"Pinoy Jeepneys"

You would have had to been a Pacific Sailor to affix yourself to these type of memories and the Pinay Jeepney! It's said they were originally made from old American military jeeps left behind after WWII and they're well known for their gaudy decor and jam-packed sitting room!! As the Americans left the PI at the end of the war the locals stripped down the jeeps to have room for several passengers and decorated them with lively colors and wild ornamentations!!!

It was made as the municipal transport that connected the main gate of Naval Base Subic Bay through the infamous Magsaysay to Subic City, Barrio Beretta and probably just about anywhere else in the island of Luzon, Philippines. Magsaysay was the U.S. Navy Mecca of commercial sin and carnal knowledge!! Anything so decadent and morally unsound it couldn't be found on Magsaysay was probably practiced in prison by fellas leashed together with ball-n-chains doing twenty years to life!! Yep, this was the land of opportunity that spurned men without any souls!!!

For a lot of us young men, many still in their teens, it was the first place beyond the backseat of Daddy's ol' Chevy they'd seen a naked set of female titties... and I use the term female loosely since there were a lot of Benny Boys running around if you know what I mean! In the PI they call them Bakla!! This was the drive through window for many a sailor's beginnings and let's just say it was something more than just educational!!!

Once the ship pulled in, sailors couldn't wait to head for the beach pack'n their watches, cash and I.D. in some hidden compartment along their skivvies and head out like a gaudamn stampede of unruly stead streaming through the gates and heading for the nearest colorful cattle car... 'The Jeepney,' just outside the gate!!!

Just as it appeared the sardine can had been packed full, the gaudamn driver would always insist there was more room on those tiny arse little seats made for pigmies with no asses and refused to drive away until we packed it in til the gaudamn thing was top heavy!!!

But sure enough if it weren't for the nauseous smell of shit river or the greatly anticipated love you long time.. no shit promises over the hill into Barrio Berretta we'd manage to cram it all in with people sitting on people and a few chickens, pigs and maybe a billy-goat in the back! We'd always somehow work our way through the throngs of the pint sized buckets they'd sometimes use for seats where breathing pungent air became a commodity and you'd start to lose the feeling of your legs which might not be a bad thing if you were nut to butt against one of them benny boys!! Then we'd be on our way where as luck would have it, the jeepney drivers ruled the road and made their stops to either side!!!

Once on the way into Subic City there was a naked Sailor who looked to be a bit cranked on something more than just the San Migoo who suddenly jumped in front of the jeepney I was on full of passengers and all! He climbed the hood and hugged the windshield with his tally whacker plastered on the glass in full view of the shocked passengers onboard!! The driver got out and tried to remove the drunken squid from his jeepney but it took a couple of his buddies to rip him off as he looked like he was try'n to hump the gaudamn windshield!! I swear to ya, I couldn't make this shit up... it's the reason they call these sea stories, and that my friends is a no shitter!!!

It was times like these a young man would increase his education in the finer things in life shelling out a few pesos to see a bar girl achieve an absolute miracle underneath the table or on stage in front of an additional twenty or thirty sailors and marines! It was part of a young man's education that could only be obtained in the third or seventh fleets unless you were doing a world tour from Norfolk!! You see, in the PI you didn't have to be settle in your attempts at casual romance!! There was no need of hinting to a cheap motel where you could relax in horizontal contemplation of the meaning of life!! To many of us at the anchor end of the chain of command this was heaven!!!

After a good night of fun and a healthy dose of monkey meat on a stick it could be hell trying to flag one of them gaudamn jeepneys down! There were no jeepney stops in Subic City or Barrio Berretta!! And if you looked like you spent all your loot you could probably forget getting a ride from one of those thrifty little bastard drivers! You see there is one thing that all those jeepney drivers, bar girls and street vendors had in common... they were all skilled in the science of separating young sailors from their money!! And we were drunk and powerless against their dubious techniques!!!

Unless you planned on walking up and down countryside hills for ten or more miles the jeepney represented the only mobility we had and substantially increased the range of our geographic accessibility back across shit river and to home base!!!

By the time we got our butts back we'd looked and smelled like we slid down a manure loading chute somewhere in the middle of Texas! The jeepney brought about salvation and escape from a long deployment of underway mayhem and single sailor debauchery with months of nothing but nudy mags to bring us solace!! The local Transit Authority must have known those colorfully flamboyant buses were on there last legs of survival...so I thought. I hear they're still in use today all over the PI!! They were built with no protective shelters for the passengers from the elements, no civil driving laws, no governmental regulations on how to manage or take care of these cattle cars... just keep pump'n the sailors of their money to and from the countryside smell'n like a sheep dip tank!!!!

It was a magic steel box that hauled you through the neighborhood decorated like a Christmas tree where you could see good-looking women on all sides... long time no shit!! At nineteen, broke as hell and at loose ends, that was just about as good as it got!!!