{"id":7130,"date":"2015-08-17T10:52:00","date_gmt":"2015-08-17T17:52:00","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/first2board.com\/wanderlusty\/?p=7130"},"modified":"2015-08-17T11:13:28","modified_gmt":"2015-08-17T18:13:28","slug":"when-urban-exploration-goes-in-an-unexpected-direction-aka-i-got-felt-up-in-the-middle-east","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/first2board.com\/wanderlusty\/2015\/08\/when-urban-exploration-goes-in-an-unexpected-direction-aka-i-got-felt-up-in-the-middle-east\/","title":{"rendered":"When Urban Exploration Goes In An Unexpected Direction (AKA: I Got Felt Up in the Middle East)"},"content":{"rendered":"<blockquote><p>i&#8217;m going to try and keep this post PG but there may be content some readers may find slightly NSFW.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n<p>you may know by now that i love exploring <a href=\"http:\/\/first2board.com\/wanderlusty\/tag\/abandoned\/\">abandoned places<\/a> &#8212; sadly, it&#8217;s been way too long since i&#8217;ve had the opportunity to, so when we passed by this building in [Middle East city redacted] several times i really wanted to head in and get my abandonment on! luckily my travel buddy this trip was more than happy to indulge me, but as he&#8217;s not into abandoned places like me, he waited for me outside. <\/p>\n<p>i returned quicker than either of us expected.<\/p>\n<p>what an amazing building! in the middle of downtown, with open windows where you could get a vantage point over the city, not too crumbly or dangerous-looking. perfect!<\/p>\n<p>it was kind of curious, though, since there were a handful of people milling about the place, which didn&#8217;t make sense for it being well, nothing. i approached and started taking pictures.<\/p>\n<p><a data-flickr-embed=\"true\"  href=\"https:\/\/www.flickr.com\/photos\/jonk\/20657304015\/in\/dateposted-public\/\" title=\"Abandoned building\"><img decoding=\"async\" loading=\"lazy\" src=\"https:\/\/farm1.staticflickr.com\/640\/20657304015_f17143ef27_b.jpg\" width=\"1024\" height=\"768\" alt=\"Abandoned building\"><\/a><script async src=\"\/\/embedr.flickr.com\/assets\/client-code.js\" charset=\"utf-8\"><\/script><\/p>\n<p>indeed i was getting excited &#8212; abandonment, finally!<\/p>\n<p>i started climbing up the main set of stairs and ran into two people descending at the same time.<\/p>\n<p><em>ha! who knew there were so many abandoned building enthusiasts in [Middle East city redacted]?! you&#8217;d think they&#8217;d be kinda used to it by now<\/em>, i thought to myself. i noticed one of them was itching his crotch. gross!<\/p>\n<p>one of them continued down, the other (with the itchy crotch) remained on the stairs; i continued up. as i got closer, i noticed he wasn&#8217;t ITCHING&#8230;he was&#8230;erm, manipulating. lots and lots of manipulation. and staring at me. i looked up and also saw a guy standing outside one of the abandoned rooms, looking at me.<\/p>\n<p>i quickly figured out what this place was &#8212; a venue for gay male hookups. i had to quickly make a decision. keep going for the sake of exploring? or turn around and run? i decided to finish climbing to the next level and leave after that.<\/p>\n<p>as i passed the erm, manipulator, i got slightly worried he might shove me off the staircase (which had no railing, of course) because he saw me taking pictures, but instead a felt him brush his hand up my butt cheek! i quickened my pace. <\/p>\n<p>AWKWARD.<\/p>\n<p>WOW. i don&#8217;t remember the last time i was felt up &#8212; maybe in a gay club 15 years ago? i took a few more pictures and then quickly descended, running out of the building. i&#8217;m not sure what i was afraid of, but it was legitimately one of the few times i&#8217;ve been afraid doing urban exploration &#8212; maybe even more afraid than getting caught by a security guard at an abandoned ink factory over a decade ago?<\/p>\n<blockquote><p>i&#8217;m withholding the name of this city, though if you <a href=\"http:\/\/twitter.com\/jonk\">follow me on Twitter<\/a> you&#8217;ll know what it is. i don&#8217;t know if the authorities know about this place, though i&#8217;d be surprised if they didn&#8217;t; it&#8217;s right in the middle of downtown &#8212; but in case they don&#8217;t, i&#8217;d rather do the local queer community a solid and not do too much to reveal the location of their <del datetime=\"2015-08-17T15:38:59+00:00\">hideout<\/del>* secret club.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n<h3>thinking about it<\/h3>\n<p>with the great strides the gay community has made recently at home in the US &#8212; legalized gay marriage as of less than two months ago &#8212; it&#8217;s easy for people like me to continue riding on a high, only to be in a country where it&#8217;s very not legal and be faced with the reality of the situation for so many people around the world. i don&#8217;t <strong>not<\/strong> visit a country solely because i object to its political or legal situation (whatever it may be &#8212; related to my personal life or not), but when i&#8217;m in a country where i may be persecuted for who i am, most of the time i don&#8217;t even think about it. it&#8217;s only in situations where it&#8217;s made salient like this, or <a href=\"http:\/\/first2board.com\/wanderlusty\/2013\/09\/give-ol-college-try-attempt-stick-man\/\">when i was in Russia during the height of the Kremlin&#8217;s anti-gay rhetoric<\/a>, that i really do count my blessings to be from a place where i don&#8217;t have to live in fear (most of the time). <\/p>\n<p>and it&#8217;s not even that bad in this country compared to some of its neighbors. and by &#8220;not that bad&#8221; you can still be jailed here for having gay sex &#8212; at least you can&#8217;t be put to death. <\/p>\n<p>(i did hear <a href=\"https:\/\/www.youtube.com\/watch?v=-msutN_OkU4\">this year&#8217;s Eurovision winner<\/a> on the radio today, so maybe that&#8217;s at least a sign of change? ha, i can be optimistic i guess?) <\/p>\n<p>i&#8217;m not sure if this place was a brothel or if it was just a place where people meet to have casual sex, but either way, it got me to thinking about how terrible it is to be a second-class citizen through no fault of your own and how lucky i am, as a gay Asian male, to have lived my entire life in a place where the discrimination i&#8217;ve experienced has been minimal to none, especially compared to people here. truly, i do feel very lucky today. (and not only because i was able to get out of there without being even yelled at&#8230;)<\/p>\n<p>*i should note that i felt compelled to change the word &#8220;hideout&#8221; above, even though that&#8217;s really an apt descriptor. it makes me so sad that people have to hide who they are. terrible.<\/p>\n<h3>the pictures<\/h3>\n<p>oh yeah, the rest of the few pictures i was able to take&#8230;<\/p>\n<p><a data-flickr-embed=\"true\"  href=\"https:\/\/www.flickr.com\/photos\/jonk\/20034742174\/in\/dateposted-public\/\" title=\"Abandoned building\"><img decoding=\"async\" loading=\"lazy\" src=\"https:\/\/farm1.staticflickr.com\/669\/20034742174_79592b5027_b.jpg\" width=\"1024\" height=\"768\" alt=\"Abandoned building\"><\/a><script async src=\"\/\/embedr.flickr.com\/assets\/client-code.js\" charset=\"utf-8\"><\/script><\/p>\n<p><a data-flickr-embed=\"true\"  href=\"https:\/\/www.flickr.com\/photos\/jonk\/20470560349\/in\/dateposted-public\/\" title=\"Abandoned building\"><img decoding=\"async\" loading=\"lazy\" src=\"https:\/\/farm6.staticflickr.com\/5749\/20470560349_56709a8705_b.jpg\" width=\"768\" height=\"1024\" alt=\"Abandoned building\"><\/a><script async src=\"\/\/embedr.flickr.com\/assets\/client-code.js\" charset=\"utf-8\"><\/script><\/p>\n<p><a data-flickr-embed=\"true\"  href=\"https:\/\/www.flickr.com\/photos\/jonk\/20631044566\/in\/dateposted-public\/\" title=\"Abandoned building\"><img decoding=\"async\" loading=\"lazy\" src=\"https:\/\/farm6.staticflickr.com\/5786\/20631044566_5b63bbd921_b.jpg\" width=\"1024\" height=\"768\" alt=\"Abandoned building\"><\/a><script async src=\"\/\/embedr.flickr.com\/assets\/client-code.js\" charset=\"utf-8\"><\/script><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>i&#8217;m going to try and keep this post PG but there may be content some readers may find slightly NSFW. you may know by now&#8230;<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":60,"featured_media":7140,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_mi_skip_tracking":false,"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"jetpack_publicize_message":"In Which I Accidentally Discover a Very Illegal Place Which Made Me Reflect On Human Rights","jetpack_is_tweetstorm":false,"jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":true,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","enabled":false}}},"categories":[3],"tags":[37,1128],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"yoast_head":"<!-- This site is optimized with the Yoast SEO plugin v19.13 - 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