The massage parlour

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The Opera

He was fifty-two years old and had not taken care of himself for a minute in his entire life. His swollen feet caused him pain in every single step he took. His back would not leave him rest whenever he was seated. His inflamed stomach and constant heart burn were never-ending reminders of a life of excess to which he had happily surrendered all those years ago. Every single one of those three hundred steps that took him to the central gallery of the Opera brought him doubt; why was he here? This was the thirty-seventh time he had taken this path. The last time he would. The opera season was almost over, the company will leave town, likely on its way to present the show in far away countries. His daughter was unlikely to come back. Her voice will probably be discovered and soon she will be booked by a big time producer and will never look back. She will experience moderate success, marry a trumpetist from the orchestra, have two children and will never talk about her growing up. She was leaving easily, as she had nothing left in this place holding her back. By the time he took twenty steps he was sweating and his breath was completely agitated. He had learned, since his first visit, to come with extra time to climb that painful mountain, to refuse the help from the ushers and to avoid eye contact with the tourists who would not offer help but would offer plenty of pity. 

His mother died when he was sixteen, and since his father had abandoned them long time before, he was forced to live on the streets. He befriended a Romanian accordion player who reminded him of his own father. They shared the tips as they shared a shipping container down at the docks, it was a place to pass out and escape the cold winters. The Romanian musician offered to teach him how to play, but every time he skillfully refused, changing topics; he never told the musician that his father had taught him how to play and was fairly good at it. His theatrics and his way of presenting attracted people and tips, that was good enough. 

The metronome

The metronome in Lètna Park overlooks Prague from the distance. It was built in the early 90's to replace an old statue of Stalin. Since its inauguration it has been intermittently cycling in an attempt to keep an allegro, it often lies still, mocking its creator. 

December in Prague is not a particularly cheerful time of the year, it is not terribly cold but the temperature manages to stay constantly around zero degrees, which in combination with the scattered snow and the gloom of rain clouds makes the overall feeling of the city, well, gloomy. To overcompensate, I think, big Christmas Markets are set up, not only on the main square, but all around the city; full of cheap figurines, hipster crafts, spiced wine and sausages, these markets were meant to provide people refuge from the gloom, but ended up turning into yet another tourist attraction. 

Prague is home to the second largest community of Vietnamese people outside of Vietnam, right next to San José California, they learn the language, they adjust to the country just fine but end up making very tight communities. It is now, not uncommon to see second or third generation Vietnamese speaking, what sounds to me, perfect Czech. All of them seem to converge once in a while in Sapa or 'Little Hanoi' a wet market that feels taken straight out of Hanoi (except for the cold), Sapa was founded by Vietnamese immigrants and it now stands proudly at the outskirts of the city; a place of refuge for those who know where to find it. People gather here to do their shopping, pray at the Budhhist Temple or eat some Phò, which ironically feels more fitted to be eaten in cold weather than in the tropical heat where it was brought to existence. 

His name was Dùc, Vietnamese father and Czech mother, his parents died when he was a kid, and the community refused to take him in (unsure if it was because of his Czech mother or his dick father), thus grew up in foster care and in the streets, he never really learnt Vietnamese, he grew up resenting his own people and the only real connection to them he has kept is Phò. 

A turist.

He had commissioned his assistant with the task of finding him a house in an exotic country where he could retreat for a year and have some "adventures". Ever since he was a kid, he had dreamed about escaping his dull life as the son of an overprotective and rich mother, who had never in her life left the comfort of her mansion in East Boston other than for the "bare minimums" that is; shopping and attending balls.

Finding the house was not an easy task, even though he was not as picky as his unbearable mother, he had grown accustomed to certain commodities and was used to splurge grandly every now and then.

Morocco was the chosen destination, it was friendly enough with foreigners while still giving the illusion of exoticness, and the very nature of the houses and their innate secretiveness provided a perfect environment to conceal him when he didn't want to be bothered or just wanted to be, let's put it this way, eccentric.

The house was located in the heart of the Medina, a difficult place to reach in the middle of a  maze of streets. A four story home built around a ten by ten patio, all decorated with Moroccan tiles in white and blue. The ground floor had a big lounge room perfect for an afternoon tea. Each floor had two mirroring rooms, each decorated in the traditional Moroccan style but with a different color scheme. It was perfect to receive his friends and party hard, friends who, giving one excuse or another, never showed up.

The roof-top-terrace had a grill and an amazing view of the Medina and the near-by mosque from up high, t was possible to hear the hypnotic prayers emanating from it five times a day.

Even though she tried, her mother could not stop him from going, so, instead she had handpicked four servants to have him watched 24/7. He was never to be left alone, never to walk by himself in that ocean of filth (as she kindly referred to the place).

The dead body

He laid back on his bed and left his head hanging off the edge; making the world upside down. He looked up (or was it down?) and to his surprise, he saw a dead body hanging outside his window, one floor up. The body moved harmoniously with the wind, and oddly enough, at the same rhythm as the first few notes of Hotel California being played on a piano over and over again by his neighbour. 

The body looked young, a man, roughly thirty, clean and well dressed. He wondered what would drive a man that looked this good to end his own life in such a crude way.

"Had it even been suicide?" he thought to himself."Let us consider the possibilities."

And what interesting possibilities had gone through his mind; homicide was, of course, the first. He probably had problems with a drug dealer who had come to settle down a debt. Or perhaps it had been an involuntary homicide; a fight that went wrong. A crime of passion should never be out of mind, he was probably cheating and was cut in the act. Later to be thrown out the window.

"What is his name?" he thought to himself." He looks like a Carlos."

The Market

It had been a couple of months now since insomnia had taken over his life (again), and as usual he hopelessly spent the first week rolling around the bed in hopes of defeating insomnia and catching some rest. It didn't work.

One hot humid night while he was lost in his thoughts and the cigarette smoke, he saw some bright lights across the river lighting up in sequence from left to right, turning that gloomy building into a bright spot. 

"What the fuck could that be?" he thought to himself. 

He lived in a very quiet neighbourhood, everything was closed after ten and by midnight you would never see a soul outside. It was now 2:30 in the morning and he felt intrigued, what could that be? This thought was quickly lost while his mind drifted away following the spirals of smoke emerging from his cigarette. He stayed like this until the sun started to rise, the warmth on his face brought him back from this trance. It was then when he felt the strike of hunger; he walked to the fridge only to find it empty.

Several nights he spent in the same manner, same ritual, same thoughts. On the seventh night the lights turned right on schedule and a weird red light shone in the very center, it seemed to be directed at him.

"Weird," he thought to himself while sipping the last of his green tea.
"I should get another one"

He took his orange bicycle down the elevator, briefly glancing at his reflection in the elevator mirror.

"I should get some sleep," he thought to himself when noticing the dark eye-bags that probably had been on his face for weeks.

Our Legacy

And suddenly it was time to leave again, this was pretty much routine for him, after moving so many times he knew what he had to do and was very efficient at it.

He sat down in the middle of the empty flat in between his two half packed suitcases and contemplated his routine:

- Pack
- Taxi
- Check-in
- Flirt with clerk
- Security
- Waiting
- Boarding
- Take off
- One or two single serving plastic meals
- One or two beers
- Sleep
- Land
- Wake up
- Passport Control
- New place
- New people
- New food
- New friend
- Rinse and repeat

For a minute there, he thought he was an emotionless bastard that didn't mind moving and leaving people and places behind. But the truth was, that in fact, after all this time he had learnt that it was not because he didn't give a fuck but because he knew for a fact that their paths will eventually cross, it is just a matter of time. And that we are never truly apart, we choose to have relationships with people that share our vision of life and sometimes our paths, we are doing, in parallel, very similar things and that keeps us united.

He took a deep breath and continued packing with a smile on his face, knowing that he was taking a bit of his friends and leaving a bit of himself in  them, and this very exchange is, for a lack of a better word, our legacy.