Paul Davis On Crime: Manila 71

The story below is another chapter from my crime novel, Olongapo, which I hope to soon publish.

The story originally appeared in American Crime Magazine.

Manila 71

By Paul Davis

After spending 62 days at sea on the USS Kitty Hawk as the aircraft carrier launched aircraft to perform combat sorties from “Yankee Station,” in the Gulf of Tonkin off the coast of North Vietnam in 1971, the crew and air wings were pleased to discover that the huge warship was ordered to steam towards Subic Bay in the Philippines for a week and a half of repairs and replenishment of bombs, missiles, fuel and general stores.

It would also be a time of release for the Kitty Hawk's sailors, airmen and Marines to depart the ship and head into the wide-open town of Olongapo to eat, drink, dance and spend time with the city's exciting bar girls.

After we put into Subic Bay, I took a week’s leave as I had planned to travel to Manila. I asked Zeny, the beautiful Olongapo hostess from the Starlight bar that I spent time with whenever we pulled into Subic Bay, to accompany me.

Zeny met me at the bus station in Olongapo. She was carrying a small suitcase that I had given her money to buy. Zeny, with her long, raven hair with bangs that were cut just above her dark, sultry eyes, her pretty face and alluring figure, was dressed in a white blouse and tight bell-bottom jeans. She looked lovely as usual.

The bus we boarded was old and did not have air conditioning, but it was clean and did not have pigs and goats aboard as I suspected it might have. I was the only American aboard and I received a few stares but no overt hostility.

Manila was 97 miles from Olongapo, and the trip by bus took three hours, driving along cliffs and through jungles and villages. About half-way there, the bus stopped along an isolated road, and everyone got off the bus. Zeny pointed me towards the back of the bus, and I walked back and saw that the men were urinating. Looking towards the front of the bus, I saw the women raise their skirts and drop their pants and urinate at the front of the bus. When in Rome, as the saying goes, so I unzipped my fly and joined my fellow pissers.

After the bus entered Manila, I hailed a jeepney and asked the driver to take us to a good hotel that a friend on the Kitty Hawk recommended. The hotel was modern and luxurious but not that expensive. After being at sea for a long line period, I had a good deal of saved cash on me, and I booked a room for the next two days.

In our room, Zeny and I took a shower together and we laid in bed, first coupling and then napping. When we awoke, we took another shower and dressed for dinner. I wore my black suit that I had made for me in Hong Kong and an open-collar white shirt. Zeny wore a tight black dress that accentuated her fine figure. We went to the hotel’s restaurant and sat at a table. I ordered a vodka on the rocks for me and a coke for her. I ordered two steaks with a side order of mashed potatoes for us.

When the steaks arrived, Zany’s eyes widened when she saw the size of the steak. After the waiter left, she looked at me and said softly, “Help.”

I laughed and took her plate and cut up the steak into small pieces for her. We enjoyed the fine meal and afterwards I suggested we go for a stroll to walk off the heavy meal. I also wanted to smoke a fine medium-sized cigar that I bought at the hotel’s store.

I was only 19 at the time, but I enjoyed a fine cigar. I never smoked cigarettes, because as an amateur middle weight boxer, I was told that cigarettes would rob me of my vital second wind during a bout.

As we were leaving the hotel, I saw two young Filipinos squared off against each other in front of the hotel, They began shooting at each other in Wild West fashion. I pulled Zeny back into the hotel entrance. The two Filipinos were lousy shots, and it appeared that neither gunman was hit. The sound of police sirens forced the two gunmen to run off.

Having witnessed a couple of gun fights back home in South Philly, I was amused at this feeble attempt, and I laughed. Zeny laughed with me. We stepped outside and walked by the police officers who arrived on the scene.

I lit my cigar, and we walked around the hotel. After I finished my cigar, we went back into the hotel and headed back to our room. Once again, we went to bed together and after slow and pleasurable lovemaking, we fell fast asleep.

In the morning, I went to the desk and hired a car and driver for later that afternoon. We weren’t hungry, so I had a cup of coffee and Zeny had a coke by the hotel’s pool. It was a warm and humid day, so we both went swimming in the pool.

After a time, Zeny suggested that we go to a local restaurant that she heard about, where we could eat authentic Filipino food. We went back to our room, showered and changed into casual clothes. We left the hotel and walked about two blocks to a small café.

While we waited at a street corner to cross, a small Filipino man came up behind Zeny, slipped his arms under her arms and cupped her breasts. Zeny saw the angry look on my face, and she gripped my arm with her right hand and brushed his hands away from her breasts with her left hand. The Filipino walked away fast before I was able to give him a smack.

“He just a fool,” Zeny said, dismissing the man who groped her breasts.

We crossed the street and entered the café. Zeny ordered Lumpia and fried rice for us in Tagalog. The Lumpia was like a long, thin and dark brown Chinese eggroll. But better, I thought as I crunched the Filipino spring roll’s tasty, deep-fried pastry shell and the enclosed meat, cabbage and garlic. I loved the Lumpia, and it became my favorite Filipino dish.

After the meal we walked back to the hotel and met the driver I hired. He was a short, thin Filipino who introduced himself as Ignazio. He said he was an off-duty police officer, and he showed me his police ID.

His car was a 1962 Nova. The older car appeared to be in good shape and was clean. I asked Ignazio to give us a tour of the city. He drove us around the city for an hour or so and I particularly enjoyed the scenic area near Manila Bay. I then asked him to take us to the Manila American Cemetery and Memorial. The historical cemetery contained the remains of 16,859 American military members who died in WWII in the Philippines. In addition to rows and rows of headstones, the cemetery also housed a building with 25 colorful mosaic maps illustrating the achievements of the American military in the Pacific. As a student of history, the maps were of particular interest to me.

As we walked through the mosaic maps, Zeny looked grim and confused.

“This is a cemetery,” she said, confused at why I would want to visit here.

“It’s a memorial to the Americans servicemen and Filipino scouts who gave their lives fighting the Japanese,” I explained. “My father didn’t die here, but he fought here and helped liberate the Philippines in World War II.”

Driving back to the hotel, Ignazio made a detour and drove past Smokey Mountain, the notorious waste landfill, which reportedly had more than two million metric tons of waste piled high, which made it look like a mountain. Flammable substances in the pile often ignited and shot out flames and smoke, giving the landfill an eerie look and its name. Shockingly, I saw a slew of people, including small children, climbing the pile and looking for salvageable items. It was a sad sight. Zeny did not comment and looked away as we drove by.

Ignazio then drove us back to the hotel. I paid his fee and gave him a generous tip.

I read in the Manila Times that there was to be a transportation strike and demonstration that day in the city by jeepney drivers protesting the high price of gas, but I didn’t give it much thought.

As Zeny and I took a walk through the city, I saw the huge unruly crowd waving banners and signs and shouting slogans. The police were between us and the protestors, so I stopped on a corner and watched the demonstration. The protestors began to overturn cars and burn them and fights between the demonstrators and the police broke out.

A jeep with two Metrocom troopers pulled up to us. The elite cops were dressed all in black with leather boots, looking like Nazis storm troopers from World War II.

“Get in, Joe,” one of the troopers said. “It’s not safe for you.”

Zeny and I got into the back of the jeep, and the Metrocom troopers drove us a short distance to the entrance of the American Embassy.

A line of Filipino police officers stood in front of the embassy. We got out of the jeep, and I showed my Navy ID card to the Marines at the entrance. We joined a crowd of American embassy workers at the windows watching the riot.

An older man in a suit approached me and asked me what I was doing there. I told him we were just visiting Manila, and I didn’t know the demonstration would be this bad.

“The protestors are blaming Americans for the high price of gas, so I’m glad they didn’t grab you out there.”

“I’m glad as well,” I replied.

I had been in the middle of riots before in South Philadelphia, most notably the major race riot at the South Philadelphia High School on the day after Martin Luthor King Jr was shot and killed in 1968, but this riot was truly out of control. We watched the violence and destruction from a window along with the embassy staff.

Some hours later, after the police routed the demonstrators, an American Marine drove Zeny and I back to our hotel. We showered, changed our clothes and had dinner in the hotel restaurant. We checked out of the hotel the following morning and a hotel car drove us to the bus station for the trip back to Olongapo..