David Choe's Strange Encounter While Hitchhiking

Like, you might find this hard to believe, but I never talked growing up. I was the kid in the corner, and like, girls would form groups and talk about which guy they want to fuck, and I wouldn't even be in... They're like, Dave's sitting right there, and they're like, yeah, he's not even on the fucking roster. And I'm like, so I go, wait, is this racist? Yeah. But what has it... How can I turn this around? What it did for me, the Asian superpower is, if you're not seen and you're not heard and we're seen as non-threatening, I can go anywhere. I can go anywhere, and people open up to me. I've been to the Congo, I've been to third world countries, I've been to every fucking state in America. I might be the most American person. Like, I've been to every fucking state. I've hitchhiked from the time I was 15 to every fucking state, every country, and I've talked, and because... Would a black guy be able to do that? Would a white guy be able to do that? When people see, oh, that guy's Chinese, he's like Jackie Chan, or he's... Whatever they think, they don't think that I'm going to do anything or say anything or I'm going to pose any threat. So they just open up and they say the most... I don't know. When I started hitchhiking, people said, no one's going to pick you up. Like, 60s, 70s, everyone hitchhiked and something weird happened in the 80s where like, you're going to get raped, kidnapped, murdered, you know? But I go, I don't think so. I think if I put my thumb out and ask for help, someone's going to give it to me. And with that, I got to see the world for free. I got to go everywhere. And much like what happened was I would sit shotgun and I'm getting these free rides, and two things would happen. Either the driver has a long drive and they want someone to talk to, or they want me to talk to them. And something would happen. And like, I'm in the car right now with a complete stranger. Anything could happen. And the first hour is always small talk. How long you been on the road? What would you do? You know, it's all that kind of stuff. Something switches when they know the rides about... Like I'm about to get out or whatever. I'm never going to see this guy again. So now we've been talking about new sports and weather for an hour. The last 10 minutes, I fucked my sister when I was 12. Whoa. Everything comes out. So I've heard... Think about how many rides. How old was he? He was 12. How old was his sister? I don't know. I mean, everything. Drugs, incest. You know, I killed somebody. Like murder... A guy called Tony? Murder confessions. Really? I've heard the most insane... Hold one at a time. Murder confession. I don't know if I should be telling you. You definitely should be. A guy confessed to me that he was thinking of raping me when I stayed at his house. Oh, Jesus. You stayed at his house? You didn't just hitchhike. You hitchhoused? I was in the deep south. I was in the deep south. It was like my... I was trying to hitchhike from LA to New York City. I was with my friend Brian. Same thing. No one's going to pick up two fucking dudes. And John Wayne picks us up. Cowboy guy. 10 gallon hat. You know. Damn, you boys look, you know, hot out there. Get in the car. And he's telling us about shrimp po' boys and, you know, he's just... He works on a offshore oil rig. And it's two weeks on, two weeks off, and it's just two weeks off right now. So he's like, where are you guys headed? And we're like, we're just trying to get to New York. New York? What you want to go there for? A bunch of queers out there. I don't know. We just want to check it out. You guys want to stay at my house tonight? Like this guy looks like Grandpa. Just cowboy boots, cowboy hat, just big gut. Like he's a dude. Right. I'm young. I'm 17 or 18 at this time. We get to his house in... Fuck. This is what I'm talking about. Tiny town in Louisiana. Deep south. We get in his house, die hard movie collection, Rambo movie collection, shotguns, and... Lube. Just the dude, just the man's man. And he has... And his side in his part time job is anesthesiologist. Part time anesthesiologist. Part time anesthesiologist. And then part time offshore oil rig. And I'm, you know, this is summertime deep south covered with like grease and mosquitoes living outside on the road hitchhiking. He's like, you guys want to take a shower? I'm like, fuck yeah. I'm the first one in the shower. And then I come out. I got the towel wrapped on. He's like, he made us like a frozen pizza or something. And there's a protest on the television. It's a Sanford. This is 1993 or 94. There's a protest of something with gay people in San Francisco and they're protesting and he's watching it. I'm like, what? He's like, I'm queer. You never see me out there protesting. And I'm like, oh shit. And then he and then my friend Brian, who's covered in grease and dirt, he hasn't showered yet. And I'm like, oh shit. And I started getting my clothes on. And you know, it's one thing to be gay and then it's one thing to be picked up by like a, you know, a big gay guy with a cowboy hat. It takes you to his house. So and and and I, here's the thing. I don't want to discourage people from hitchhiking. This is one weird incident that's happened in like 15 years of hitchhiking. So he's like, hey, hey, Brian, why don't you it's your turn. Why don't you take a shower? No, I'm okay. I'm all right. You're filthy. Why don't you get in there, take a shower? He's like, no, no, I'm all right. I'm okay. And I go, oh, fuck. What do we do? You know, I do a little powwow in the corner. He's like, he's old. We can take him if he tries anything. We're tired. We were fucking so tired. We're like, he's he looks like he was like falling asleep on his on his couch. And he goes, he's gonna go to sleep soon. Let's just fucking stay the night. It's fucking air conditioned in here. And then let's leave first thing in the morning before he wakes up. Okay, fuck it. Let's just do it. All right, boys, I'm gonna turn in like, yes. So we we take the couch and I go, let's sleep in a formation. And let's take turns. You stick. We should have just left. You go, you stay up for an hour and then wake me up. I'll stay up for an hour. We'll just and then we'll leave crackadon, you know, I had a pocket knife. So I slept like this. I took the knife and I put thing like this and I slept like that. And I stayed up for the first hour and I see his him walking around his room. The lights are on. I'm like, this, this guy is not going to sleep. Midnight, one in the morning. He's still I'm like, what the fuck? Why won't this guy go to sleep? Putting his mask on. So I nudge Brian. I go, hey, your turn. I got five. I'm gonna fucking pass out. He's out cold. I'm like, fuck, dude. Fuck, man. I'm too tired. And I go, OK, I'm just gonna stay up the whole night. So I'm up. I'm like, guys are closing. We're going back up again, gripping the knife. And then sometime around five thirty in the morning or something. My eyes are closed, but you know, when you feel someone. So he comes out of his room and he's standing there and I could see and then I oh shit. And then I grip the knife and I go, this is it. This is it. It's going to happen right now. And he just leaves. He goes out the door and I go, oh, fuck, like. And then I wake up Brian. I go, Brian, the fuck out of here. He's like, what's going on? He's like, dude, he just left. He's like, OK, I'm going to take a shower then. What are you talking about? He's like, if he went to the store or something like he's not going to get some duck. Yeah, he's not going to be back for a little. I'll jump in and jump. I go, dude, let's just go right now. Like he was I don't know if he was jerking off or what. Like he was I had my eyes closed, but he was standing right there and he's like, I'll be I'll be quick. So he runs in. Takes a fast shower. We get our clothes on and like just as we're walking out, he's like, hey, he's like pulls in. You guys leaving without saying bye. I just went to the market to get some eggs for breakfast and like, oh, fuck, dude. So I'm like, I have a knife in my hand the whole time I go like it's that that thing where I'm a people pleaser, you know, like I'll even put my own life at risk to like this guy went to the store and got eggs for me. Yeah, sure. We'll have some eggs. So we go in and the guy starts talking about his wife and how he works on this offshore oil rig with like a younger dude. It's just two guys running this whole oil rig. And the other guy just talks about how much he hates gay people the whole time, not knowing that this guy is. And and then he just like like like all the other times I've been picked up, it starts opening up about how he was married. He has a bunch of children and then he figured out he was gay. And then he's like, I could see it. He knows we're on our way out. He's never going to see us. Let's just fucking let it on. You boys look so cute on the side of the road there last night. And it was like, I was so like, I'm so lonely. I don't get to, you know, you don't know what it's like to be a queer guy in the deep south. And man, when I came out this morning and I saw you guys sleeping together, you guys on the couch, you look so beautiful and perfect. And I'm like, oh, my fucking God, dude. And then he says, I thought about just, you know, if you guys wouldn't mind if I just touched you a little bit. And I'm like, what the fuck? And, you know, once again, I froze. I'm like, oh, yeah, yeah, cool. Yeah. So I'm so I said, yeah, we're gonna we're gonna leave now. So we just fucking booked it. And then all his neighbors were black. Like he lived like in a black neighborhood and like the houses are on stilts because of the swampland and whatever. And I don't know if he's done this before, but as we ran out, like I heard like the kids laughing and they're like, oh, Tom, they're trying to do it again. And I'm like, oh, fuck, like this isn't the first time like and look, man, this is looking for hitchhikers. I've hitchhiked all over the world. Right. And and and so I highly recommend it. But yeah, what I was saying about being invisible is a lot of times people will do this or say, come back, go back to where you come from, because they're like, this fucker is not going to do anything. And that's just not the way the world works. You know, like someone was explaining to me the other day that no one ever wins a war. I go, what are you talking about? When we come in, we blow shit up and then we take the it's like. If you look at Germany and Japan, right, two countries that are very small, you look at a globe and you look at how small they are. These are two countries that are very tiny that have tried to dominate every country around them. And Japan has started, you know, Germany starts every world war. Right. And so you're like, oh, but we won those wars. But we drive their cars now. We drive Lexus. We drive. They won in the end. And then you think of the soldiers that come home, the PTSD, the drug addiction, the homelessness. It's like, look at our country now. It's like, did we win? Like you won like on the charts. You look at the numbers. We took this town. We did this. We did that. And when you fuck with people, when you hurt someone, it stays with them forever. Like it stays with them for a long time unless you have tools and different things to like work through those things, which I I've been working on a lot. Yeah. Being. Oh, fuck that sort of racist that no one really thinks of me as a threat. How can I turn that into an advantage? I'm going to travel the entire world.