Flashbacks - Queenstown

He had silver teeth, he looked like jaws. I looked like Bambi with sweaty paws. I was now starting to regret the bet that I had made with the girl I had met the night before. It was done to impress, but as a result I was feeling the stress. You see I had met this girl at two in the afternoon, outside the piercing place as agreed. What seemed like an excellent idea at 2am that morning seemed like bad idea this afternoon. Maybe it was the multiple cocktails and bottles of beer. Maybe it was a moment to impress. Maybe, just maybe it was a moment of sheer stupidity.

I walked into the piercing place. I was hoping there would be a long queue. Any excuse to leave. But there wasn’t. There was one girl having her tongue pierced. The smell was clinical, the screams were daunting. “I want to get my tongue pierced” I asked. “Sorry not today, we are all booked up” was what I wanted to hear. In reality it was “Yeah no worries mate, just sit down there, be with you in twenty minutes”. Great. Not only could he fit me in, I had to wait. It was twenty minutes of torture. I tried to console myself by reading the customer comments book. Surely if they were well enough to sign the book, it must be ok.

Then it was my turn. I sat down on the reclining chair. My eyes started to water. To jaw’s credit he talked and talked. He could see I was nervous. For a start I could not poke my tongue out long enough for him to clamp it. Then I waited. Pain or no pain? How long will it take? Is he going to stab it? What happens if he missing the spot that he had picked? No, let’s think about something else. What’s the weather like out where? What am I doing tonight? No, this is going to hurt. Please be over as quick as possible?

It does not matter how many people say "It does not hurt, there are no nerves in the middle of the tongue", it still looks like it is going to hurt. Maybe it was the man with big metal teeth and the tattoos. Maybe it was the silver spike. My friend Fred had had his tongue pierced in Auckland. He assured me everything was fine. I mean passing out was nothing he assured me.

In reality it was like going to the dentist. Only this was my choice. And then it happened. Like they say, it did not physically hurt, but mentally hurt. I spent the whole day wondering around hoping people would not talk to me as I would respond with a load of gibberish. And then there was the soup. I sat in the communal kitchen that night, spilling soup all over my t-shirt. Special needs they must have thought. Then I set off for bed. I could only hope my tongue would be there the next day. Maybe I would find the ball on the pillow.

I followed the procedure. Clean twice a day with mouthwash. Drink soup. Talk like a mentalist. It hurt. It was annoying. I thought about taking it out. People would reassure me “It’s only because you have a long bar in, it will get better when you put the shorter one in”. They were right I suppose. But it still meant eating was a lottery. The clunk of metal against tooth was always cringing. Eventually after three weeks the stinging pain started to go. Ok, I admit the first thing I did after the piercing was to drink eight bottles of beer. Caught. Maybe I should not have smoked those cigarettes either. I was hearing horror stories from people who had done the same and suffered from infected mouths. I thought, in my naivety, if I took the risk in getting it done, I could take the risk in having a few cigarettes and beer. Besides, and more importantly, I was in the party town of Queenstown.

It’s been three months now. Well I have swallowed the damn thing four times. I have chipped my tooth once. The major drama was when it fell from my mouth and bounced along a pavement in Sydney. Without a spare I searched for the nearest piercing place. It had been two hours. I tried to feed it through. I tried to feed it through again. The whole was closed. The kind piercing man pushed and shoved. Blood was present. Just as he was about to suggest that I get it re-pierced, it popped through. The relief. Lesson learned. Always keep a spare in your wallet.


But I have learned to like my new piercing. It remains a constant reminder of my crazy time in the crazy place of Queenstown.