Archive for September, 2008

Catch me if you can

Monday, September 29th, 2008

Last week, I was at the Profil Megastore (my Croatian publisher’s flagship store) to see how my book is feeling there. I found a book by Banksy, the UK street art guru (see my post from 20.5.2008) which I can recommend to everybody – it will both amuse you and make you think. So, I sat down at the café on the gallery to have a cup of coffee, look at Banksy’s work and occasionally glance down to see how people “interact” with my book. And then I realised I never signed any books for the store, so inspired by Banksy’s interventions, I simply went down, picked a huge pile of my books, brought them up to my coffee table and signed them. Each with a little note, of course. I returned the books and was very amazed because NOBODY reacted. I could have been just anybody writing anything into anyone’s books. I could have taken a bunch of Candace Bushnell’s books and signed those. Lesson learned: you can do whatever you want, as long as you do it with an overdose of confidence. “Catch me if you can”, remember?

Later that day, I proudly told Lucija about my “intervention” into my own books. “Shit, what if people complain that someone destroyed the books! Even the people working at the store can’t know the signature is really yours!” Well, shit happens. Maybe somebody gets the joke. And if not, if they really think someone else signed my books, they will have to throw them away – and print new books. And that’s how you get your second edition!

Coming Home for Christmas

Sunday, September 28th, 2008

I still have to decide if being back in the civilisation, including all its technical blessings, is good or bad.

Well, the good thing is that coming back felt a bit like coming home for Christmas. On 5 August, before I left, I wrote (and you debated, thank you!) about starting to save the world by switching off the financial markets. I came back and “swoosh!” the markets are trying to switch themselves off! Mr. Bush and his bailout plan are trying to stop Santa from fulfilling my wish, but even the fact that the system stripped itself down to show its starved-to-death-and-decayed-with-disease body felt like receiving a big Christmas present. Yes, now we all officially know that the system is NOT working. And hey, this happened much sooner than I expected! The funny thing was hearing about how “we need to save the financial system” for the past few days sounds like singing Halloween songs during Xmas. Wrong! Sweethearts, it is so clear now that it is not the financial markets that need to be saved and changed – it is the whole socio-political system. Yes, I know it would be like having 100 Christmases in one. One big orgasmic blast. I will not be that impatient.

So, off I am to vote (Austria is selecting a new parliament because ours is also not in the best shape). And guess who I will vote for?

Santa.  

Startas

Thursday, September 4th, 2008

I am writing an article about Startas, tennis shoes worn by everyone who grew up in Yugoslavia. They were white and affordable to everybody. Together with our blue school uniforms, they were a part of the socialist ideology of equality for all. Nobody had much, or different for that matter of fact, but everybody had what they needed. When we wanted to be different, we had to use our own creativity.

The shoes used to be produced in Vukovar, the city that was totally ruined by the Serbian army in the attack on Croatia in early 1990s. The production started in 1976, in a factory that employed 22,000 people. 5 millions of pairs used to be produced a year.

And now M.Massarotto, a Croatian designer who used to work for Gucci and Custo Barcelona, decided to re-launch the famous shoes. He created 16 cool models, with prices varying from €28-70. And I was thinking about what a brilliant symbol those shoes are for the transition from one socio-political system to the other. All it takes you now to be different is money. And the more money, the coolest your “difference”. You don’t need to waste your time inventing and creating anymore. All you need to do now is – pay.

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