Thursday, March 17, 2011

Tears in the rain

Graham Greene wrote that "once your passport is stamped, life won't ever be the same", exactly what a Frenchman in Uyuni said to me: "After a travel like the one you're into, you'll be happy to be at home and to see your friends but just for the first days. Then your thoughts will be quickly focused far away from home."
I start thinking they're both right.
Two days ago, in Ushuaia, I was walking up to a glacier into a misty fog and light rain. The silence was that kind of silence so loud to blow your mind, my steps the only listenable noise within kilometres. At the horizon, only foggy shades of trees painted grey. It reminded me Alaska, once more. I felt so happy and glad to be there that I wanted to cry. But then I realized that sooner or later the dream has to come to an end and will be time to go back. So I've thought of Milan and all the other big cities - modern watchtowers on human ignorance - and the people there, happy just to survive instead of living a real life. I've thought to those with no time to talk, to listen or even to smile, while ending to waste hours stucked in traffic jams. I've thought to all the contradictions and the hipocrisy of that society: the need of becoming richer and richer to buy brand new cars just to show the others as a proof of status (but revealing in reality only poor self confidence), the need of fashionable clothes to cover up the emptiness of the person inside, the need of a fast-growing career to feed a fast-growing ego and so on. It took 2000 years to build such a society. All those thoughts depressed me greatly. So, the only reasonable thing to do at that point was to celebrate the last few hours at the "world's end" with a bottle of red Argentinian wine and one black beer, in company of 3 Dutch girls and 1 Danish from the hostel, just before boarding on a 30 hours' bus to Puerto Madryn. I love Ushuaia and Tierra del Fuego.

3 comments:

  1. Eh eh amigo Lonelytraveller,

    It seems to be impossible, but most of the people looks like incredibly blind and deaf, even if your thoughts were subjects of great songs everyone sings, of famous movies everyone watches, of paintings everyone saw... maybe the rain is the tears of all those singers, artists, philosophers, who spent life shouting about what you say, and crying now to see their miserable failure.
    But don't give up, and fight for the sun!

    Listen this story: I just met an argentinian boy last week here in Milan... while talking, he told me "i am here since a week and i am surprised about how italian people drive good". I said "what?!". "Yes, cars are so perfect here, while in argentina all cars are damaged here and there". I must told hime that the story is another one. Probably people in Argentina loves first the family, the friends, their tango music, their Patagonia landscapes, wine and beer, and finallymaybe the car... in Italy things are a little more wierd right now...
    We made a big laugh about it, but just to avoid adding other tears to the rain.

    Mucha sorte!
    Elettrico

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  2. tears in the rain, reminds me of joe satriani, isn't it?
    come on man, shock us! Go west and fly to Australia! :-)
    Bookmakers will go crazy about that!

    Tonio

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  3. Elettrico: great words your ones. But it's a quite complex subject to talk about in a foreign language and in few minutes after one bus to leave and another one to get... Anyway, I have one good and one bad news for you. The good one is that everywhere around the world good people exists. But they are usually difficult to see and meet as the good people could be easily overshadowed by even just one asshole. The bad news is that people is the same all over the world. Ok, things in Milan are out of control (but think also that it's the capital of fashion and finance, could it be different?) but the situation isn't too different from New York, LA, or even Beijing and Shanghai where the newborn capitalism is making them acting even worse than us. In Argentina, cars aren't nice like in Milan just because they can't afford them. When money start to flow and people to be rich, everybody start to live in the same stupid/blind way, with no distinction of country/religion/sex. It's just a matter of level of richness and capitalism attitude, not a cultural behaviour driven by the affiliation to a country or a certain geographical area.
    Countries are only political bodies, the people inside them is all the same around the world, like same are the human needs. So, misanthropy seems to me the only reasonable solution to this quest. Join the club! ;)

    Tonio: god knows how I love Joe Satriani's music, but this time I was thinking to a quote from the movie Blade Runner: "I've seen things you people wouldn't believe. All those moments will be lost in time, like tears in rain."
    Nada Australia, amigo... "ending is near".

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