Congenial-speak #14 (Norway partC)

Hostel Youth

We spend four days in Bergen. In from the fjords, the playing field shrinks again. Norway's efficient and clean. Existential rationale surrounds us, and we sense the Norwegians' pride in their landscaping majesty. Our new digs is the Montana Youth Hostel. It appears to be empty and we, about 20 youths and 7 adults, have full run of the place. It is only a place to throw off your pack to roam the city unfettered. Most of us never unpack, canteens hang off packs from top bunks, sleeping bags remain in stuff sacks bunji corded to the frame of the pack and hiking boots wait under the bunk. They are hastily swapped out for tennis shoes, the only item unpacked.

No one wears the uniform anymore. We go out as the average American tourist—jeans, T-shirt, shorts or sunglasses. One kid wears his scout shirt. It's all wrinkled and baggy and probably slept in with bits of campfire chilly mac staining it. He mocks the idea, perpetually displaying his scout rank, his sloth and lack of motivation to ever rise above the first “given” rank. He is the exception to the rule though. Most take things like advancement with some nod to sincerity. I know I do. I have my Eagle ranking at 18 and I know this is my swan song. This trip is the last thing for me with this troop. The fathers tell me and the older scouts, all who will likely also leave their legacies behind them as they debark the plane in Minneapolis, to “set an example” for the younger scouts. I am not a leader material (far from it) but, as it turns out, can be inclined to accept a challenge.

The discotheques pepper Europe. It is a feeling like the short-lived American trend, the ilk, the forum, has invaded Europe. We hang out in one in downtown Bergen—even a few fathers—perhaps as infidels. “When in Rome”—we are vikings. We are plunderers who pillage and scout the most beautiful-women-on-the-face-of-earth with the noblest of intentions. The discotheque is not like an American bar, dance clubs or even halls. None of us—but the fathers—are old enough to have ever entered a disco, to really have gotten the leisure suited, bell-bottomed flavor of the time. We were in though, drinking at 18, and no bouncer ever checked our ID. We hang out in the shadows, in the ambianced pockets of the joint, the spaces sound knows to dim and dull its vibrations. This is the beginning of my “dance king” phase. I go out on the floor and dance solo to Springsteen's “Dancing in the Dark.” The others are laughing. They're egging me on as I get things going, as this dark-haired blue-eyed kid apes “the boss.” With subtle undulations of my shoulders I summon the undecided, the few waffling blonde-haired beauties skirting the discotheque. They smile, genuinely I think. There is not the obvious insincerity I've seen deep in the eyes of American girls. The song ends and I go back to their table. We hear “Mony, Mony” strike up, and I wonder if the crowd will fill in the overt sexual entente, the refrain that I hear at every bar in the States. They do, “get laid, get f----,” and I realize that mentality, that release of sexual suggestion, is international. By this time the room is pumping, bass thunders the music, all of my troop and those high fidelity fathers—the ones who revisit the 70s—are dancing with the average Norwegian beauty. The girls and I go outside to talk.

We look at one another in the streetlight, under the neon of signs, the fringes of Bergen. The disco is still close enough to pulsate. The records inside can be identified, like the patrons are not, upon entry. A lot of body language is tossed through the waves of sound. Few words need be said and a fascination begins—or continues—perhaps because of who I am. The three women are smart and, even though we were rarely in a group, know that I'm with the rest of the troop who can easily bass for the average guy from Norway, I stick out in my troop. I ethnicize the Scandinavian picture.

“Set an example” is annoying. I am trying my best to reciprocate, to parry the flirtations that surround me in the cool night breeze. Taxis speed by with their signs lit. I think of the rank I achieved last November. It probably was my own sketchy morality, my suspicion that our troop was far from innocent, that the laws and ideals of scouting were flouted regularly, especially in a foreign country where blonde women were in such perfection. I excused myself, and felt like a dork right away, just climbing into the cab. It was as though a battle had been fought in my mind, a battle that most likely did not need to be fought. A moral battle that I lost. Or maybe it was just me projecting my own cowardice, feelings of insecurity, of inadequacy, on a conscionable moment. Was it that I really thought setting an example to the younger scouts was a priority, an insane idea to even put on the table, or did I simply doubt somewhere that I could return the trios' apparent attraction?

The cab speeds through the streets of Bergen to the youth hostel, quiet, empty at 1AM. In the back I wrestle with the thought of the last gesture I would ever make in that troop. Should I, would I, could I be remembered as a conscientious Eagle Scout or a foolish idiot, a sap, a sucker who gave up a possible night of—not necessarily sexual—but meaningful international relations with three of the most beautiful women I'd seen. If it was sexual, I missed what would make me the envy of all men—the menage a quior.