Part One:
An Island Wager
It was around 2:30 in the morning when Armand Muñoz decided to go all in on an ace high that, for all intents and purposes, should have won him the game. The poker epic started earlier in the evening, maybe around seven. We all agreed that it had gone on far too long for a $20 buy-in. Muñoz had been the chip leader since about midnight, slowly and methodically taking out eight savvy players. I was the only one left, holding at best, $1,000 in chips and barely able to cover my blinds. Muñoz decided to try scaring me off by not only going all-in on the hand, but also by throwing in a privately owned island he had recently acquired in another poker game in a dank, seedy bar somewhere in the Chihuahua region of Mexico. Muñoz said he had won the island from a drug smuggler who simply went by the moniker, Buttons.
Obviously, I couldn’t match the bet even-steven. However, I was holding in my hand, the coup de grace of poker: the royal flush. Worthy of note: This was the first and only royal flush I had ever seen…and as God as my witness, I was holding it! I decided to throw in some odds and sods in an attempt to match the pot and keep me in the game. My bluff was well executed, truly the skilled performance of a thespian. I actually willed a solitary bead of sweat to form on my brow, run down the slope of my nose and leap off the tip like an Olympic ski jumper. With all the modesty I could conjure, I matched by offering my car (white 1984 Volvo 240 DL, body: fair), my parent’s house (1,200 sq. foot ranch, 3 bedroom, 1 and 1/2 bath) and the Lord of the Rings (Extended Edition) 4k box set (missing Return of the King disc).
“Is the pot right?” The dealer asked.
“No.” Muñoz said, much to the surprise of the gathered crowd. “What else you got?”
I thought for a moment. “My cat?”
“Short hair?” He asked.
“No. Long hair. Maine Coon.” I said.
“Pots right.” He declared.
The dealer nodded his head to each of us. “Good luck,” he said. “Now let’s see ‘em.”
Muñoz waited for me to show first. I revealed my royal flush to the gasp of the onlookers.
“Jesus Christ,” he muttered, as he tossed his cards to the side.
“…was born on Christmas day.” I smirked. “Nice island. I’ll take it.”
Part Two:
Modernizing My New Island
When I first came into possession of the island it was named Isla de Tristeza (loosely translated: Island of Misery), which was an apt description, to say the least. There was a group of indigenous-types that lived there and, for some reason or another, none of the previous owners had bothered to kick them out. In all the years they had occupied my land, they had never built a grocery store or even a quick-mart. Instead, they were living off the land, growing their own food and building little grass and mud huts to live in. Things were going to start changing around Isla del Feliz Diversión Diversión (loosely translated: Island of the Happy Fun Fun) and if they wanted to stick around they’d have to start carrying their weight.
First things first, each person was going to have a specific job assigned to them. This would be accomplished through a full proof merit system. I would simply need to figure out who was good at what: construction, clothes making, hunting and gathering, cooking that which had been hunted and gathered, medical care, telemarketing, et cetera, et cetera. I would then delegate the responsibility to the person best suited for the position. But because I didn’t have time to evaluate and assess skill levels and proficiency, I basically just selected based on an individual’s submission and willingness to conform to my every whim.
A serious issue that did arise in my job placement program, was what to do with the elderly. I was gobsmacked to discover that people did not seem capable of dying there. We literally had people who were well into their hundreds. I’ve never seen so many centenarians in one place. Blame it on the non-preservative food they were eating, blame it on the pure water they were drinking, the clean air they were breathing; these people were just getting old and staying healthy. It was rather quite annoying. Sure they could get around all right, but they couldn’t necessarily work hard; you know, like pick up heavy things, till the soil or hear well. They also took a lot of naps and told really boring stories. As much as I hated to do it, they had to be euthanized. Hey, no one ever said running your own country was easy.
Once the citizens of Isla del Feliz Diversión Diversión realized that I was numero uno around them-there parts, they got their act together pretty quickly. You’ve never seen a group of people so eager to work. Hell, they didn’t even seem to mind that they weren’t getting paid time and a half for over-time. So I got to thinking, if they aren’t kicking up a fuss about that, maybe they wouldn’t mind not being paid at all? Admittedly, when I first pitched the idea to them, they of course took to the dirt roads protesting and calling my policy proposal “indentured servitude” or “slavery”. But I cleared things up by explaining that they were being unpatriotic, and that in order to prosper as a sovereign nation, certain sacrifices would have to be made by the citizenry. I also challenged them to crunch the numbers themselves, do the math; after all, not collecting a paycheck would greatly reduce their income tax. At this they cheered. Maybe just maybe, I thought, running my own country would be easy.
Alas, it was not. You see, it became quite clear after the third week of my rule that my empire was quickly running short of natural resources. One of the young island men who I had befriended and affectionately referred to as, Guy Who Helps Me Out, suggested I find more practical uses for the trees that I had contracted my lumber-jacks to cut down. He spoke very broken English as it was taught to him by one of the previous owner’s of the island. I had to laugh at his choice of words in the context in which he used the term “practical use”. The wood was for my summer villa which was being built on a precipice that overlooked the brackish waters of the Caribbean. So I said to the pigeon-English bastard, “Its tough being the leader of a 2 mile by 3 ½ mile island nation. Sometimes a president needs a little time-off. Where’s a king to go if he doesn’t have a summer villa? Your loving, yet authoritarian dictator deserves a summer villa with a veranda, does he not?”
He agreed.
By the end of the first month we had lost several lives due to famine and unhealthy living conditions. I blame the latter on the inept plumbers who had won the bid for building our country’s first sewer system. This had been a part of my administration’s infrastructure initiative, which had been tremendously popular with the islanders, after I explained that instead of squatting over a hole they dug to go to the restroom, they could have flushable toilets. In hindsight, I don’t think those so-called “plumbers” had ever seen a pipe before. What a mess that was, shit was everywhere. Literally. Needless to say, it was a dark time for my administration, my approval ratings were abysmal and continuing to plummet daily.
On one bright, clear day when I was overseeing the construction of my summer villa (which, worthy of note, had it been completed, would have been the first house on the island with a toilet) I happened to notice something off in the distance just on the horizon.
“What is that?” I asked Guy Who Helps Me Out.
“It’s another island,” he said, although it sounded more like, “Esa nutter I lun.”
“What do you mean another island?”
“We’re part of an archipelago. I believe there are seven, maybe eight more islands out there.”
“Wait a second, that gives me an idea.” I said. “Here we are running out of resources, people are dying, waste management is sadly not being managed, and frankly the overall morale of the citizenry is at an all-time low. I know you’ve seen the latest Gallup poll and have purposefully avoided talking to me about it. It’s become a real elephant in the room. But now you’re telling me there are seven or eight more islands around here? Think about it, just a few miles away, unimaginable amounts of resources are just waiting for us. I’d say it’s high time for these islands to unite with us! Soon we shall become Archipiélago del Feliz Diversión Diversión (loosely translated: Archipelago of the Happy Fun Fun).”
“Yes, but Your Highness, the people of these islands may not want to unite with us.” He suggested timidly.
“Listen to yourself, Guy Who Helps Me Out,” I said. “Do you remember a few short weeks ago when the people of this island didn’t want to join with me? Sure, I had to force some of them at gunpoint, but look at us now. We’re like a big goddamn familia! I feel like a father and all of you are like my children. And as it stands, 37 percent of my kids currently like me and approve of the job I’m doing, and that’s more than some fathers can say. We may just need to be a little more assertive with these other islands, that’s all.”
Part Three:
War!
Production on everything ceased as we prepared for battle. I have to admit I knew very little about war, except of course what I had seen in movies. And in hindsight I probably spent too much time forming a cadet glee club and not enough time training the soldiers for combat. That’s on me. I’m not too proud or stubborn to shoulder some of the blame. Although I don’t regret teaching them Billy Joel’s Goodnight Saigon, I still prefer our acapella version over the original. Sorry Billy.
My nearly completed summer villa was torn down so that the wood could be used for building boats. We made weapons from rocks, seashells and branches, anything we could find really. One guy even made a throwing star out of a Styrofoam cup that had washed up on shore; we all agreed that it probably wouldn’t come in handy.
We finally set sail one early Saturday morning. The women and children saw us off.
We reached the shores of the first island we were to conquer liberate almost 36 hours later. Much to our chagrin the people of the island had seen us approaching several hours before we made landfall. It all went south as soon as we stepped out of our boats. I can’t sugarcoat it, it was an absolute bloodbath. Still, what’s most important to mention when recounting the tale of Isla del Feliz Diversión Diversión and my people’s fight for liberation, was that while, yes, they were no match for the Colombian drug smugglers who had apparently been using that particular island for sometime to conduct their lucrative business, but it was the islanders’ faith, their unwavering conviction that truly defined them. My people fought until the brutal end, each and every one of them, even the women and children. (I realize I mentioned earlier the women and children stayed behind, but the truth is, we needed all hands on deck for this one.) Nevertheless, they should all be remembered for their courage and patriotism.
I would like to tell you that there were more survivors than just me. Unfortunately, there were not. And I’m sure the only reason I made it out of alive was because I hid during the battle and then, later that night, stole one of the Colombian’s boats and headed toward Panama where I caught a red-eye flight back to the states. My penance for naively believing that I could lift my people out of squalor and elevate a third-world country to at least a second-world country, maybe even a first-world one was the price of the plane ticket. Having to book last minute at the peak of travel season is nothing short of inhumane.
In the end, there is a lesson to be learned. Never go all-in in a poker game with a sexy Latino man who has just raised the stakes with an island off the coast of Panama, even if in your hand you hold a royal flush. Why? Because either way, you lose.