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12 RYKA AOKI When Something Is Not Right “Hold on, hold—hold on! Something is not right here. Something is not right!” It’s March 2008, and I am in Greensboro, North Carolina, on tour with the Tranny Roadshow, a barnstorming transsexualgenderqueer vaudeville show/gender studies symposium coming soon to a liberal arts college near you. It’s past midnight, and we are returning to our hotel after preaching the Gospel of Gender Awareness, which for me essentially means convincing anyone who will listen that transwomen do more than inject ourselves with industrial silicone, blow wannabe frat boys in alleys for twenty bucks, and get beaten to death when a wannabe frat boy claims he was fooled by a chick with a dick—all while keeping the audience entertained and wanting more. Anyone can be trans, or an activist, but to be on the Roadshow, you had better do a good Elvis. Jamez is an ex-Alaskan dog-musher/current Harvard Divinity student who plays the violin and recites poetry in a shaggy lion costume with floppy yarn mane. Kelly is a social worker and zine librarian who resembles nothing so much as a four-foot-ten Chuck Norris–channeling Hunter S. Thompson. When Red’s not singing to straight hipsters about how irritating they are, she’s a professional chef who rhapsodizes about the perfect gravy, homemade mayonnaise. Oh, and she has about a million viewers who follow her Weblog on YouTube. And then there’s me, an Asian American English professor with an Ivy League MFA, who sings, “We’re Off to See the Wizard!” while waving a floppy blue dildo with Styrofoam Muppet eyes. Tonight we rocked the house. The queer kids seemed queerer—they applauded louder, flirted harder. Best of all, they bought more of our CDs and zines, which means I have enough money to pay the parking lot attendant when I get back to LAX. Even the faculty were cute, like that professor who tried 196 Ryka Aoki to make small talk but was so nervous, as if unsure whether hitting on me made him gay. So it’s all good as we enter the hotel. And then, suddenly, it’s Another World. The mid-city Clarion or Red Roof or Ramada is not like its brethren in New Orleans or Las Vegas, where you dump your bags in the your room and bust out into the night. Often, the local business hotel is the destination, where the lights are brightest, the music loudest, the prime rib primest, and where both traveler and local can count on air conditioning, clean restrooms, and a drink served in a tall, thin glass. If you live in the area, you can hook up with an interesting outof -towner who will seduce you with sweet nothings and margaritas and then leave before you have the chance to forget his name. Heck, even the local boys are trying to be just as anonymous as you, so as long as you understand this is a no-tell situation and you don’t catch any icky diseases, having a place to dance, drink, flirt, and get a room at one convenient location sure as hell beats another night of watching The Biggest Loser. Here in North Carolina, this hotel seems to be working perfectly, for as we exit the elevator and turn down the hallway, we encounter a blonde. Gloriously primped, hairsprayed, and a little old for that halter top, she’s like that faded VHS of Xanadu I have somewhere in my closet. At her side is her friend, brunette , dressed similarly, but with decidedly less splendor. Together, they have bagged two big young bucks, with their obligatory baseball caps and baby-fat muscles that roll from their arms to their backs all the way up their necks. Back in high school, when I was a boy and on the wrestling team, I knew a couple of guys like this. They ate a lot of meat and would break things when they started swinging—think carnivorous wrecking balls. Usually, a scene like this means Armageddon for a group of queers, but the women seem to be happy with their boys and the boys with their women, and all of them with their drinks. Besides, we’re still goofy and glowing from our night. So we leave the couples to their breeding and continue down the hallway. And it’s just as we pass them that we hear, “Hold on, hold...

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