Romi From Romania

There is a sandwich chain in London known as Eat. and it competes with McDonalds for the number of outlets in one area. In one branch near Liverpool Street Station works a young woman, Romi, whose favourite sandwich to restock is the Chicken Salad. She considers it the most aesthetically pleasing and wonders what it would be like if she could afford a fresh one.

Romi is from Romania and she would like to let everyone know that she knows all the jokes that can be made in relation to her name and the name of her country. In fact, Romi has often considered climbing to the top of the Gherkin with a megaphone to let everyone know. While she is up there, Romi would also let everyone know that Eat. sells soup, pies and salads in addition to sandwiches.

Romi arrived to London from Romania two years ago and would be happy to anyone that she is quite proud of the position at Eat. even though it is lowly paid. Romi would say that she is happy because she gets to meet so many well-dressed English people. Romi won’t talk about it but she was disappointed when she noticed that the customers are predominately white. For her first week working there, before she knew better about London, she wondered where all the people in her neighbourhood got their sandwiches.

To keep her day interesting, Romi gives small discounts to customers that she perceives as cute and handsome. Romi hopes that when they look at the change they will notice this discount and then they would notice Romi. At night, in bed, Romi does wish that they would notice her without the discount but she does admit that so many of them seem to be in a hurry and making someone on the other end of their phone hurry.

When Romi isn’t working, which she wouldn't like to admit is very little time, she browses Romanian websites and updates her Romanian blog at her local internet café which is operated by a Hungarian man. The Hungarian man gives her internet for free as he is aware of her minimum wage. Due partly to this, Romi is proud to tell people that Romania borders with Hungary. It is also because she thinks it will give people a better spatial sense.

The money Romi saves from free internet and by eating stale bread, she saves at the bank, although Romi has become slightly scared by banks in the last months. Romi won’t admit this fear to anyone but she suspects many others have the same fear. Nevertheless, Romi enjoys her savings, she hopes to have enough to go back and visit Bucharest sometime. Romi would make sure people know Bucharest is in Romania.

The Man in the Museum Quartier

There is a man in Vienna, Austria who goes to the Museum Quartier with a broad grin. He wears a blue sweat shirt and carries a gym bag as he greets other people who happen to also be at the Quartier, mostly art enthusiasts. He greets newly walking toddlers by running over and patting them on their head before moving onto their mothers. His main goal would appear to be to make people smile.

He has one tactic that he considers his favourite when it comes to making women in the Quartier smile. He will begin by pointing across the square in the middle of the museums and tell his target woman or women that he is going to give them a show. The target audience may not notice but that will not stop him dropping him gym bag and removing his sweat shirt.

The man now only in a white singlet reveals that he does spend a bit of time in the gym and this important to the tactic to make a woman smile. The man now begins to flex, turning it into a dance with a full 360 rotation. Satisfied that he has satisfied, the man pulls his sweatshirt back on, gestures for the women to smile widely, picks up his gym bag and continues through the Quartier.

The display made several things clear. The man has nowhere else to be in the middle of a Thursday. The man has no special woman for whom he performs. The man spends his time outside the Quartier mostly at the gym.

I’m not sure if he performs elsewhere.

Luisa

Luisa always wanted to be good at what she does. And why shouldn’t she be good at what she does, Luisa often thought. Luisa didn’t care for those things in life that people who live a bit slower get to enjoy, they weren’t for her. She was proud to say that fashion was in her blood, after all she was Italian. To go even further, despite her Southern name, she was from Milan; a city one could argue is the fashion capital of the world.

Luisa took on the position of assistant to fashion designer at one of London’s top fashion chains, Top Shop. Luisa would have much preferred assistant fashion designer and this is how she would introduce herself to people that would never find out that it was actually assistant to fashion designer. The job involved Luisa attending clothes markets, such as the ones held near Brick Lane, and taking photos of the best outfits that she could spot. She even thought fashion researcher might be a better title.

Luisa would identify people at the market by the clothes that they wore. Luisa spoke to a pink t-shirt in men sizes at one market concerning the colours typically assigned to a gender. Luisa laughed at a joke concerning the market crowds made by wool beanie on another day. Once as Luisa went over the photos, she struggled to remember the names and faces that belonged to the pictured clothe items but soon gave up and dismissed the thought, it was after all, fashion that she had in her blood.

Luisa wasn’t expecting for things to change when they suddenly did and she was caught unprepared. From across the market she noticed a black leather jacket on broad shoulders. Luisa wondered where the broad shoulders had come from and tried to correct herself to only notice the leather jacket. Moments passed until Luisa again noticed a black leather jacket on broad shoulders with a handsome face, perhaps even handsome and friendly.

Luisa thought about other things such as buttons and stitching and when the leather jacket came nearby, she asked if she could take a photo in her usual politie manner. Proud that it was now only a leather jacket, Luisa snapped away happily, sure that the fashion designer she assisted to would be pleased with her.

Luisa returned to the lab and developed the photos, forgetting about all the things that people that live slower enjoy. As the photographs started to show, Luisa came to the realization that all the photos of the leather jacket we’re instead of a handsome and friendly face. And she remembered that the face’s name was Alan.

The Bum Foot

Franc came hobbling out of the hills of Budapest to where a group from his hostel waited by the Danube. Franc murmured something to members of the group but it was inaudible due to the sounds of fireworks on Hungary’s national holiday. To some members, Franc’s bandaged foot looked even more twisted then it had when they first met him the day before. At the time, Franc explained his bandaged foot was due to a large and possibly obese Hungarian falling on his leg at a concert.

Earlier on the Hungarian national holiday, roads had started to close all around Franc and he didn’t know Budapest well enough to avoid what was effectively entrapment. Franc would begin down one road that appeared accommodating only to quickly find a mostly meat-eating Hungarian police officer turning him back. Franc would briefly consider the pub before trying another road.

The road closures reminded Franc of Sydney when either George Bush or the Pope visited the city. Franc often had voiced the opinion that it can’t be easy to know that you need that much security to avoid being killed. Neither was in Budapest though, instead the fuss Franc found pitted against him was specifically for the firework display occurring later that evening.

Franc later told people that under other circumstance, he would have gone to that pub, sat down with a pint and would have enjoyed the chaotic mixture of closed bridges and dangerously excited eastern Europeans. However the circumstances he found himself in saw a pretty girl from the hostel waiting for Franc. She was waiting on the other side of the closed Buda Hill, a hill preparing for a very pivotal performance in the firework exercise.

The protein-charged police officers did suggest for Franc to walk around the hill but Franc is much more tenacious than that. Besides, Franc later told people, the ninety minute walk around the hill would make him thirty minutes late for the date. Consequently, once out of sight of the police, Franc began to scale a steep, unguarded grassy incline up the hill on his bum foot.

As Franc pulled himself to the very top of the incline, he found himself being photographed by two French girls who giggled upon sight of his clumsiness. Franc soon discovered that the pair thought they had best vantage point for the fireworks. They went onto to try to convince Franc to stay with them by cutely dropping French words in their English sentences. Franc giggled in response to this charm.

Franc later told us that he looked back at Budapest, a beautiful Hungarian in its own write, and thought ‘Why not?’ He figured that there would be nothing wrong with sipping on French wine on the side of the hill as thousands of Hungarians bustled below. Franc decided to sit down for a rest at least and practiced his French on the girls.

“Comment vous appelez-vous?”, asked Franc.

“What?”, replied the French girls.

Franc went on to mutter ‘Baguette’ at them and promised that his French would get better. The French girls smiled at Franc and Franc smiled in response to the charm of a French girl’s smile. The sun started to set and Franc started to consider how lonely the pretty girl from the hostel would be during the romantic fireworks. Franc looked to the French girls and said ‘Au revoir’ before standing on his bum foot and starting along another path.

Franc soon found up himself on a residential road filled with homes that overlooked the city and we’re clearly designed for the wealthy. As he hobbled, Franc considered the wine that most flow amongst friends that were celebrating the nation inside these houses. With this thought, Franc wandered a little up the street and then a little way back, unsure of which direction to head.

Soon a local man appeared on the road carrying a glass of the red wine that Franc had thought so much of before. The local man stopped Franc and quickly pointed to a Mercedes that he owned. Franc smiled at the Mercedes before explaining to the local man that he was lost and in a hurry. Franc hoped that the local man would offer him a ride down the hill in his Mercedes.

The local man did not offer Franc a ride in the Mercedes, but he did offer a sip of the wine to warm Franc’s Hungarian spirit. Franc took the sip and thought it quite pleasant; he started to explain to the local man about the pretty girl from the hostel. The local man was quite sympathetic and offered Franc a glass of wine.

Franc, glass in hand, was pointed in the right direction and he started his descent down Buda Hill. As Franc went down, he soon found a small lump to stand on to get his bearings. Franc’s footing quickly became uncertain however and he fell. Later Franc was proud to say he didn’t spill a drop of wine but he did hear a snap and pain from that same injured ankle shot through his body.

Franc hobbled to a stone and sat down as he tried to come to terms with the intense pain. Once he had, Franc wiggled his toes to make sure it wasn’t broken and he found he was successful. Still, Franc was depressed. Time was running out and he didn’t think he could walk and he had no phone to send a message. Franc was stuck

Franc looked down at the glass of wine he carried, thinking to himself that if had spilled some, surely it would have been a gulp. So Franc took a gulp. And Franc stood up and started walking down, promising to himself that the rest of the wine would be for her.

Franc came hobbling out of the hills of Budapest and spotted a group from his hostel waiting by the Danube. The fireworks started and the group could barely hear what Franc was muttering them as he looked for the pretty girl. The fireworks finally died down and the streets of Budapest were dark when one backpacker told Franc that the pretty girl had left for Bucharest this very evening.

The Man on the Bus

The man nearing his late 20s boarded the night bus to the east somewhere around Liverpool Station, thinking about something he didn’t want to think about. The man navigated the crowded bus as it started to pull away from the curb and his footing became less certain. The man sat down next to a sleeping man and opposite a younger man, almost a boy.

The sleeping man wore a jumper ingrained with dirt, in his hands he nursed an empty soft drink from and a melting chocolate bar; his body produced a strange odor. The man-boy opposite held a book that he refused to read and looked around happily. The man thought this wasn’t where he wanted to be at all and decided to keep his wits about him.

The bus bounced and the sleeping man woke up with a start, looking across at the man-boy. The previously sleeping man asked the man-boy for 50 pence, the man-boy said no with the same smile on his face. The previously sleeping man turned and asked the man for 50 pence, the man answered in the negative.

The bus came to a stop and the passenger behind this group of three stood and left. The man sprang to his feet, desperate for a chance to have two seats to himself. Before he could get in though, a man from the back row with similar aspirations slipped in and sat down. The man withheld his anger and sat down next to the man from the back row. The journey continued.

As the bus got further east, more and more passengers vacated the bus. At least another pair of seats became vacant and the man sprang to his feet. Before another passenger who also enjoys his space could slip in the man reached the seats, sitting down next to the window. The man decided that one particular thought was genius and he placed his backpack on the other seat to discourage other passengers from joining him.

The man was finally happy to have adequate space. He even allowed himself to smile for the moment in the knowledge that no one else was near him. The smile wasn’t to last though as the doors opened at the next stop and a young woman boarded the bus. Her hair was brown, her build slim, and freckles on her arms along with a vaccination scar.

Upon seeing her, the man immediately removed his backpack from the seat next to him in an offer to this new passenger. The young woman didn’t even notice and stood in the aisle holding the bar above her head. The man glanced at the vacant seat next to him, wondering how he could possibly get the girl to sit down. The man figured that for the conversation to begin, and certainly lead to romance, he needed her to take this seat.

The man patted the empty seat suggestively, hoping to capture her attention with the sound of his patting. The sound did not reach her ears however as she had white earphones blocking the way. The man attempted another tactic loudly offering the seat to anyone who needed it, but the young woman had volume on loud enough to surely damage her hearing.

After several minutes of desperation, the man’s hope was rekindled when the young woman glanced and noticed the spare seat. The young woman smiled at the man and pressed the button for the bus to stop. The doors opened and the young woman disappeared into the night. The man slowly placed his backpack onto the spare seat.