April the 1st, 2009

Disclaimer:  One lovely lady send me some money for my legal fees, so I need to be up a disclaimer ASAP.  This is, in fact, an April Fools joke.  Thanks to all those who got a laugh.  Sorry to that person who thought I was a "Dickhead" and a "Fuckwit".

Crash.  Tinkle.

Did you hear that?  That's the sound of a dream breaking.

I write this from a prison cell in Manila on a scrap of paper and a borrowed pen that almost works.  My friend Raymund has been kind enough to upload this to the website.

I failed to get arrested in Korea despite my best efforts.  Seems just a tad ironic that I get arrested here despite trying my best not to.

I bet you a hundred bucks that you can't guess what I got arrested for.  An illegal gathering?  Criticizing the wrong people?  Blasphemy perhaps?

Nope.  You lose.  You owe me a hundred bucks which will be put to good use for my ever mounting legal fees.

I - in fact - got arrested for adultery.  Yep.  That's right.  Malcolm who often joked that he was into activism for the "chicks and money" had got himself in deep, deep trouble over a "chick".

How did this happen?  Lemme tell you.

There is a game show here called Wowowee.  Wowowee is uber-popular daytime game show here.  It has a lot of silly games to give the average Filipino the chance of big money.  I went along one day to check it out and immerse myself in the sillier side of Filipino culture. 

One of the guest hostesses was a attractive young lady called Mae.  Being the only foreigner in the crowd - and therefore getting undeserved special treatment - she invited me out to dinner with some of the other celebrities. 

We went to a nice restaurant and - for reasons that escape me now - I broke a ten year or so habit and had some alcohol.   This turned out to be start of my troubles...

The rest of the celebrities left and it was only Mae and me left.  We were both too drunk to drive and so we got a taxi back to her place.  I assume you can work out what happened next...

The next morning, I was awoken by a loud and angry Filipino man.  The angry man turned out to be Randy Mores, the local vice mayor and  - unbeknownst to me - Mae's husband.  Mae and Randy shouted loudly at each other in Filipino and I didn't understand a word.  I quickly got dressed and got the hell out of there.

I slulked back to the guest house in Manila and tried to forget the whole incident.  It was never going to be that easy.  The next day, a policeman came to the house with - you guessed it - an arrest warrant for me for adultery.  (Some quick thinking friends took the photos.)

There is nothing much you can do when you're issued with an arrest warrant, so I was lead away by the policeman and placed in an initial holding cell.   The first cell was kinda weird.  More of less some random garden like bars attached to a house.  I was only there briefly before being led away to the Manila prison where I am now.

Being arrested for adultery may seem weird to some of you, but it is technically against the law here (It's the same in Korea).   It is immoral, but should it be illegal?  That is what my legal team and I are basing our case on in the coming months (years?)

This story is likely to get big here.  Very big.  A foreigner having an affair with a local celebrity who is married to a vice mayor is just too juicy for the tabloids to pass up.  Except my ugly mug to start appearing all over the place.

It was a stoopid, stoopid thing that I did and I paying a huge price for it.  No more activism, no more Meaningful Volunteer.  From now on, it is a legal battle that I fight...

I am very low write now.  Please send me an email.  My friend will print them out and bring them to me...