Photo by Brody Levesque | Japanese University students, Takatumi Hori, Tsutomn Shirichi, & Mitsuhiro Kurosaki, across the street from the North Portico of the White House in Lafayette Park.
By Brody Levesque (Washington D. C.) Aug19 | I am always amused by human nature especially when one is caught off guard unexpectedly. The old cliche, '...looked like a deer caught in the headlights...' is so true as to be very funny in certain circumstances. Yesterday, my experience with that expression was no exception.
I often find myself gravitating up Connecticut Avenue in northwest D. C., in the middle of the afternoon, to escape the cubicle existence of my office or just the blathering at the numerous press briefings that I attend in the course of a daily news cycle. My destination is the Lambda Rising Bookstore for the pleasure that I derive from chatting with the bright & lively young staff employed there. Then there is also this aspect that I enjoy the most in my visits, the ability to engage in the purest form of entertainment available, people watching, or in the case of Lambda Rising, oft times street theatre, which would be a much more accurate description. Some of the conversations that occur at the front sales counter would cause even the crudest individual to blush and stammer due to the rather frank and graphic nature of them, including myself, your correspondent. (Noting also that my profession has a centuries old reputation described as off-colour in most circumstances to start with.)
Besides the ongoing show and flow of conversations ranging from banal to fiery, to outright silly, every once in awhile a person or person will enter the store and as they walk down the main aisle, it rapidly dawns on them that they have entered a Lesbian, Gay, Bi, & Transgendered business and bookstore... As if the rainbow accessories rather prominently displayed weren't enough of a visual clue! Yup, the deer-in-the-headlights-look strikes!
In fairness, the vast majority of the patrons are LGBT and Lambda Rising is a community gathering spot. However, Washington is a tourist town and those I speak of are quite obviously not normally inclined to patronize a Gay & Lesbian bookshop. The speed and indecent haste of which some of them evacuate the premises is quite humorous followed by their vivid facial expressions.
Yesterday, as I stood there chatting, a trio of young Asian males came in the door and almost immediately had 'the look' followed by an obvious need to acquire, well, something. Fortunately, they spoke English fairly well and asked for maps of the area. I spoke with them and found out that they were students, from a university located in the Tokyo Prefecture, Japan, and were visiting Washington for only three days having come from Boston. Turns out that they had arrived in D.C. only a couple of hours prior to their walking into the bookshop and apparently had lost their way back to their hotel.
The helpful staff and customers around them armed the trio with the requisite maps and as they approached the counter top to purchase those items, Amber, one of my favorite staffers, started plying the young man paying, with a boatload of brochures, flyers, and the local LGBT Free weekly magazine with the entertainment & bar guide in the back, which she helpfully pointed out to him. Vastly amused and having just a hunch from the brief conversation I'd just had with the three of them, I was pretty sure that it was rather doubtful they'd care to 'enjoy' the local Gay scene. I gently cut her enthusiastic barrage of information off with a quiet; "Amber, they're NOT Gay ."
I escorted them out to the sidewalk and pointed south down Connecticut Avenue towards DuPont Circle itself and then showed them on the map where their hotel was located. They thanked me profusely and then asked if I had a few moments to spare to walk back that direction. As we walked into Dupont Circle Park, the young man who bought the maps asked me, "Why was bookshop have so much books with lots of pictures of men?" The other two also looked like they were confused by that as well. "Well, because its a Gay bookstore," I explained. Suddenly, as if you could see a light bulb literally turn itself on, recognition dawned on their faces. "Oh no, I am not Gay!" He protested. Then they all started laughing. Turns out that they were very non judgmental and like most of their fellow countrymen, very polite and gracious. I ended up taking the time and showed them to how to use Washington's Metrorail subway and then took them by the White House where I shot a photo of the three of them. I spent a very pleasant forty-five minutes with them and as we parted, we exchanged the traditional bows and then, the one young man, Takatumi Hori, proclaimed again with a huge smirk on his face, "I'm not Gay."
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