The Ubiquitous man

I’m no God but I can be everywhere at the same time, it's easy, let’s try.  So, right now I’m landing at Meskel square, in Addis Ababa and then I’m at Bygdøy or Bygdø, Oslo, a península where parts of the movie Lords of Chaos were shot. And then I’m in Dallas, Texas, Little Mexico district and afterwards I'm on the other side of the sea, in Vientiane, Laos, at a night market by the Mekong river. So, coming back to Africa, I’m now arriving in Agadez, capital of Aïr, north Niger, one of the traditional Tuareg–Berber federations. And I´m in London, at the Hobo Hilton, a huge squat, once the British Telecom headquarters. And right after I’m in Beirut, Rue Gouraud, in the Gemmayzeh neighborhood. And at the same time I’m in Seattle, inside a taxi, going along Sand Point Way, a main road that crosses the northeast part of the city. And then I’m in Santiago de Compostela, a peregrination city in Galicia, northwest Spain. Afterwards I’m getting out of Tijuana's airport, a city with one of the bigger homicide rates in the word, they say, and now I sit on the burning stairs of Syntagma square, in Athens. And in the follow-up I’m on the roof of a not so tall building in El Cerro, a poor neighborhood in central Havana, Cuba. And at the same time I’m in Kampala, Uganda, by the lake Victoria, which is said to be one of the sources of the Nile river. And soon after I’m in Srinagar, burying myself in the slime of Dal lake. And then I’m in Vancouver city center, more precisely in the Burrard neighborhood... Berlin now, at the Metropol Hostel in Mehringdamm, eating crisps, and then I’m in Tanger, at the Grand Socco, and at the same time I’m in Miami, at the Jackson Behavioral Health Hospital, and then I’m in Bangkok, Kao-San, an area with many farangs and at the same time I’m in South Africa, more precisely at False Bay, Cape Town. And then I’m at Malika beach, Dakar. And in the meanwhile I’m going up and down the Ramblas, walking streets of Barcelona city center. And as it goes up and down I reach the Phewa Lake in Pokhara, Nepal. And soon after I’m at a flea market in Praça da Sé, São Paulo, Brazil. And at the same time I’m in Unalaska, a remote city on the Aleutian Peninsula of Alaska.  And I’m in Dubai, not so far from the Burj Khalifa, the world's tallest building, they say. And then I’m in Caracas, Venezuela, talking about the missing eggs. And right after I’m in Gjakova, a city on the border between Kosovo and Albania. And soon after I’m in Napoli, Italy, going up some narrow street with Pinerno columns, a kind of black and white marble. And then I’m in Zanzibar, off the Tanzanian coast, east Africa. Afterwards I’m in Zamalek, El Cairo, a man-made island on the Nile river. And at the same time I’m in Shanghai, up in a very tall building in the Putuo area. And right after, I’m getting lost in Beverly Hills, Los Angeles. Then I’m going down Jalan Malioboro, in Yogyakarta, Indonesia. And now, I’m inside a coffee-shop in central Amsterdam, getting stoned. Afterwards I’m in Oporto, at Ribeira, eating lupins. And as the devil rubs one eye I’m in Baghdad at Firdos square, the square from where the Saddam Hussein statue was toppled, years ago. And so, then, at the same time, I’m in Hanoi, Vietnam, on a small island under the Long Bien bridge. And soon I’m landing in Bogotá, the third-highest capital in South America after Quito and La Paz. And then I’m in Kinshasa, formerly Léopoldville, the capital of the Democratic Republic of the Congo. And, as it goes, it’s night and I’m going up the infamous stairs of the Sacre-Cœur cathedral in Paris. And then, I’m landing in Harare, formerly known as Salisbury, the capital and largest city of Zimbabwe. And now, I’m up north, in St Petersburg, Russia, and at the same time I’m in Istanbul, sailing across the Marmara sea and just after I’m on the other side of the world, at Retiro, a poor neighborhood in Buenos Aires, Argentina. So, back to Meskel square, at Addis Ababa, a site for public gatherings and demonstrations, like the Meskel Festival, a Christian holiday in the Ethiopian Orthodox and Eritrean Orthodox churches that commemorates the discovery of the True Cross by the Roman Empress Helena (Saint Helena) in the fourth century. Then in Oslo again, at the Bygdøy or Bygdø peninsula, where is the Gol Stave Church, a church that, in the nightie, suffered an arson attempt by black metal fans of bands like Mayhem, Burzum, Darkthrone, Immortal etc. Dallas now, back to the Little Mexico neighborhood. I’m here at some rock n’ roll bar, drinking beer with big Tony, listening to rockabilly classic like Ace Andres / Hasil Adkins / Amazing Royal Crown / Smokey Joe Baugh / Tommy Blake / Eddie Bond / Bonnie Lou / Crazy Cavan and the Rhythm Rockers / Cigar Store Indians / The Everly Brothers /  Rosie Flores / Dale Hawkins Chris Isaak / Heavy Trash / Jackslacks / Buddy Knox / Brenda Lee / Roy Orbison etc. And so, as I get out of the airport in Tijuana, I quickly spot the fence with the United States, two fences actually, around ten meters high each one, one on the Mexico side and other on the gringo’s side, taller, and a big space between the two, some jeeps patrolling and surveillance cameras on the top of huge poles. Thus, as I advance along the road on the side of these fences, I can say that, there aren't almost no cars passing by at this time, just some dusty vans and from time to time and now, a big and robust school bus comes by, inside there no kids but rednecks with big hats on their heads, faces dozing against the windows. Then, after some time walking by these fences, a patrol car on the other gringo's side is already following me, and this is, I guess, because, some meters before I have touched the fence, say, I got to that point that I really felt the need to test it to make sure if it was electrified or not. But, it was a short chase, after some minutes they stopped and got out of the car… not following me any more. And I think to myself, why should they bother, if they have all the equipment, they can track me through the surveillance cameras, satellite, etc. So, I keep walking, and let’s say, as it goes, from ten to ten minutes I would cross with another fellow coming in opposite direction, usually someone carrying a small backpack on his back and walking fast, not looking to the sides, but, on the exact moment we would pass by each other, this fellow would move up his head, do a kind of salute, and me answering the same form, then we would keep our march, no talking. Now, back at the night market by the Mekong river, in Vientiane, Laos. On the other side of this river is actually Thailand, so, from here, we can catch sight of its lights, but let’s rather concentrate on this place, now moving along the Chao Anouvong market, watching what is on display at the stalls. An array of buddhist-inspired paintings and chinese made knickknacks. Sunglasses and slippers of all types and shapes. Beer Lao T-shirts. Fisherman pants and one-size-fits-all dresses and skirts, all very colorful, and clean, a thing made for the tourists, but here there aren’t many actually, coz Laos isn’t as touristic as is its neighbor country, Thailand. Even so, many locals passing by, to and fro, a great bustle, but everything calm at the same time. Then, on the main road, the food stalls. People seated in small plastic benches around low tables and between them and the stalls, metal buckets turned into stoves with scorched grills at the top. About the roasts, meatballs (pork, duck or fish), that are then dipped in various kinds of sauces, and served with sticky rice with peanuts, stir-fried vegetables, papaya salads with soya milk and roasted bananas with various sour toppings. And so, I try some of these things and then someone takes me to see the buddhist temples, the wats, that are close by. Back to Agadez, a major transit town for West African migrants heading to Libya and then further on to Europe, since Agadez is the final stop before passing through the long trek across the Sahara desert. And then in London, at the upper floors of the Hobo Hilton squat, people have tents installed in the big living rooms, and others made their nests inside offices with glass tables and swivel chairs piled in a corner. Now Beirut, crossing the Gemmayzeh neighborhood, going up the Saint-Nicolas stairs, taking a look at some graffities, including a heart being trespassed by eighteen huge bullets, each of these bullets representing one of the eighteen recognized religious sects of Lebanon. Now Seattle, going along the Laurelhurst neighborhood, the taxi driver tells me that this neighborhood, “has had several famous residents, including Melanie Griffith and Antonio Banderas, who rented a house on the waterfront one summer while filming a movie; musician Duff McKagan, bassist for Guns N' Roses and Gates, William Henry Gates II also lives here”. And so, surprised, I ask “So, there are two Bill Gates?”; “There are actually four or five… not to miss the oldman Gates I, a furniture store owner, born in Bremerton, Kitsap County, son of William Henry Gates and Rebecca Eppinhauser. He married Lillian Elizabeth Rice, a black woman, a diplomat, a political scientist, a civil servant, teacher, and the current director of the Hoover Institution at Stanford University… She was the first female African-American secretary of state and the first woman to serve as National Security Advisor…”  And then, back to the old continent, I'm in Santiago de Compostela under a porch playing the concertina with a pot on my front. Mid afternoon now, clusters of people are passing by, groping through the haze, babbling around the ultra-religious pillars, stairs up stairs down while the bells from the adjacent cathedrals clatter, and I just keep opening and closing the bellows, pressing the wrong buttons, messing with the sense of time. And so, the weather is darkening now, and clearing up in an instant… thick sunbeams cross the portals, bringing revelations, pearls for pigs… all these people that keep passing by on my front, appalled and wacky. Then I feel loose, I lose control, so I go off to have a piss at the nearby garden. So, back to Athens, syntagma square, the Hellenic parliament on my back, a huge pink building that I have nothing to talk about. And so, at this time there aren’t many people crossing the square. This is, it's really hot and quiet, so you can feel the boredom hovering, like in many other squares of Athens at this time of the day. Say, these heavy stones should melt, but no, a failed promise from the sun. Thus, there is a metro exit on my side and I face the people now getting in and out of the station entrance, not many, and I face their expressions that surprisingly, don't look so bored, actually, they express some equilibrium, and are dressing casual, not pretenders, judging by the looks. So, from where is this feeling of boredom coming after all? I think to myself. Perhaps from the openness of the place itself, or the lack of enthusiasm shown by some of the people moving through the surrounding gardens… plus the heaviness of the walls containing the square, who knows… more this sun, full of empty promises… therefore, I have no problems about sprawling my loneliness here, like a viscous, pouring from this imposing staircase in front of the parliament, and spreading through the veins of the marble floor down there, blazing veins debouching around the neoclassic fountain installed in the middle of the square, from where yellowish water is being projected, from time to time, randomly. And by the side of this same fountain, an old bearded man hangs around, sometimes murmuring, or emitting a kind of speech more like a cry. And he carries a stick with him, a stick with some plastic bottles and other sorts of plastic packages attached to it, holding this same stick over his shoulders, or waving it around, and a kind of flag is hanging from the tip of it, a flag where you can read the word “cancer” written with big letters, and other shorter letters from the Greek alphabet. Thus, some tourists are approaching the fountain from time to time, but when they see the man, they stand back and leave the place. But the locals passing by his side, they do not look shocked at all, they just pass by informally, some even smile at the man, and make some comments. Therefore now, I’m back in Havana, still on the roof of a not so tall building in El Cerro, a poor neighborhood that once was, by the end of the 19th century, home to palaces and sumptuous villas now fallen into a certain decay. And so, the facades of the buildings that I can see from here, have faded paintings; and a labyrinth of black cracks crossing the dry frontages and potholed sidewalks. Whatsoever this is the neighborhood that holds the key, they say. "El Cerro tiene la llave" is a recurring statement around here. A phrase linked to the fact that the water source for the city and the headquarters of the aqueduct that still exists are located in this territory. The entrance channel of “La Zanja Real” is located around here, in this neighborhood, and that was the first aqueduct in Havana that brought water to the city by gravity from the founding of the city until the 19th century, aqueduct already deactivated, being nowadays just a huge pipe covered with moss. Then I’m in Kampala, Uganda, with two other guys, the founders of the Nyege Nyege collective, an experimental music label and concert promoters, they are Arlen Dilsizian and Derek Debru, this is, Debru was born in Burundi but grew up in Belgium and moved later to Uganda to teach at the Kampala Film School. Dilsizian is Greco-Armenian and studied ethnomusicology in Europe before relocating to Kampala, circa two thousand ten. The name Nyege Nyege, they tell me, refers to a Luganda word describing "a sudden, uncontrollable urge to dance. And now here we go, already on the way to Jinja, where the festival will occur, at an abandoned riverfront resort, they say. Then I’m in Srinagar again.  Back to Dal Lake. Just got rescued from a swamp area by the lake side by a boatman mounting what they call here a shikara, a kind of canoe with a small shed in the middle, somehow like the Venetian gondolas. The man’s name is Rahul, and as I get aboard, straight away he throws a big mantle over my back, and also suggest me to undress the wet clothes and clean myself, this is, to remove the mud from my body, what I do instantly, and so, this mantle he gave me is what they call here a pheren, a sort of gown that can cover all my body from neck to ankles… and so, I’m feeling better now, and I thank him for the assistance… but he doesn't take it very seriously, he just says like “I’m only doing my duty”, and then, finally, he decides to ask me what was I, afteralls, doing there, in the middle of that swamp, “Looking for Eels,” I say. And he scoffs, looking me in the eyes, while making the canoe move by pushing a long stick into the water, a stick which apparently would touch the bottom of the lake and generate a propulsion force. And as he does this, he says that “there are no more eels in here… they catched them all during the bad times”. “Hum” I say, and then he asks me from where am I from, and “Africa” I say, to what he reply “I thought african people are black, “not all”, I say, and then, still rowing, he asks me what am I supposed to be doing in Srinagar after all, and I make silence, but he don't insist, actually at some point he stops rowing and comes to seat on my side, in the middle of the barge, and so, here we go, floating, slowly approaching the opposite bank of the lake where there are some water houses, or cottages, that is, elevated houses supported by thick stilts raised from the bottom of the lake and painted in strong colours, and it will be on the side of one of this houses that we will disembark, and then, already going up through some slippery wooden stairs we meet Eshal, seated on the balcony in front of the house, dealing with some plants, plants that I recognise, some of them were the same as the ones I got all tangled up, moments ago, in that swamp area… but, I don’t mention that, we just exchange mislaid smiles and as it goes the man is already conducting me to the main door of the house, and we go inside, into a sort of kitchen/living-room, where I meet to his son, that is seated on the main table of this room, apparently working on some drawings, and so, as me and his father approach he stands up and comes to great me in the kashmiri style, and I get to know, his name is Maumoon, and then I stare at the drawings spread over the table, and also the ruler and a set-square on the side, and I see in one of the big sheets, a sort of architectural design, straight geometric lines over another lines and in the middle of them some sort of very small abstract bodies, and, as I look at it, I ask what is this and that, and he, he tells me he will tell me about it later, once we are on the boat, and, as he says that, he stands up and begins to sort some stuff from the table, and then, said and done, off we go. So, now I’m in Vancouver city center again, Burrard. People not looking happy, not looking sad. Well behaved. Not fat. Whitish or pale, walking fast, even if they are not heading to their jobs, as I understand, they are entering shops. “Greenpeace was founded here”, someone says, pointing to the entrance of what looks to be a closed-down hairdresser. And there are many Asians around. Chinese bakeries and butchers and gift shops. And then, I remember that David Townsend, the singer from that band, Strapping Young Lad, was (or is) based in this city. Years ago I used to listen a lot to his album “Infinity”, which we can describe as a mix of progressive metal and ambient music, with some sort of operatic vocals. And so, the statistics say that this is one of the loneliest cities in the North American continent. So, now I remember, David Towsend also spent some time in some kind of mental hospital. I had read it in a music magazine. He was diagnosed with traumatic depression and bipolar disorder. But fuck that, I want to see some beach. And when I ask, they tell me the best beaches are in Vancouver Island, on the other side of the bay, or the Strait of Georgia. And I also get to know that, on its southern tip is Victoria, British Columbia’s capital, with the neo-baroque Parliament Buildings and the English-style gardens. The harbor city is Nanaimo, home of chocolate-and-custard Nanaimo bars. And I laugh at this. English-style gardens, no way. I just want to get close to the water, or a small dirty beach. So, they tell me that there are many beaches, the city is surrounded by water, and they also tell me that the closest beach is the English Bay beach. Oh English again. Gosh. So, they tell me that I just need to cross the bridge to the west side. And yes, Westside sounds better. “On the other side you have Hadden Park beach, Kitsilano beach and Jericho beach and…” well this name, Jericho, suits me. I have read a book with this name, something frenchie as I remember. So, already on my way, I pass the “666 Burrard Street” or Park Place, a sort of futuristic huge building with a pink granite facade adorned with flush-mounted copper-glazed windows that match the granite's appearance, and then I arrive at the Burrard Street Bridge, a bridge that we can cross walking, so here I go, already walking through some arcades with sculpted carvels up our heads. And on the other side is Vanier Park, and on my right side the marina, with some small yachts, and a giant Indian man made of wood, with open arms and a funny red hat. And so, now I’m arriving at Hadden Beach, a beach with more weeds than sand, but clean. A couple of guys are seated on the top of some rocks and there is a sign saying “DOG OFF-LEASH LOCATION”. I ignore it, and try to get closer to the water, but soon I get the confirmation, and see a lot of small dogs touring around, some of them coming towards me. I run away, and even have to jump some barriers. So, back to Berlin, now at an asylum called Metropol Hostel, in Mehringdamm, next to the Hallesches Tor cemetery. Breakfast is served: coffee or tea or juice of different colors and flavors and tonalities, with or without sugar; sliced white bread or yellow or dark with seeds, or no seeds, with and without crust; cheese chips of different shades; gelatinous ham; jams and peanut butter with or without vinegar; pieces of assorted cake; different types of hyperchromic cereals; dry fruits; Greek yogurt; Swiss yogurt, fruit salad with extra vitamins; and more fruits apart, with or without peel. And on the opposite side of the big table there are some middle-aged Germanoids, and I'm guessing, from what I can see, maybe they're factory workers with no fixed address, maybe chauffeurs/truck drivers, because some of them are dressing overalls, what is typical of someone who is a mechanic or works as a travel assistant, etc. And I also notice, by chance, their chewing mouths, and now witness one of them bailing various types of sausages topped with peanut butter and yogurt and I don't know what else, all mixed together... And I think to myself, if this is what should be called a typical German breakfast: sausages with raspberry jam and dark beer mixed with laboratory coffee. So, Tanger now, still at the Grand Socco, a piazza at the top of one of the city's central hills, an intersection of rue de la Plage with rue d'Italie with avenue Sidi Bou Arraquia with rue Sidi Bouabid with rue d'Angleterre and rue de la Liberté. And then I’m at the Jackson Behavioral Health Hospital, in Miami, waiting to see a friend. I sit in a small room with modern art paintings on the walls and a TV set is on. Lying on the sofa is a young girl, wearing a pink dress, staring at the TV screen. A man runs through the desert, and above him the sky is a mesh of tiny mathematical equations zooming in, and behind these numbers you also can make out a series of distorted faces with sharp teeth. And then the actor is looking at that sky and keeps running and running, and falling, and rolling on the sandbanks and standing up again. And as it goes, the numbers in the sky seem to get bigger and bigger and the monstrous faces closer and closer, and the man keeps running in circles, and the sky getting closer and closer, until that, after several falls, the man ends up discovering the oasis, and at the last minute, he dives into the lake and slides down a snail-shaped tunnel that ends in the pool of an aquapark surrounded by hysterical children, so the hero is saved and the film comes to an end. But someone is not satisfied with this ending, "Stupid! Stupid! Stupid!”, rants the girl with the pink dress. "Idiot! Idiot! Idiot!” she continues in a stronger tone, and then, already standing up “Bastard! Bastard! Bastard!" So, as expected in these cases, the characteristic white-coated nurse appears and asks “So Bruna, what's happening here? Who is hurting you?” And so, now the girl throws herself to the ground, or better, to the carpet, kicking around, crumpling her dress, she says “it was the stupid actor, instead of facing the monsters in the sky, he fled through a hole in the sand, idiot-idiot-idiot”. Now back to Kao-San, Bangkok, an area full of Farangs (western tourists). Here, local merchants would pull out your arm on the street and impose their products on you. Stuff like: Roasted centipedes; Pad Thai; hippy clothing; and traveling packs to places like Pattaya, Phuket or Chiang Mai. Here, many westerners walking hand in hand with Thai girls and the clubs around blasting hip hop beats with some Mor Lam melodies in the back, trying to be as cool and pro occidental as possible, that means, a lot of insinuations, people being forced to party, the so called sex tourism, plus the “be happy or die'' philosophy. Anyway, it wasn’t that bad, I liked the mysterious and relaxed aura of the city, mainly the surrounding areas of Khao San, by the river, where many locals would stay outside awake all night, fellowshipping, exchanging their merchandise, strolling the spirit, etc. And, it was close to this area, when exploring some narrow streets, that I found my cheap hostel, half hidden by a big bodhi tree where a Kohli bird would sing at random figures of time. And so, after some weeks staying at this hostel, I began to understand who were the locals and who were the visitors. This is, there was an old French man that almost everydays would sit by a rusty table under that bodhi tree, reading and drinking beer, in silence, and there was a Russian guy and a Spanish guy always smoking pot and whispering things about the local women between them, and there was also another guy of unclear nationality, he would walk around, going up and down the metal stairs, talking alone. Back to False Bay, Cape Town, not so far from Khayelitsha, a slum village that extends from the city until the dunes, by the seacoast. And I have just walked from Monwabisi Beach to Gordon's Bay, from where we can catch sight of a series of craggy rocks, more like crocodile tails entering the water, and further, there are swirling breezes moving around, more like a flock of miniature birds, this is, some sort of typhoons disappearing into the sky. Then, to the sides, after the breeze has passed, I catch sight of some sort of a wrecked ship, stranded between the rocks and the mounds of sand, round windows all around, like a submarine, and the roof covered with enormous sails and other sorts of junk all bouncing and tinkling together… Thus there I go, dragging myself over the sandbanks, trying to get to the thing. Back to Malika beach, Dakar, there are some fish cottages here, and I’m with Amandou, by now we are actually painting big letters with shiny colors on the hull of some pirogues turned upside down, painting sentences saying things like: “Papa Alada Ndao”; “Yeye Fatow”; “Dieng Dieng Dieng”; “Noo Ko Bokk”, etc, and while we do this work, we listen to the Kora, coz someone is playing it inside one of these fishermen's cottages. Then, I’m in Barcelona, still going up and down the Ramblas. Pokhara now. Here I’m seated on the terrace of some small café on the shore of the Phewa Lake, a terrace decorated with the some triangular flags hanging from bamboo canes, that kind of flags with tibetan writings often found strung along trails and high peaks in the Himalayas, but also in other places of the old hippy trail, worldwide. And so, staring at the other side of the lake now, we can have glimpses of the so-called water buffaloes, wandering through the marshy lands, between the lake and the mounds of mud. This is, Pokhara is considered a worldwide base for all the trekking wanna-bes, and for that reason the city is stuffed with shops specialized in mountaineering and travel equipment. There are also a lot of small hostels, the so-called boutique-hostels. So, low-fi tourism is still the main business here. And they also say that, during the sixties, this lakeshore city was considered the end of what the hippies called “the silk route”. But to talk about that, we have here Rama, a local personage that spent the bigger part of his life in Europe and America, and is now back here, just to tell us the big differences between what was Pokhara during that time and what it is at the current times. And so, now I’m at a flea market in Praça da Sé, São Paulo, Brazil, a flea market named feira do rolo, an expression that means something like rolling market, a thing that happens illegally almost everyday on the side gardens of one of the city’s main cathedral, simply named Sé. At a square in the middle of this garden, people put their items for exhibition on the top of small tarps spread out on the floor or even selling it directly in hand, items such as old soccer shirts, normally signed, sun-glasses, sneakers, many kind of clothes, watches, jewelry, cell phones, the most varied electronic items, and usually there are also a couple of guys walking around equipped with some cool boxes, selling drinks, normally “cachaca” that is a distilled spirit made from fermented sugarcane juice, also known as pinga. And there we go. Unalaska now, a city on the Aleutian Peninsula of the USA. So, as I arrive at Dutch Harbour the first thing I do is to throw up, then I go wash my face in the cold waters of the so-called Bering sea, and just then, when raising my head from the water, I’m taking a look at the very green mountains on the other side of this bay. So, back to the harbor, I get to meet my host, his name is Liam, “but you can call me Noah, James, or Oliver, or as you want”, he suggests. So, I go for the second option and take the fourth as my name. “It looks peaceful here” I say. “Way too peaceful”, he answers. Then, as we walk by the harbor I notice that some boats even have Wind Chimes, or Vint Tshimes, or Ulu Chimes, as they say here, he tells me. We can see them dangling from the boat masts. Not the usual ones made of metal tubes, these ones are made of clay, which makes the sound hollower. And so, as we pass several groups of fishermen in this harbor, I get to see that they have a lot of gear to organize, but they seem to do it patiently, quietly, even if I see no fish. What I actually see now, is a thermometer inside the window of one of these boats. It says 55 degrees Fahrenheit, what is about 13 degrees Celsius, I got to know. It's summer now; and it wouldn’t get much higher than this. It’s fresh, but not really cold. Even though, up on our front is a chain of grayish clouds hovering by the green hills. And also I can spot some purple flowers up there, on the slopes, and then, my mate tells me about these flowers. Afterwards, as we leave the harbor, a couple of yellow school buses are waiting for tourists here, French speaking ones, I notice. We pass them, and as we do it, I understand what they are actually talking about. Not about cheese this time. It’s all about Cordova and the head of the Orca Inlet on the east side of the Prince William Sound. So, a middle aged man with slanted eyes tells the others that there are no roads connecting Cordova to other Alaskan communities, and I get to know that there was some accident there, years ago, “The Exxon Valdez oil spill”, my colleague says, “people want to go there because of that”, and we skip that conversation. Further, as we advance, we pass a couple of souvenir shops, but there is almost no one inside, and then we pass some provincial cafés with wooden fences on the front. My mate even greets the lady at the door of one of those cafés, “her name is Monica”, he says, “she is my auntie”, he confides. Then, along the roadside, by the water we follow, and after a while I can resume it. There are almost no buildings here, just a couple of warehouses with grayish containers on the lot and some broken piers made of wood and moss. The warehouses look semi-rotten, and the accesses are covered with weeds and piles of shellfish hulls. Further, we get to a muddy area and see some one-floor abandoned houses, also in ruin. No doors, no windows, fallen roofs, plus all that mud around, so, Chernobyl comes to my mind. So, back to Dubai, still looking at the Burj Khalifa tower building, I’m reading here that the tower of this same building was built by Samsung Engineering from South Korea, which also participated in the projects of the twin towers of the Petronas Towers, in Malaysia, and Taipei 101, in Taiwan. And now I’m in Caracas, in a queue, waiting to get in a supermarket. They say there are shortages of milk, eggs, coffee, rice, flour, butter, toilet paper, personal hygiene products and medicines, so we have to wait here. Then I’m in Gjakova, wandering through one of the main settlements of the so-called Balkan Egyptians, the Ashkali. And then again I’m in Napoli, and it’s night. A mild night with no stars. And so, here I go, with my gorilla mask on, uphill, walking surreptitiously through a narrow street, hearing only my shoes stepping on the unlevelled ground, and then, as I go up, I begin to hear what looks like echoes of giggles, laughs, jeers coming from… apparently from the top of the hill. So, after some stops, I get to a crossroad with an abandoned fountain and a broken saint statue above it, and I turn left or I turn right, it doesn't matter. I go along another narrow street with stony pavement, and now yes, I can see from where the noise was coming from, this is, there are clusters of people down there, on the sidewalks, and in front of the bars, nightclubs, taverns etc. Some individuals seated on the floor, some wandering around the surrounding gardens with beer bottles and plastic glasses in hand. And so, amidst all this giggles, whispers and whimpers, I can hear tattered discussions about the existence of unnamed beings. Interjections of dubious connotations. Lascivious looks topped off with weird pronunciations and what we can describe as, slingshot poses, the atheist fervor, or the imagery of bizarre gods with many arms and legs but incapable of making decisions. And in the middle of all this, some kind of paranoid heroism is exalted, half-truths, let's say… unfinished sentences… This is, stories about transgenic fairies and smart woodworms. Verbs running over each other, like caterpillars. Stolen kisses. People murmuring, maybe happy in this or that instant. Guys and girls looking at the closed sky and letting themselves fall back, preferring to dream than talk, while others spill beer over them… plus, stories about bullfights in the parliament, and then, reconciling breaks to go for a piss... So, here I’m now, going through all these people, saying "Uha uha, ed io ho due amori (and I have two loves)... Uhu! Aha! Uhu! Aha!... che in nessun modo sono uguali (that in no way are the same)... Uhu Aha Uhu! Ma non sono sicuro (but I’m not sure!)... Uh! Ah! Ah! Se sono immaginari o irreali (If they are imaginary or unreal) Uhu aha! aaah!”. And at the same moment, I’m in Zanzibar, on the beach, with a guy from Ethiopia, Assefa, and we are speaking about the languages of his country, and so, he is saying that “we speak mainly the Cushitic and Semitic branches… but there are also Oromo, Somali, Tigrayans and the Amharas”, he explains. And the term Semitic is quite usual for me, but I’m a bit confused about the meanings of it, and so, I ask about it “the Semitic languages are a branch of the Afroasiatic language family, spoken in the Horn of Africa, some countries in North Africa, Malta and in small pockets in the Caucasus… and actually, historically, the term “Semitic” comes from Shem, or Sem, that was one of the three sons of Noa, along with Cain and Jafé, for sure you have heard about that…”; “that rings me some bell!”; “It is said, from the Book of Genesis, that Noa was already five years old when Sem was born… and so, some of his descendants were Elam, Ashur, Aram, Lud and Arphaxad… Abraham, the patriarch of the Jews, Christians and Muslims, was one of the descendants of Arphaxad… but in other versions from the book of genesis, Shem is also said to be the father of all the children of Eber or Ābir, an ancestor of the Ishmaelites, the sons of Ishmael… So, Ishmael had one daughter and twelve sons, the "twelve princes'' mentioned in the Genesis… and so, in the Islamic tradition, these gave rise to the Twelve Tribes of Ishmael…'' he says and I distract myself, staring at the sea now, thinking about what could be there on the other side. So, back in Zamalek, El Cairo, here I’m at some pier by the Nile river, me and some local friends, we are walking around, enticing clients/tourists to get aboard some feluccas, recreational boats that transport tourists up and down the Nile River. Then I’m inside a flat in Shanghai, Puxi area, and here, in this room, there is also a local man sleeping on the sofa, snoring, his belly coming up and down, slowly, and me,  watching TV, while he sleeps. So, I’m touching the remote control, doing some zapping, and while doing that, the sort of images appearing on the screen are things like this: some kind of commercial involving fishes, pajamas and antenas, and then there is a girl crying inside a lift, a muffled kind of cry, and then there is a bizness man on the phone... talking bullshit, and so, I look around the sofa, staring at some unidentifiable gadgets scattered through the floor… I pick this and that but, can't really understand if this and that is a decorative thing or if it has any function, so, after a while, I move to the window, that was already opened, and as I lean against the parapet, I can feel the smell of fresh cement, frying oil and camphor with alcohol, something like that… and there, on the horizon, I see, big cranes are turning slowly, and then I recognise one voice, so, I turn back and see on the TV screen mr Robin Williams, he is accompanied by some Chinese woman, and they are promoting some pharmaceutical product, maybe a perfume, maybe a detergent, I’m not sure. Then, Mr Robin is gone and there is a phone line, we should dial the number if we wanna buy this or that product associated with Mr Robin Williams charm, but the number is too big, and now the screen is totally covered with numbers so… I’m back in Beverly Hills, Los Angeles, I go along Santa Monica Boulevard. And then I’m in Jalan Malioboro, a famous commercial road in Yogyakarta. And now, I’m at the Babylon coffeeshop, in Amsterdam. I’m here drinking tea with some friends, one guy from Kashmir, Salim, another from Argentina, José, and one American girl, named June, from Des Mones, Iowa. And so, while we smoke that shit, Saalim says that he is working in Berlin, “at various humanitarian organizations for the defense of human rights, animal rights and alien rights too” and we laugh. June, the American, says that she came for a small trip in Europe, “London, Amsterdam and Paris… I visited London already, and to come here I took a ferry, from Harwich, not far from Southend-on-Sea, to the Hook of Holland, close to Rotterdam''. José says “I came to Spain to work on a restaurant, saved almost all the money I did in one year, and I’m now traveling around Europe… and then I wanna go to Australia”. I say, “I’m from Africa, and here I came by mistake”. And then we start a conversation about the difference between the British, the Australians and the Americans. Saalim called the English hooligans. June called the Australians lazy and too laid back. José says that “the Americans are too presumptuous and ignorant” and me, I give them some examples, like “between Harry Potter, Crocodile Dundee and Slipknot, I prefer the last ones, it makes more sense to me…” And again, I’m in Oporto, at Ribeira, a downtown area by the Douro river. Let’s see, under those arcs, further back, there are some kind of catacombs with some old bars more like wine cellars. I was there last night, but let’s not talk about that. Here now, facing the river, a row of terraces from the fish restaurants, a tourist bait, but not for me. So, now walking on the side of the river pier, over the embankment, there are some stalls here, this is, fluffed ladies selling embroidered fabric, but also some youngsters with merchandise on the floor, handmade jewelry, and some other guys selling tickets for boat trips etc. And now, back in Baghdad, it's getting night here and “they” turn on the lights of the water fountains at the square, red and green, the colors of the Iraqi flag, and I fell the condensed smoke, from the cars circulating around this big square, mainly Japanese brands like Kia, Hyundai, Suzuki, Mazda, and some of them making a big noise, which is not usual for Japanese cars. But, despite the size of the square, there aren't many people here, just some children running through the water jets, from one side to the other. Actually this is a somewhat desolate place, and I’m getting bored here, so, let’s move up. Hanoi again, Long Bien bridge, we have a settlement here, in a small river inland under this bridge, this is, some barracks made of bamboo and rubbish, and a couple of banyans, that are the indian fig trees, their branches forming a sort of canopy over the roofs of the barracks, so people passing on the bridge’s deck up there can’t straight away see that this island is inhabited. And now, Bogotá, the capital city of Colombia. Here we are, at a mountain with over 10,000 feet, just on the side of the city. A mountain where is the “El Señor Caído - The Fallen Lord" monument, which rises around 3000 meters above the sea level. Then I’m in Kinshasa, going along Boulevard du 30 Juin, the city center's main artery, connecting the southern area of La Gombe with Kintambo and the Ngaliema to the west. And as I walk by some people try to sell me gold, they say it's cheap, the cheapest gold I can find in Africa. So, back in Paris, from the top of emblematic staircase à l'entrée de Montmartre, it is possible to see almost the entire city, so all kinds of tourists and tourists suckers are coming here, on this stairs, not only the paunchy americans and chinese photographers, but also some low-budget travelers, backpackers, night-goers of all kinds, some still attracted by that idea of Paris, city of dead romantic artists, this is, the surrealist movement finished decades ago, but the son’s of the Maghreb migrants are here to replace it, now arriving in sportive cars, opening the doors, ladies coming out, like in the movies, loud music coming from inside, hip-hop beats with arabesque melodies, rhymes in French and in Arabic language, hashish smell circulating, white youngsters imitating the moves of the maghrebins, and around, up and down the stairs, darker-skinned individuals selling Eiffel tower miniatures and other tricks to the public, the ones seated on the sides of this big staircase. Then I’m getting out of the Robert Gabriel Mugabe International Airport, in Harare, Zimbabwe. And just then, I’m back in Istanbul, aboard a ferry boat, crossing the Marmara sea, the sea that actually divides Europe from Asia. So, let’s talk about it, there aren’t many people aboard at this time, some here and there, sited on the wood benches, silently, this is, bearded men looking at their bellies, some middle aged women reading magazines, others eating cookies, young boys and girls looking at their phones, and some more, outside, on the open deck, staring at the sky, staring at the water, maybe trying to spot the electric jellyfishes that are said to inhabit the ambiguous waters of this sea, and plus, exalted arab tourists trying to touch the seagulls that circulate around the ferryboat. Then, on a corner, away from everybody, a young dude is smoking big cigarettes, and so, I approach him and ask for a smoke, this is, normally I don’t smoke, but this time, my goal is to get into some conversation, so “Boş sigara var misin?” I ask, and he, straight away, picks one cigarette out of his packet and passes it to me, smiling. So yes, I may say, he looks like a good person, this is, it looks like in this country we can evaluate a person more and less based on the first impression, coz, normally they don't hide, the first impression is always the more real here, I get to know. “My name is Burak”, he says, while removing the headphones from his ears, and, despite the minimal volume, I still can understand Led Zeppelin playing on that tiny speakers, and so, I tell him that my favorite album from Zeppelin is the forth, simply untitled “IV” and I’m not sure if he is getting it… but, as it goes, I get to know that he is a native of Adana, a city from south Turkey, and then he reveals that it makes only a few years since he has come here into Istanbul, “I came with my brother and sister, but my brother soon fled to Germany, and then my sister became pregnant…” And so, as I understand it, it looks like the baby's father is “some kind of mad” he says. So now Burak has a family to support, “but I’m not complaining… I love my sister and I feel that it is my duty to help her… plus, she is a very creative person and the baby, the little Elif, is a wonderful thing… that makes us very happy…” So, as it goes, I even get to know his schedule, he says that, during the day he is actually helping his sister in the babysitting thing and during the night he’s working as a bartender at some club close to Taksim, from where he is coming now. “Tonight is my night off, so, I’m going to Kadıköy to meet some friends… and if you want, you can come with me, actually…” and then he ask me things like, where I’m coming from, how I came here, and why I came, and I tell him that my father was a black man and my mother is a white woman from a northern country, this is, “I lived in many countries before coming here”, I say. Then, I reveal that “my father was a loose salesman working here and there, and my mother got jobs in casinos and sometimes in big ships, cruising the world, and since young I have crossed the seven seas, but I have grown up unsure of my own roots”. “And in which European countries have you lived, afterall?”, he finally asks me and then “Which countries do you prefer? This is, which ones do you think are best to make a living… I mean, I’m wondering about that coz, I may go somewhere too, with my sister, in the near future…” he says with some caution. "Well…” I say “for me, Europe is shit…sorry to tell you that, I wouldn't go into such a rational place…”; “Rational?” he asks, and I make silence. Thus, now I’m back in St Petersburg, I wake up in a shabby room with three mattresses installed on the floor, I´m in the middle one and on the other two guys on my right and left side are actually operating small battery radios, changing the stations continually, molding frequencies, AM, FM, MW frequencies, and there is also a skeletal girl seated on a bench by the window, her nude back turned to us, hair almost touching the floor, she is wriggling the body, as if answering with movements to the cacophony coming from the battery operated radios. News, comments and folk russian songs are being constantly cutted and intertwined with different kinds of white noise, purple noise, etc. And so, after a while, I stand up, pick my drums, lay them on the mattress, and start playing in a pointillist kind of style, rolling the fingers, making abrupt stops and sudden start-ups, giving space. And the girl by the window is already standing up, doing a serie of jumps, and then letting the body fall on the floor again, she is dragging on the floor and then, making as standing up in a serie of failed propulsions, and while she does that, the guys operating the radios are shaking their devices intensely, putting the antennas in different positions, and continually changing stations in a way to catch my kind of rhythms. And so, while they do that, there are giant shadows dancing on the walls and attic, shadows reflecting the moves of the girl, my moves and the giant arms from the guys, plus the antennas, bending over and making knots. Then, the girl finally manages  to stand up, suddenly throwing the body against the wall, smoothly sliding along its surface, a wall spotted with verdigris, and the shadows on the attic continue, the antennas extending, and my percussion devices rolling in the middle of them, and then I’m in Buenos Aires, at “Villa 31”, a shantytown that appeared around 1932, as an informal settlement after the crisis of 1929.