The File On Stormy Foster: Chapter Two
THE FILE ON STORMY FOSTER
A Cartoon Movie Serial in Twelve Chapters
CHAPTER TWO:
“THE GAY SANCTUARY”
HAWAII, 1990 (and in flashback, 1942)
CAST OF CHARACTERS:
IRENE BANG, the NARRATOR
NIRMAHL BEN-ABSALOM, the REFUGEE
DIAMOND FAWS, the DEMAGOGUE
JEFF JUNE, the DOUBLE AGENT
PAJARO HINA, the QUEEN
PUMA, the RESCUER
BASIL SINGAPORE, the DECOY
It’s Irene Bang again, sharing my recollections of Nirmahl Ben-Absalom. By the way, I never, ever called him by that name! He was introduced to me as Stormy Foster. My husband Basil was supposed to recount this part of the story, but he had a scheduling conflict this morning. He’ll try to break away and come later.
I’ll start by recalling what Stormy told me about his arrival on Pajaro Island. You’ll remember from my last audio tape that he was fleeing life as a male prostitute, which he’d been forced into under strange circumstances. After helping Stormy recover from serious injuries, a mysterious man named Puma took him to this secret sanctuary.
He told me that a large group of men met their boat. They wore the same kind of loincloths that Stormy and Puma had changed into before making their journey. Puma greeted them all warmly, calling them "brothers" in his native tongue. Later, Stormy would learn to speak it but some of the islanders could speak English. The welcome they extended felt sincere, and for the first time in months, Stormy began to feel safe. That’s how his period of residence on Pajaro Island began. It lasted from May to August of 1942.
His hosts called themselves "Kanaka Tanga" or “Kauwa”, and they were part of a population he estimated at about a thousand people. He learned that the Kauwa were an ancient race, a “lost tribe” that had separated from other Hawaiians eons ago. They claimed to be immortal, which of course he didn't believe; but then it dawned on him that he never saw any children or very old people!
He never heard of anybody dying while he was there, either. Illness and injury were rare; Kauwani medicines were numerous and amazing. The potions that Puma had used to heal him were typical; Kauwa medicine women (there seemed to be only a few male practitioners) had perfected many homeopathic remedies based on rare plants and minerals. Most of them, he was told, were only found on the island.
THE QUEEN OF PAJARO ISLAND
There was a Kauwani queen known as Pajaro Hina. Stormy would meet her later on. She was mahu, which is the Hawaiian word for a person of third gender. He described the queen as a transgender woman, masculine in every way but her voice which was soft and melodious. Legend had it that she was also a shape-shifter. Kauwa elders claimed that, in the form of a rainbow-colored bird, the queen had led them across the sea to their island paradise. This had happened so long ago, nobody could say exactly when.
Stormy was a quick study, and it only took him a couple of weeks to pick up the basics of the Kauwani language. From snatches of conversation he heard, he guessed that the islanders were refugees from some kind of horrific event; but the story was closely guarded. Nearly all Pajaro Islanders were original settlers, but most had no memory of the migration. Only Kauwani elders knew the full story, and they only shared it with those who’d been confirmed in their faith. Even then, the elders kept parts of it secret.
You didn’t have to believe to be considered Kauwa, though. Kauwani lore taught that all same-gender-loving people were related, and the Kanaka Tanga had developed a kind of “Gaydar” that allowed them to recognize their brethren anywhere. Periodically, a designated Pajaro islander would travel to Hawaii to bring back potential converts. Currently, that was Puma’s task. Stormy had been one of his “recruits”, for lack of a better term.
But conversion to the Kauwa faith had to be approved by Pajaro Hina, and only those found to be true believers could stay on the island.
The queen’s tests of faith were harrowing, so almost nobody did; but all Lesbians and Gay men who’d been brought to Pajaro Island were free to come and go, so long as their portion of sacred Lavender Tarot root lasted.
That was the strange herb Stormy and Puma had smoked just before embarking on their canoe trip. All Kauwanis were periodically allotted a portion of this root; it was considered a birthright.
Stormy learned that without inhaling Lavender Tarot smoke, no Gay person could navigate to or from the island’s secret location. Any who tried would become hopelessly lost! Maka Inana, or heterosexual people, derived no benefit from smoking this root. In any case, they were absolutely forbidden to visit the island.
Despite all this coming and going, Pajaro Island's existence had yet to become known to the heterosexual world. Stormy thought it remained secret for as long as it did because the Kauwa people were adept at determining who was and wasn't safe to bring there. He credited that good judgment to their "Gaydar". I think there was another reason: Lesbians and Gay men always kept their meeting place locations confidential. We had to, because we were considered criminals! So this hidden tropical sanctuary surely would've rated the same level of discretion.
As you’d expect, the Kauwa were an agrarian race whose lives revolved around planting, harvesting and fishing. Stormy said women did most of it; the men usually occupied themselves with cooking, cleaning and weaving. Kauwani leisure time was filled with many kinds of sport, and he described how the people loved athletic competition. Sometimes these competitions pitted men against women and, Stormy assured me, “the women won as often as the men did!”
For most contests, the teams were gender-neutral, but men and women on Pajaro Island always lived apart. They occupied different regions of the island in large households of “brothers” and “sisters”. As far as Stormy could tell, no heterosexual activity ever took place. Everybody seemed to be Gay!
THE WAY OF THE KAUWA PEOPLE
Athletics were a big part of Kauwani culture, but religion was its most important aspect. There was daily communal prayer, and elaborate religious rituals took place every two weeks or so. Stormy found Kauwa beliefs similar to Judaism: The people kept a form of kosher, observed a shabbat and celebrated religious holidays that reminded him of Passover and Rosh Hashanah.
One major difference was that they worshiped two gods instead of one: Papa, known in English as “Mother Penis”, and Wakea, which translates as “Father Vagina”. (These gods were similar but not identical to ancient Hawaiian dieties with the same names.)
Another difference was the ritualization of sex. Puma and his brothers, who were actually not related, all had regular carnal knowledge of each other. This happened even though they were partnered in pairs. At first, Stormy thought this kind of sexuality was just “messing around”. He tried to join in, only to be firmly rebuffed! Over time, he began to understand the religious significance of these couplings.
When the brothers were satisfied that he'd learned to respect their ritual, they admitted Stormy to their circle of lovemaking.
He first became intimate with Puma, and then with another man, and then another. Before long, he was fully initiated into what they called “the loving brotherhood.” He was, I think, inherently polyamorous so he adapted quickly to this cultural norm. “Each experience was intense,” he told me. “It was spiritual!” He said that it was like praying but he couldn’t explain how. Sex with Kauwani men was just very different from any homosexual contact he’d ever had before.
The unusual intensity that he felt while coupling played a part in his conversion to the Kauwa religion; but sex alone could never have made Stormy abandon Judaism. He said it was a combination of what he felt, what he saw and what he heard. He was profoundly moved by the faith’s core tenets of peace, love, respect for the natural environment and equality between genders. These tenets were taught to him by the local Kahuna (high priest). Incidentally, all Kahuna on Pajaro Island were female. For some reason, it was forbidden for men to hold that position!
When Stormy announced that he wanted to convert, the brothers were all overjoyed. They held a feast in his honor. Puma explained what would happen next: At summer's end, he would attend the Makahiki Festival, where all new initiates danced for the queen. Then he would be taken up the mountain to the base of the big bird statues.
There he would undergo four tests: Suspension in air and fire, and burial under earth and water. He had to remain in each of these states from sunup to sundown. When the tests were complete, the gods would take away his human soul and give him one that was immortal. It sounded like certain death!
This was the point at which most initiates reconsidered converting, but not Stormy. Somehow, he never doubted that he could pass those lethal tests. His life would also be in danger if he returned to Oahu, and he didn’t want to go back; so he agreed to undergo the ritual, which took place a few weeks later.
DEATH BUYS A TICKET TO
PAJARO ISLAND!
Just before the Makahiki Festival was held, Puma went back to Oahu. He was still looking for new recruits to the Kauwa faith and hoped to bring some to the Festival; but he never returned to Pajaro Island. When Stormy returned to Hawaii, he learned that Puma had been found dead in a Honolulu back alley! He died of a drug overdose, but an autopsy revealed that he’d also been beaten and tortured.
It was treated by authorities as a typical drug-related death but Stormy was convinced that Puma had been murdered; what's more, he believed that Puma's killers were the same haole thugs who had targeted him! Information that I found in Stormy’s FBI file confirm his suspicions.
For some reason, that Kauwani "Gaydar" I told you about failed Puma. He approached a Gay man who was anything but safe to talk to! His name was Thomas Jefferson Rokugatsu. He was a closeted Gay man of Japanese descent, and a future ally of Stormy; but at that time he was a Japan sympathizer who’d signed on to the Nazi agenda. His parents, patriotic Nisei, or first-generation Americans, had named him after one of their adopted country's founding fathers; but after he turned against America, Rokugatsu began calling himself “Jeff June”. That name allowed him to pass himself off as Korean during the wartime purge of Japanese Americans.
When he was on a recruiting mission, Puma was never very forthcoming with information; but from what he did say, Jeff June guessed that there was some kind of secret refuge for Gay people. He passed the information along to a Nazi bund that was operating in Honolulu.
Adolph Hitler had sent one of his lieutenants, a man named Wilbur von Schweiss, to supervise this bund and report back to Berlin. It was von Schweiss and his American Nazi recruits who had tried to kill Stormy! Now they captured Puma and forced him to talk about Pajaro Island.
Apparently, it wasn't the first time bund members had been told about a Gay refuge, but they didn't believe what they'd heard. What they learned from Puma lent credibility to claims that seemed incredible. Torture yielded the secret of the Lavender Tarot root he carried, the hidden location of his canoe, and the name of his most recent recruit: Nirmahl Ben-Absalom. Von Schweiss recognized the name as belonging to the former Kid Bombay. After getting what he wanted from Puma, he or one of his cronies administered a lethal drug overdose!
Another member of that bund was the masked holy man that Stormy had encountered in Mrs. Tricks’ brothel. Under that mask and hood was Diamond Faws, a popular evangelist based in Hawaii. He was known as Deacon Diamond or just “the Deacon”. Despite having been born on Molokai with part Native-Hawaiian blood, Faws was drawn to White supremacy; apparently, he concealed his Pacific Island heritage so he could mingle with other supporters of Hitler's Master Race theory. For sure, this dude had major issues, but I’ll delve more deeply into that later on.
It was the Deacon who'd wanted Stormy dead, and he was alarmed to learn that he was still alive. Wilbur von Schweiss decided that someone should go to Pajaro Island and track him down. Instead of trusting the job to underlings again, Faws wanted to make sure he was dead by personally killing him! Von Schweiss initially opposed that idea. He changed his mind but told the Deacon that he'd need some men backing him up. In the process of arguing pros and cons, “men” got whittled down to one man: Jeff June. Jeff was assigned to accompany Faws on his murder mission. Going forward, he became a kind of personal assistant to the Deacon. This and the information I’m about to give you is drawn from Jeff’s personal testimony to the FBI.
Charting a direct route to Pajaro Island was impossible; you literally had to perceive the right direction, and smoking the sacred Tarot root enhanced your senses so that you could do so. However, just inhaling the smoke wasn’t enough; you had to be a person of homosexual orientation. That Deacon Diamond was able to find and set foot on the island confirms what Stormy saw evidence of that day in Mrs. Tricks’ torture chamber: The anti-Gay demagogue was himself a Gay man! That fact also underscores the hypocrisy that lay behind his other nefarious activities, which I have yet to detail in full; but from his involvement with both brothels and Nazis, you can already tell that Diamond Faws was more than just your average conservative evangelist.
“FORGIVE ME, FOR I HAVE SINNED”
He and Jeff June arrived on the island just as the Makahiki Festival was winding down. Keeping their presence there a secret, they managed to sneak into the queen’s compound. In his testimony, Jeff recalled how enraged the Deacon was at seeing Lesbian and Gay couples making love right out in the open. Let me quote the text: He said it was a struggle for him not to shoot them on sight! The two interlopers were outnumbered so, thankfully, that wasn’t a viable option.
They stayed hidden and continued to look for Stormy; once they found him, an opportunity might come for them to capture and/or kill him without being seen. They never did find him but became distracted by a naked man, slender and deeply-tanned, with long silver hair and a beard. Judging by how the Pajaro Islanders revered him, he was some kind of religious icon.
They watched from a distance as this man demonstrated amazing control over the natural elements; Jeff described how roots sprung up out of the ground at the gesture of his hand, and tongues of flame leapt from his fingertips! Both he and the Deacon were frightened by this display of apparently supernatural power.
Diamond Faws decided that it was too dangerous to remain on Pajaro Island; but before he and Jeff retreated, they sneaked into the Kauwa temple. After overpowering and killing a guard, the Deacon stole a large quantity of Lavender Tarot root. He also made off with a religious scroll that my husband Basil will tell you about. Once again quoting Jeff June’s testimony, Deacon Diamond vowed to return to the island and wipe out all those fucking sex perverts!
As I said before, Jeff June eventually switched sides and became a fervent supporter of the Allies. Stormy was responsible for his change of heart, and he introduced us. Jeff told me that the emotional shake-up he experienced on Pajaro Island also contributed to his redemption. Seeing dozens of Gay men coupling without shame was a revelation to him, so much so that he briefly became reckless with his own sexuality!
As unlikely as it may seem, Jeff became infatuated with Diamond Faws during that sojourn on the island. What’s more, being in constant close contact with the Deacon raised suspicions that he was, as Jeff put it, “a kindred spirit.” In fact, he believed that most of the men from their bund were Gay but he would never have dared to broach the subject! Nazi doctrine was explicitly homophobic; even so, he let his guard down shortly before he and the Deacon returned to Honolulu. They stole some Kauwani wine and drank it in their secret camp. Both men got a bit tipsy, and Jeff tried to kiss Faws on the mouth.
With tears in his eyes, he told me that the Deacon beat him to within an inch of his life! Diamond Faws was an older man, but very strong for his age; he gave Jeff a bloody nose, a broken tooth and bruises all over his body. After the beating, he forced Jeff to kneel and “repent his sin before God.” Then after reaching Honolulu, the Deacon made him spend a few weeks in a kind of Gay conversion therapy program. That’s another aspect of this story I’ll go into later.
But it turns out that Jeff June and Deacon Diamond had seen Stormy Foster on Pajaro Island; they just didn’t recognize him! He was that silver-haired athlete whose strange abilities had scared the shit out of them. Now I’m going to tell you how Stormy became that man.
First chapter in the Stormy Foster saga
Then be sure to read
Third chapter in the Stormy Foster saga
Concept by HAMPTON JACOBS
and PATTY BALL
Art by STUFFED ANIMAL
Costumes by HENRIETTA la del BARRIO
Project Assistance by RODERICK MACK
and DAVE PEARSON
Text by HAMPTON JACOBS
