B.C. Street

I've noticed a few google searches concerning Okinawa have directed people to my blog. When I was in Okinawa there was a particularly notorious street known as B.C. Street. It was just a few blocks away from Gate Two Stree which is connects to Gate Two of Kadena Air Base.

B.C. Street was full of topless bars that featured Fillipina women. They lived under horrible conditions such as putting in shifts over 12 hours long and having to sit on the laps of pawing GI's and be nice to them. You would buy them a small drink and they would nurse it for a song and tickle your ear and coo. Pretty exotic for a 19 year old that was less than a year out of northern Michigan. I got B.C. Street out of my system pretty quick when I realized I was spending a fortune and getting nothing in return.

I couldn't resist going every now and then, though. There's a line from a Tom Waits song called 'Shore Leave' where he says:
"I had a cold one at the Dragon
with some Filipino floor show
and talked baseball with a lieutenant
over a Singapore sling."

Being a pathetic romantic I couldn't resist being inside a Tom Waits song now and then.

I mention this because I once wrote a poem about B.C. Street and I wrote it with Tom Waits in mind. I know any former Marine that finds this website is definately looking for a poem about B.C. Street, so here goes:

B.C. Street

Lewd gestures
immature faces
too much make up
on Phillipine faces.

Red ripped couches
this place stinks,
two-fifty for
small rum drinks.

Dancing girl
baring her chest
is just as bored
as all the rest.