Barbie and The Douche Master

Korea Land is every bit as rich with douchebags as Canada Land. Merely existing here has resulted in exposure to the following charmers:

• Subway Soju Man, who felt that 9pm was an appropriate time to be a drunk ass.

• Random Frat Boy, who felt that a bar fight and threatening text messages were the appropriate response to common courtesy.

• The President of Dyssemia Anonymous (a weak nickname, in hindsight, but what's done is done), who incorrectly interpreted my complete disinterest in knowing him as a cry for help.

There have been countless others, but these three serve as illustrations of the various types of douchebag that have been known to insist on crossing my path and speaking to me (having said that, there is at least a faint possibility that I invite the attention of douchebags, on account of my being an ass). Now, before somebody gets sad that I'm only picking on men here, I assure you: I have bitch stories, too. Someday, I might even share one. Today, I feel like taking a trip down memory lane and spitting up a tale about the douchiest douche that ever did douche. Going forward, he shall be referred to as The Douche Master (TDM).

It was the last Wednesday in January. I had decided that there was no time like the middle of the work week to run up to Daegu and get inappropriately drunk. I hadn't been entirely sober in about three days, since I'd first learned of Kyle's death. As such, I was on the brink of going from confused to really fucking angry. Had I been aware that there was anger to be unleashed, my dishonourable encounter with The Douche Master could have been avoided.

I met with a few friends of mine, who had darlingly dropped everything on a week night to come out to the bar and watch me respond to crisis by absolutely wrecking myself. At some point during a series of conversations where friends shared their own stories of grief, a man wove his way over to our table and decided to strike up conversation about how spectacular he thought he was. The Douche Master knew how to make an entrance.

As I longed for a distraction, his pompous monologue was initially welcomed. After entertaining us for a few minutes (though not quite in the sense that I suspect he thought he was entertaining us), he wandered off, presumably because he heard word that the rest of the room had been seriously deprived of awesome since he left it.

With the welcome distraction gone, one of my friends and I got back on the heartwarming topic of death. The Douche Master, having received imaginary word that now our part of the room was void of awesome, decided to shift back our way within a couple of moments; right in the middle of a good conversation, and perhaps the only moment that night that I didn't want a distraction. Cutting me off as if I didn't exist, he began trying to court my friend by explaining to her how awesome he thought he was. Bored, wanting to get on with the only productive conversation I'd had that night, and knowing that my friend though TDM was a Neanderthal, I politely interrupted and explained that I was having a serious discussion that required completion. While it's grossly unlikely that I was quite that poised and polite in my use of language, the point is that I wasn't yet being an ass.

The Douche Master, in disbelief that somebody would dare interrupt his irresistible barrage of come ons, decided that ignoring me was the best course of action. He was wrong. He moved closer to my friend, cutting me off completely from the conversation. I responded in turn by getting in his face and slightly less politely telling him that he'd interrupted an important conversation, that I would like to continue. The Douche Master advised me that he was now having an important conversation with my friend, and I could wait until they were finished.

And this is about where shit hit the fan.

Drunk, my confusion immediately flipped to rage, and here we had the perfect, most deserving of targets to take it out on: The Douche Master. Slamming my pint down on the table, I said something to the effect of: "If you'd excuse me, my friend just fucking died and I need to talk about it. That, and my friend does not want to fuck you. She has a boyfriend. She's laughing at you. We all are. So fuck off".

Now, in hindsight, drunkenly slamming pints around and yelling at perfect strangers because your friend just died and you're angry, isn't appropriate behaviour. But it's excusable. It's understandable. And it's something that anybody with even a shred of basic human emotion can see and know to let be. What followed my less than admirable behaviour is what separates The Douche Master from the other douches, and moves him into a category of Total Fucking Cunt which is all his own.

The Douche Master examined me for a brief moment, as I gripped my beer mug, blinked back tears, and shook in anger. He then responded with: "Well, I need to talk to her, too. My parents died yesterday".

9 months later, and I still don't know what the fuck you're supposed to say to that. Or how the Hell anybody who has ever felt what it's like to be human could possibly retort in that manner. My response at the time was to tell him what a disgusting pile of excrement I thought he was, splash my beer at him, then run to the bathroom before I tried to throw a table at him, too. Aside from the fact that I would undoubtedly get removed from the bar for doing that, he was a big man who had just demonstrated that he lacked empathy; I have no doubt that he would have snapped me in half. Running to the bathroom is perhaps the most appropriate thing I did over that span of 40 seconds.

One of my friends followed me to the bathroom, where I apologized for my behaviour and concluded that we should probably just empty our drinks and leave. We return downstairs to find The Douche Master talking to the bar tender, attempting to get me kicked out of the bar for "attacking" him. Anger ensued. Seething, I pulled my friend's obituary out of my purse and threw it on the table in of the bar tender and The Douche Master. A friend of mine, who also knows the bar tender, attempted to explain what happened, as The Douche Master interrupted her in order to share his own twisted version of events. Unable to fathom how one could possibly be so bad at life, I grabbed my belongings and fled the bar.

I see The Douche Master out in Daegu from time to time, still. Every time, I turn the other way. He's just vile. I should probably find a more appropriate name for him than The Douche Master, but there really aren't words foul enough to describe him. So, it will do.

As an aside, the friend who he was ruthlessly hitting on would have interjected and gotten rid of him had she not been stunned to silence by his level of douche. She was forgiven immediately.