employer slid a twenty-dollar bill his way, assuring him everything was under control.
"Perhaps there is something that can be done." My employer suggested, leaning forward with a grin. "You've got a way with words, Merritt. And a passion for deep analysis. You might be the last one left. Thompson, Bourdain, a rare but, well, before I met you, I considered a dead breed."
I let out a short laugh. "Don't flatter me by putting me in that company; and don't insult them by lumping me in either." I took a sip of the fresh whiskey the bartender had brought. “Those are Gods.”
My employer nodded slowly. "They were gifted observers and fantastic writers, no doubt, but their analysis never provided any proper diagnosis. They never really saw beyond the illusion, did they?"
"Not until their final decision," I admitted, blowing another cloud of smoke into the humid Houston air.
My employer's tone shifted from philosophical to transactional, asking a question in a moment I will never forget. "Mr. Merritt, how would you like to pick up that torch? Head on out to Scotland and see what is really going on in those woodlands."
"Get the fuck out of here,” I laughed again, “I got a job, man, and too many bills. Hell, I can't even afford a trip to Mexico, let alone Scotland."
"Never mind any of that," he said with a wave of his hand, dismissing my life's problems as if they were a bothersome gnat. "I'll take care of it."
”You really can't be serious.”
”I'm bored, Merritt. Everything I see. Every media channel bores the hell out of me. The money isn't an issue. There's plenty of it, trust me. I'm just dying for some authenticity in the middle of this digital dystopia, and I know I'm not the only one. You can change that, and pay your bills at the same time. I mean it, I'd like to hire you.
That fateful meeting took place eight fucking days ago, and I quit my job seven days ago, fully believing we would get straight to work. It took eight fucking days for him to call me, and when he did, I let him have it. I bitched at him for a minute, explaining my situation, jobless, hungry, etc.
He had my phone number, so he asked me to look at my bank account. A Zelle transfer of $3000 was available instantly. "Holy fuck, man," I couldn't believe it. I've never once in my life received a check like that, not even for hard, honest work.
My employer laughed and said, "Now all I need is your email and I can have your round-trip tickets to Scotland sent right over."
"This shit is really happening," I thought. I gave him my email and sure enough, round-trip tickets to Scotland for... "THIS FUCKING WEEKEND!" I shouted. "You expect me to be on a plane tomorrow morning?"
"If you can't do the job, then tell me that,” he said sternly. “Put some food in your belly and pay the bills with the money I sent you, but don't expect anything else. I'll find somebody…"
"You son of a bitch, don't hang up this phone. I'll go, just... fuck, dude, I don't know if $3000 is enough. I'm grateful, don't get me wrong, but expenses... My account was bone dry until now; there will be nothing left after I pay this month's rent," I explained.
"I will send you another $3000 when you arrive in Scotland, and another $3000 when you send me the story," he said.
"How many words do you need?" I asked.
"Just blow the New York Post out of the water with this one. Go full Gonzo on those bastards," he laughed.
"I'll have the story in your hands Monday morning," I assured.
"$9000 in one weekend. Not a bad gig.”
"I hope there's more where that came from. I quit my job."
"It's time to make you a rich man, just don't blow it all on cocaine and hookers."
"I'm more of a psychedelic man myself," I corrected.
"Then have a ‘safe trip.’ I'll talk to you Monday," he laughed again and hung up the phone.
In true Gonzo fashion, the next morning was a nightmare. Maybe it wasn't a good idea to spend the whole night "celebrating" my new job. Of course, by celebrating, I mean driving down to Galvaston and blowing every fucking dollar my employer just sent me on, you guessed it, cocaine and hookers. Okay, maybe I shouldn't call them hookers. They were really nice girls, and we had a great night, but my God, they could really run up a tab. The eight ball of cocaine was for them, a sheet of acid for me, 18 shots of tequila, 6 beers, and 3 lobster dinners; hell, it would have been criminal if the night didn't end in a three-way on the beach.
It wasn't until 4 A.M. that I remembered I was to be flying out of George Bush International Airport at 7 A.M. for my grand Scottish adventure. God dammit, I hadn't even packed yet. It takes fifty minutes to drive back to my apartment in Houston, then another thirty minutes to drive to the airport from there. I ate another hit of acid and left my two beautiful companions naked on the beach, hopped into my car, and let that V8 roar as I hauled ass up I-45. Luckily, there's no traffic at 4 A.M. and not a single highway patrolman in sight.
Oddly enough, I made it back to Houston in record time. I packed my bags even faster, then hauled ass to the airport, arriving at my terminal by 5:30 A.M. Now it was time for the worst part of the whole experience.
International Airports. This is where you go if you want to see just how far we have fallen as a civilization. The perfect place for a sociological experiment (or people watching, if you want to call it that). It's not just a place to catch a flight; it's a living, breathing nightmare. The unholy stench of stale coffee, cheap perfume, and a thousand unspoken anxieties pushes down on you like a physical weight. The poor bastards, every one of them wearing their quiet desperation on their face, testifying to the fact that our wretched souls are nothing but fuel for the cosmic machine.
Take your average business traveler, for example, their eyes glazed over with the residue of a thousand PowerPoint presentations and empty corporate slogans. The mothers and fathers of screaming children, their faces contorted with a mixture of exhaustion and doomed hope for a vacation that will inevitably fall short of their expectations. Every person, every hurried step, every forced smile was a vital lie, a desperate attempt to convince oneself that their chaotic pilgrimage was anything but a slow descent into madness. I watched them all like a misanthropic God in my own purgatory, taking notes on the degradation of the human animal. The airport isn't a gateway to the world; it's a mirror reflecting the lives we are all trying to outrun.
While I obviously loathe the whole ordeal, I do my best not to let these airports get to me. I cannot stand the thought of spending countless hours in a state of frustration just to board a plane that ends up barreling into the ground at 600 miles per hour because some kid received a video of his girlfriend getting a train ran on her in a nightclub the night prior, sending him into a spiral of sorrow and disbelief, so much so that he can’t perform his duties and misses one step in his maintenance routine. Then I'm left clutching my nuts, forgetting all the safety precautions I just learned before take-off as we make our final descent into oblivion.
So what do I do? I drink and I write. I research anything I can that might explain why an ex-opera singer from Africa would believe that Jerusalem is actually in Scotland. What possesses a 36-year-old man to abandon his family and home in Stockton, take to the tents, and declare himself king? How is a 21-year-old Texas girl, a missing persons case, and a handmaiden to a couple who claim their ancestors were black Jacobites deported by Elizabeth the first?
As pitiful as any news article produced in the 21st century is, with their lack of depth and insight, the few I did pull just so happen to have a couple nuggets of psychic decay for me to excavate. The leader of this whacked-out tribe, Kofi Offeh, goes by his new name, King Atehene, and was not too long ago assessed by a local authority as suffering from psychosis, leading to a brief stint in a psychiatric hospital. “Okay, that makes sense,” I thought as I moved on to his Queen.
Nandi was born Jean Gasho, a mother of SEVEN (maybe even eight) god damn kids, who were all removed from her care by social services. Now you can find her fabricating her own warped sense of reality on social media, claiming that her children were "legally abducted" by the council and placed in the care of her worst nightmare, one of those God awful "Gay White Couples".
And what about the handmaiden? Well, Kaura Taylor, a single mother herself, from Texas, also had her child removed from her care by the British social services, while claiming that she fled an abusive family back in the States.
All three of them, a trifecta of broken souls, living out some delusional narrative of their own making.
Jesus, I haven't even left the airport and I've already gathered that this isn't just some kooky cult; it's a perfect storm of desperation, mental illness, and a complete break from reality. The local authorities see an "illegal encampment", the Texas family sees a "manipulated" young woman, and what do I see? Something far more fundamental: the death of meaning. What they have found, what we have always found, is a story, no matter how ludicrous, to fill the gaping existential hole that is our lives. And in a world where we're all just trying to outrun the void, who the hell am I to judge? I had my own brand of escapism last night, butt naked on a Galveston beach with two women I will never see again. The Kingdom of Kubala just has its own brand of escapism. One that involves living in tents and calling themselves royalty. It's all the same sick, sad little world in the end.
Well, there it is. I have my report, and I didn't even need to board the plane. Maybe I can make it back to Galveston, and my naked lady friends will still be there lying in the sand waiting for their disheveled prince to return. Maybe I don't need to go to Scotland after all. But as soon as the thought occurred to me, they called all first-class passengers to begin boarding.
Fuck! Why go? I've already provided a deeper analysis than the New York Post, Daily Mail, or The Telegraph could have ever dreamed of. Then my fucking phone rang.
"Goddammit, what? I'm boarding! Don't you understand? The whole terminal is a fucking asylum!" I roared into the phone, the sound of my own voice swallowed by the pre-boarding chaos.
"I was hoping that was the case," my employer said calmly over the phone. "Just securing my investment, Merritt. A small taste of the whip, you understand. I know how you Gonzo types operate. One second you're a god, the next you're a junkie passed out in the gutter."
"Your investment is secure, you miserable bastard, but I am telling you, man, I've already dissected these worms! They're just like you and me, I swear! Broken, pathetic, living atop a mountain of lies!"
"Don't give me that bullshit, Merritt! You're a diamond in the rough, but these people, these 'Scottish Africans', are full-blown frauds, and they need to be exposed. Properly. Not with some soft-core, half-hearted drivel these publications are peddling to soft-brained wine moms. We talked about this. Remember? Give the world something to chew on. Something that will shatter their fragile illusion."
"What we need is a fucking ego death of global proportions." I proclaimed.
"Exactly! So, get your ass on that plane, or walk away with nothing but the measly three grand I already paid you. If there's even a dime left in your account, which, by the sounds of it, I highly doubt."
"You son of a bitch! I've already written the damn story!"
"I said I want Thompson, you little shit! That means boots on the ground! In the thick of it! Another three grand when you hit Scotland, and a final three for a full-fledged, balls-to-the-walls Gonzo editorial!"
"Okay, fuck! Just shut up!" I yelled over the crowd.
The lady in the boarding line turned, her eyes narrowed with a murderous contempt that could curdle milk. "What are you looking at?" I snapped. "Alright, you piece of shit, I'm getting on the plane!"
"That is what I fucking thought," he said with a cruel laugh. "Don't forget, Merritt. When the going gets weird, the weird turn pro!"
The Phone clicks.
And so it was, the journey from one absurd reality to another. My frustration with my employer subsided into a sobering panic as I stepped into the steel tube clutching my boarding pass like a death warrant. Maybe it was the LSD, maybe it was the tequila, or maybe I am sleep deprived and exhausted, but my guts were churning with the terrible clarity that I was being packed like a sardine into a hermetically sealed missile with a payload of 200 poor unfortunate souls.
The Boeing 737's first class cabin was arranged in a 2-2 layout, meaning I would likely have a victim to torture for the next two and a half hours on our way to Chicago O'Hare for a layover. And just as luck had it, I was sat next to a portly accountant type, with the vacant eyes of a lobotomized deer.
"The perfect specimen," I whispered as I took my seat next to him.
"Excuse me?" He asked.
"Oh, nothing," I said, "It's just.. I've been going bald, too."
He furrowed his brows, put his headphones on, locking himself into the manufactured comfort of an in-flight movie.
"Figures," I said, "A meaningless narrative to distract you from the fact that we are just biological cogs sitting in an indifferent death machine; be it the universe or this metallic bird."
He couldn't hear me. He was the perfect representative of the masses I was so hell-bent on exposing. He had no clue that he was just another part of the problem. Fuck it, I needed to work anyway.
We left the ground at 7:30 A.M., I ordered a Jack and Coke, pulled out my Freewrite Smart Typewriter, and began typing. The stories I had already dug up were a good start, but they were nowhere near enough. A true ethnography requires immersion. You have to put your head in the lion's mouth, feel the teeth, and smell the putrid breath of the beast. My employer was right. I couldn't write the final chapter from a barstool in Houston. The truth, in all its ugly, unvarnished glory, was waiting for me in Jedburgh, and I was on my way to find it.
-Dean Merritt
The Gonzo Press