”Mi lascia in pace, per favore”: la città di Roma

Uno dei posti dove mi è toccata vivere è Roma. Quella città vecchia e bellisima. A molti piace, a me invece... Di solito la chiamo una città per turisti e politici, e dico che per il resto della gente la cosa è più complicata.

How Do You Tell the Ugly Stories?

Most of us experience a lot of things, simply being alive. Good things, bad things, meh things. We tell each other about them, or we don't, depending on whether we find it worth telling about. But sometimes, just sometimes, something really, really ugly happens. Of the sort where you may have to deal with it for the rest of your life. You might not want to tell people, but sometimes they need to know, for whichever reason is applicable. That is not something that anybody can really do anything about, except maybe by fundamentally changing how people treat each other, but I find myself wondering – when to tell? And how?

Så slap dog af, det var jo bare for sjov!

Jeg er tilbage på bloggen! Juhu! Og starter hårdt ud efter pausen (som skyldtes en arbejdsplads hvor ”vi har ytringsfrihed, men...”) med en historie, jeg hørte sidste år i toget. Der er en pointe med den, så stick with me.

En gruppe unge damer skulle på Skanderborg-festival, og sludrede løs på vejen dertil, så hele togvognen kunne overhøre, hvordan de gav hinanden tips og advarsler. Særligt det sidste: det nye fede blandt ungdommen nu til dags er åbenbart, at når man er stærkt beruset på en festival, og de unge mænd spiller øl-bowling, og der går en kvinde forbi, de synes ser pæn ud, må en af dem råbe ”tiger-mis!”, og derefter løbe efter hende, og vælte hende omkuld lige der midt i det hele, hvad enten hun synes det er sjovt eller ej. Så bare lige så I ved det, piger, hvis I ser nogen, der spiller øl-bowling, så gå langt udenom!

Run for Your Life – before you lose it

Today a little run-through of jealousy in popular culture. Or rather, in a few selected songs. Not your old-style, relatively innocent ”my stomach hurts when Bob/ette is talking to someone who's not me” jealousy, but when it veers into violence and potential death. Jumping from songs to dead people might seem like a long shot, but at least in some cases it isn't that much of a leap.

If you see a stranger on a bus...

Just another silent onlooker

Already upon entering the bus, they catch my attention. It's Saturday night, Halloween celebration day, and people are out partying. I left my party early and am taking the first night bus, it's barely 1 am. They're bent over her bag, obviously drunk, and she screams to him about finding 'it'. (Turns out she's referring to his bus-ticket.) I enter the bus, pick my seat and start looking for my mp3-player and my half-eaten snack.

They finally enter the bus, he loudly thanks the driver and informs that he's the nicest guy they met today. They discuss about which seats to pick, and she sits down and yells at him to come and sit next to her.

He addresses some other bus passengers, first in Danish, but switches to English when he realises they're foreigners. Begins complaining about her, how she talks to him. How would random bus guy react if his girlfriend gave him orders? (Bus guy would do as told.) And if she said so and so? (Still the same.) And so on, making more and more detailed questions. Someone behind me says, “you're not getting any sympathy, cut it out.” He ignores this.

Finally he sits next to her, wishing the other couple and me a good night. Shortly afterwards a friend of the foreign couple enters the bus, and they discuss exams and other everyday events. Within minutes he's back. Is he interrupting? No no.. he isn't. And he begins talking, mostly offending* her, and once in a while she offends him, too, asking him to come and sit down. She asks for cigarettes, he offends her, informs her she can't smoke inside the bus. She asks for them again, he gives in, throw them at her, saying, “you can have your fucking cigarettes.” Goes on discussing with the foreigners, exchanging life stories, trying to convince the friend to start thai boxing. The foreign couple are aware that I'm following the scene, but say nothing.