The Lewis Pages

I have learned many things during my travel with Ryan, I learned that ten thousand teenagers are a frightening sight, mother nature is much stronger than I (painful boogie boarding lesson) and I that Ryan and I inhabit two different worlds.  This first became apparent to me as we were cruising down the winding streets of Sydney.  I was a bit apprehensive getting into the car with Ryan but I figured that since he had survived driving around New Zealand with Kevin he would be fine in Australia.   It turned out he was fine but I wasn’t.  I can hardly describe the feeling of shear terror that I experienced when I stopped fiddling with the radio and looked over at Ryan while he was driving.   Ryan apparently has the utmost confidence in his ability to drive with most any part of his body, this in of itself is very impressive but he manages to do this while talking on a cell phone, grooming his hair and belting out an impressive rendition of Smokey Robinson’s “Tracks of my tears”.  After the terror subsided a little, I tried to encourage Ryan to maybe pay a little more attention to driving; this was greeted with a look of pure contempt. (I will point out that so far Ryan has managed to always drive on the correct side of the road whereas I have been a little more lax about it.)  This episode was my first introduction to the world of Ryan Stroker.

            Another interesting aspect of Ryan’s world is the role that signs play, such as traffic signs.  It seems that for Ryan signs are simply suggestions that are to be taken into consideration, except of course for parking signs, which are to be ignored completely. (To his credit, I don’t think that Ryan realizes that he is doing anything wrong, I am almost positive that for some reason, mental or emotional, Ryan cannot understand the concept that there are places in this world in which his not allowed to park)  Ryan likens illegal parking to a drug, “Once you do it (park illegally) one time your hooked”

            I think that the best example of Ryan’s world comes from a discussion we had in the car between Bogangar and Surfer’s Paradise.  The discussion started when I asked Ryan if he was in the middle of a mall and he came across a button that said, “Do not push” whether or not he would push the button.  Upon hearing the question Ryan took in a deep breath, looked at me as though I had just asked him the stupidest question he had ever heard and then responded, “Of course I would.”  This shocked me, I had assumed that Ryan being an intelligent person would understand as I do that there must be a good reason to not push the button since someone had gone to the trouble of writing “Do not push.”  I pressed Ryan to explain himself.  Ryan’s explanation is as follows.  “I understand that there is a reason not to push the button but I need to know what that reason is.  If the person who had written do not push had also explained why not to push, I would not feel the need to push the button.”  Ryan’s logic confused and amazed me, he almost had me convinced of how stupid I had been to have not wanted to push the button until he uttered what could be my favorite Strokerism to date, “I mean I’m not a lemur!!! I’m not going to follow the pack and not push the button!” I feel pretty confident that he meant to say I’m not a lemming but I’m not totally sure?  Either way I understood his point.

            On Ryan’s “Game” or moves with the ladies (for those people who are over thirty and scratching there heads trying to figure out what “game” means)           

   Athleticism is the one word that springs to mind when I think of Ryan in a social setting.  Whether it be a trendy bar in Sydney (see Cargobar pictures) or a seedy bar in Davidson, you can feel confident in knowing that at some point in the night you will be able to see Ryan breaking out the best dance moves from the early eighties.  His repertoire is nearly limitless, he has the robot, the lawnmower, the sprinkler and off course his patented move the worm.(It is important to note that right now there is a legal battle being waged between Jon Debord and Ryan Stroker as to who owns the rights to the worm, in a similar case Mike Torres is trying to get a court order preventing Ryan from stealing his moves)

            On Roundabouts

For those of you who don’t know Australia is littered with roundabouts, they seem to throw them up anywhere.  Even if your on a one way street with no turns your likely to run into a roundabout, the Australians can’t seem to get enough of them.  Well, while the Australians love roundabouts Ryan doesn’t.  Ryan gets the overall idea of a roundabout but its the subtleties that he has trouble with.  He has yet to use a turn signal in a roundabout (except of course if you count his pointing out the window as an acceptable method of signaling.)  Ryan’s lack of turn signal has not affected us in any way but for some reason it isn’t uncommon for all traffic behind us to come to a standstill after we have left a roundabout.  I can only assume that the Australians are taking some time to figure out how two Americans in a rented Toyota Celica have broken one of their beloved roundabouts. 

            On Boogie Boarding

Ryan has spent a lot of time in the ocean, I have not.  During our stay in Bogangar Ryan and I decided to go boogie boarding.  We got our gear two boogie boards and two sets of flippers and we set out to the beach.  Ryan spent five minutes examining the waves and deciding what the best and safest way for use to get out to where the waves were breaking.  I felt very confidant even more so because Ryan seemed to be taking an interest in keeping me alive.  The problems began when we entered the water.  Ryan and I entered the water together and started to paddle out to the waves.  The next thing I knew Ryan was forty yards ahead of me telling me to hurry up.  As I said before I do not swim to well, I can stay afloat but my chicken legs simply won’t get me going to quickly.  When I finally catch up to Ryan I politely chastise him for not waiting.  He informs me with a straight face that he didn’t wait because it was dangerous to go slowly through the area we had just swam.  I’m not sure if he saw the irony in this statement but I let it pass.  Once we got out to where the waves were breaking all doubts I had about boogie boarding vanished.  It was beautiful.  The sun was shining the water was cool and refreshing and the scenery was incredible.  Ryan and I spent a good deal of time trying to catch waves but apparently they weren’t to great for boogie boarding that day.  However, one wave did come and I managed to catch it.  The ride was incredible; the feeling of zooming across the water with the wind in your face is indescribable.  I was exhilarated I had caught a wave and survived.  After more unsuccessful attempts at boogie boarding we decided to head in.  This should have been easy, I mean the waves were heading that way so it should be a cinch.  I pointed the nose of the board towards shore and headed in on a good size wave.  Then the sea turned on me, Mother Nature decided to take me down a notch.  I rode the wave a good distance but then decided to bail out for fear of hitting rocks.  The wave had other ideas, the next thing I knew I was under water and short of breath.  I managed to surface only to see that I another wave that had to be about eight feet tall(to be completely honest the wave was only about seven and a half feet, alright maybe only three but it was a big three feet.)  This wave tossed me around like a rag doll.  I had no idea which way was up or down so I simply grabbed my boogie boarding lease and followed it up.  I surfaced to find that the waves hadn’t stopped and that I was now one flipper short.  Apparently the ocean wasn’t only trying to drown me it was also stealing from me.  I caught a glance of the flipper and swan towards it.  This put me in the path of yet another wave that repeated the demoralizing, painful and scary drowning incident again.  I managed to get the flipper and started to head in.  Mother Nature wasn’t quite done with me though.  As I flailed and flopped my way to shore I was once again assaulted by a wave.  This wave stripped me of my last shred of dignity and both flippers.  At this point I was giving myself a decent chance of never making it into shore.  After I surfaced and nearly ate one of my flippers I decided to make one last charge towards shore.  This was aided by the fact that I was swimming (if it can be called that) in water that was maybe four feet deep.  I waded ashore humiliated and exhausted only to be greeted by Ryan with a broad smile who had these words of encouragement, “Just like Torres, you lost a flipper!!”  This helpful statement was followed by a chuckle.  At that moment if I had any strength, dignity or self-respect I would have hit Ryan but seeing as I had none of the aforementioned characteristics I simply sat down in the sand.