Texas Two-Step … Bosnian Edition
The Sensitive Player By Alex Crevar
Most connect Sarajevo with the war of the 90s, when mortar shells rained down on the capital of Bosnia and Herzegovina. If they think about it, that is. After all, it’s a place stuck somewhere in an area once called Yugoslavia, which is somewhere in that blurry blob in Southeastern Europe among countries with communist-sounding names.
Some really old timers would perhaps remember that the First World War started here when Archduke “l” Franz Ferdinand was assassinated during a visit in 1914. (If you are among this WWI group, you’re likely in the older-than-100 category and I salute you. I also worry, frankly, that by reading this column you’re perhaps not spending your last days as wisely as you might. Suggestion: squeeze into that zoot suit one last time, grab yourself a flapper, put a fresh carnation in your lapel, stash a new jimmy cap in your wallet, wind your pocket watch, leave your worries on the doorstep, direct your feet to the sunny side of the street, and may your final moments be spent cutting the rug or doing the horizontal mambo … walker or no.)
At any rate, the bottom line is that Sarajevo’s a complex place with regard to history and politics, and, more appropriately, for love. They say Bosnia is the place where East meets West. This was the border between the Ottoman Empire and the Austro-Hungarian Empire for centuries. And there is still a considerable amount of Turkish influence. A Muslim town, the sound of muezzins calling folks to prayer can be heard five times a day.
“Okay, Okay … but how are the women?” you’re wondering. “Have I been putting my own jimmy caps to use?”
You are sharp today, my friend. Nothing gets by that steel trap of a mind. Thank you for keeping the Sensitive Player honest. I’ll get to the point.
I know I’ve made proclamations before but let me be clear here: the women are so beautiful that one has problems making it 
through the day. Really. I think it may be the mixture of the different cultures that give the lasses an evolutionary step up. As I sit in my office and try to meet this or that deadline, all I have to do is look out the window and see a gaggle of Bosnian ladies – wielding cigarettes and laughing conspiratorially – and Shazaam! I am transported to a place where pillows are made of chocolate.
Yeah, that’s right, I said it, they’re made of chocolate. And there’s a subtle hint of something exotic wafting about the place … I can’t quite put my finger on it. I want to say cinnamon and bacon. But I think that’s only because of my fondness for bacon. In actuality Muslims don’t eat pork. At any rate, cinnamon is kosher. I mean okay. And the chocolate pillow certainly can’t be argued with.
Maybe it’s because there are so many of them that they seem more beautiful. Something like sensory overload for the heart … and the nether regions. Homeboy just don’t know. He just don’t know. I’ve said it many-a-time but I’ll say it again: I am not the sharpest knife. Ain’t a person ever accused Don Sensi Play Play of that. But I got mad instincts. And when I feel that blood a-pumpin’ and that chocolate-bacon-cinnamon dream starts to wash over me, ooohh-weee: it’s like things get all noodle-ly.
The situation wasn’t any different when I first arrived here in the late 90s for a visit.
At that time troops still patrolled the streets. There were no tourists. There were three foreign-owned businesses in the country.
To make this story less like the dotted line following Billy in a “Family Circus” cartoon, that visit turned into me becoming manager of a restaurant named Texas (one of the three businesses). Again, to cut to the chase: we made mean chicken fajitas and we were the sole importer of tequila and Corona beer to the country. To get even more to the point: you really haven’t lived until you’ve invited a bevy of beautiful Bosnians – all juiced up on margaritas – to come back to the apartment and dance to Stevie Wonder.
During such an episode, I convinced one honey eating at the restaurant to join us back at the pad. That sweetie – let’s call her Wanda to protect her identity and because, come on, Wanda – was Bosnian. But, in the spirit of full disclosure, she had moved to the States during the war and had thus been more than a little corrupted. (Unfortunately for one Mr. S. Player, Bosnian culture is significantly more conservative about chicas running around with chicos.) “Aha,” I thought. “Gotcha.”
“You Haven’t Done Nothing” turned into “Reggae Woman,” which turned into “Sex Machine” (man gotta eat, lawd knows … it can’t be all Stevie). Suddenly Wanda and I found ourselves in the street. Nominally we were looking for a late-night bakery. Actually, I had my pants around my ankles in an alley behind the Old Town.
But, as is typically the case, while she was buttering my bread I was looking at her with a whole new level of respect. It was officially the first instance of my chocolate-and-bacon dream. In this one there was a duck-billed platypus. It was, if I’m not mistaken, wearing an Atlanta Braves jersey and tapping out a rhythm with its tail. Though hard to pick out at first, when I got it, it seemed so obvious: “Of course, Willie Nelson’s ‘Whiskey River.’” That realization came just as the rubber was meeting the road, so to speak. Shave and a haircut, two bits.
Son, we were drunk. I mean stinking and now sticky drunk. So much so that neither of us had a clue of how to get home. We sat down in the National Bank’s doorway and purred into each other’s ears … the purring of cats in heat plus tequila. The next thing I knew, it was morning. I knew it was morning because it was hot and really light. I also knew it because we were spooning on the doorstep as bank customers stepped over us to get into the establishment and get started with their daily business. Wingtips, high heels, pumps, and tennis shoes straddled our early-morning cuddling.
Though it likely sounds a little depressing, it wasn’t. I was invigorated. And she was cute and chirpy, even as she pulled a candy wrapper off her cheek. We made plans for that evening – the evening before she would go back to college Stateside – and I put her in a cab.
I hurried home. I took a nap. Showered. Cleaned my sheets. Went grocery and alcohol shopping. Said a prayer to the love gods. Accompanied it with a dance I like to call the “Lone Wolf.” And then I waited for her phone call.
It’s been nearly 13 years and I’m still waiting … while burning chocolate, cinnamon, bacon, and butter incense. My gods won’t let me down.
Read More The Sensitive Player:
The Irony of Being a Player, Having Sex and Falling in Love
Love, Lust and Longing From the Eastern Block
Top 5 Reasons to Buy a Vibrator
