EPISODE 7 | Simulation = Memory + Emotion

A Vegas Sound Walk with Vi Khi Nao

[Ominous, droning music rises in the background]

VI KHI NAO: I am beginning the walk at 11 am. The intense heat of the afternoon light has not become unbearable yet. 

I must put on a hat, like a sombrero to protect my face and my gloves to protect my hands. I don’t even leave my ankle exposed. 

[Sound of a person walking and cars passing joins the music]

Now, I’m out the door and I see cars whipping by. 

I am passing the casino inside of the grocery store to my right. This casino is always so dark. I don’t know why anyone would want to lose their money or win any money here. 

I walk because I want to forget my body.

The heat can change the garment of everything, including the garment of loneliness. 

Even if the desert is full of desolation, do you think the heat makes it less lonely? Do you think a very hot day can be an antidote to loneliness? Or is it the opposite?

[Ominous music swells into the sound of coins being put into a slot machine]

~

I’m walking at night now, and the air feels quiet. 

[The sound of wind and footsteps is heard in the background]

I walk away from the apartment in my flip flops. 

The scorching heat of the day is no longer. I can feel the air between my toes, and they are free to indulge in the Vegas atmosphere. 

I am waiting now. The light turns green. I make eye contact with the driver in the car in front of me. 

[Vi counting in Vietnamese over ominous music in the background]

I see my shadow projected on the pavement by their headlights. 

I hear the beating heartbeat of the walking street sign, like a machine becoming temporarily human.

[Droning, ethereal music swells]

I can see the glowing green sign of a Starbucks to the west, so I switch directions. The streets look emptier now, desolate. I am picking up my pace, though my flip flops are holding me back. 

I sit on the Starbucks patio, even though it’s closed. 

I can see Trader Joe’s. I can see the gas station. I can see Panda Express. 

Then, I can feel a few of my tears have fallen onto my cheek. I just let them fall. 

This is the desert after all.

My tears blur the view of the city. I see the microscopic lights flooding the landscape like a gathering of a million fireflies. And even with my blurred vision, I suddenly make out the Starbucks security camera.

I shift my body away from the camera, thinking, “you can’t hide in the desert wind.” This makes Vegas a terrible place to die. It is not like San Francisco where you can bury your body in water, where your soul is quietly tucked away. When you die in Sin City, your body will likely be found right away. 

[Sounds of cars passing join music]

I’m on St. Rose now, away from Starbucks, worrying that if my consciousness and my body walk too closely, I might be compelled to let my body fall into traffic, ending my life. 

Yet, despite this fear, this fear of the edge, I walk and I walk, away from the danger of that edge. I walk away from that edge which is a very short ledge. 

[Sound of someone singing a slow, karaoke-like song in Vietnamese]

Nocturnal walking is a way for me to wake up to sin city. 

[Nao’s voice echoes]

Nocturnal walking is a way for me to gamble away my energy. 

[Echoes again over the sound of a slot machine and coins]

The ghost of my diurnal self meets the ghost of my nocturnal life - two bodies, one visible and one invisible, crossing and intersecting each other - conversing silently as I walk. 

[The sound of footsteps is heard over the droning, ominous music] 

I walk alongside the ghost of my former diurnal self. 

I walk. 

[Music plays to fadeout]