What I Learned At Wanking Masterclass
By Jesse Paschal
For years I’ve wondered, “am I good at giving hand?”
That’s right: hand. Not head, not bareback-chem-sex, not menage a trois; just… Hand.
From my experience (social and otherwise), I’ve come to the conclusion that people worry most about the things they can’t control, like: “Will he laugh at my tiny pin dick?”; “How the fuck did the amyl literally burn the skin off my nose?” and, “What am I going to do now that my Grindr profile got posted on a name-and-shame website because some racist asshole stole my identity and started sending abusive messages through my account?”
I try not to worry about those things. I just worry about giving hand-jobs. When circumstances call for an intimate moment between my fingers and a foreign object, I find the up-and-down technique tires around the ten second mark and by then I’ve run out of ideas. Look, I’ll admit that there’s appeal in being a cum-guzzling deepthroat whore, but my gender theory 101 idol Judith Butler taught me to be vigilant about the inherently melancholic nature of subscribing to labels. So, I want to be good at giving hand, too. As my paranoid Jewish mother used to say, your hands can’t catch chlamydia. So use them.
When Heaps Gay offered me the chance to attend a ‘Wank Bank Masterclass’ last week, suffice to say I was beyond grateful for the opportunity to learn all about the art of phallic massage. And that’s coming/cumming from someone who attended the very same workshop only a month prior.
Practice makes perfect, thus I marched with pride into The Newtown Social Club on Wednesday eve ready to give second-base with a carrot one more shot.
Yep, a carrot. Adam Seymour – AKA Rural Ranga, creator and guru of the Wank Bank Masterclass – lends carrots to his pupils on which they may practice their newfound hand acrobatics. Specifically long, bulbous carrots that I admittedly couldn’t resist munching on (frustratingly, no nudity is involved in these sessions).
Adam’s mastabatory journey began when he was a starving artist juggling jobs at Aesop and MOMA in New York City. To make cash on the side, he adopted the persona ‘Ned Jackaroo’ and began giving happy endings to down-under-loving massage clients using the testers he acquired from work. His first incarnation of ‘Wank Bank’ was a series of drawn portraits depicting the various recipients of this service. From there, Adam developed his infamous Masterclass.
In contrast to the session I’d attended previously in the delightfully dingy basement at Freda’s Bar (with its semblance to a twinky Ukranian porn set), the second Wank Bank Masterclass was far more stylised; a little less ‘inner west is best’ and a bit more ‘Darlinghurst darling.’ I arrived early to find the function room at Newtown Social lined meticulously with shiny black chairs upon which sat small tote bags emblazoned with ‘Wank Bank’ in bold yellow type. This layout was delineated against a dark curtain by the kind of gigantion steel floor lamp you’d find in a Potts Point penthouse. And there was Adam, not one hair in his fiery beard out of place, greeting guests with the charm and charisma he possesses in abundance. *Swoon*
Like last time, the audience was mostly comprised of straight women. I suppose in a world that doesn’t talk too openly about men as objects of desire, a beautiful opportunity opens up for queers and straights to engage in dialogue on hand-ling our partners’ members. Adam began by providing context on how he came to develop his tantalising Taoist-inspired techniques. He then accepted his first volunteer to perch on the massage table at the room’s fore, a carrot wedged between her thighs to act as makeshift big boner. There is something surreal about watching a cis-woman lay on her back and get jerked off by a gay guy. Heck, I thought it was hot. Us audience members were able to follow the techniques on the laminated Wank Bank spreadsheet, which thankfully can be spray n’ wiped.
This ‘how to’ guide features a key system that notes to take care with cut or uncut cocks depending on the technique being used, as well warns of certain approaches causing, erm, unexpected ejaculation.
Adam suggests starting with ‘Spider’, whereby one walks their thumbs down a partner’s thigh up to the base of their penis in order to stimulate blood flow. The most intriguing categories were probably ‘Rock Around the Clock’ – moving the penis in a circular motion from the bellybutton down towards the balls – and ‘Cock Cradling’ – the act of rubbing one’s palm against the underside of a dick, which rests against your other hand parallel to their belly. I’m not going to lie, I roughly attempted a ‘round the clock’ on some poor soul in recent memory. It was awkward. I took better notes this time.
The most exciting part of the workshop came (figuratively) when we were paired up with other audience members to practice our learnings. I was matched with the lovely woman sitting to my right, who’d attended the workshop with nine colleagues from the hospital where she practices as a nurse. Between letting it slip that her boyfriend’s member didn’t compare to the carrot in hand, her excitement at discovering silicone-based lubricant and the faux-hand job I received for twenty minutes, I’d say we had a lot of fun together.
Admittedly I’ve had a number of questionable dreams about the opposite sex since our encounter.
Once my new friend departed to drink despite her looming 7 am shift, I left with a smile with on my face: ready to take on the big boys of this bad world.