LIMOUSINE FOR FREEEADING 15

WARS WELCOMES W/YOU

This slogan is a metaphor for the unchanging, irreformable Polish drunken communism. In the Polish People’s Republic, this was the text used to greet people in the WARS dining car on a train that was always late. In Warsa, long-lasting bigos, a traditional Polish mishmash with cabbage that easily stimulates and accelerates gas, and Breton beans, which also accelerate gas, were heated using gas in traditional pots. A lot of gas. Tough stringy pork chops served with disgusting mashed potatoes, always with the day before yesterday’s salad. It was very expensive in such a carriage, but you could always buy alcohol. It seemed that this was the only way to avoid physical and mental indigestion. I don’t know anyone who remembers that food, didn’t have bloating or was just happy with it. Wars food wars.

I left Poland on Corpus Christi Day. There was such excitement at the gas station just before the border that people did not respect the queue to the cash register. As well as the salespeople themselves. Just like the rabble in an imaginary war, leave this place as quickly as possible. Impunity, rudeness, Polishitness. That’s one of the reasons why I always wanted to leave here for always but always stayed / went back. Because it looks as if it is still, unchangeably, impossible to reform, as if no one still consents to this change. A stubborn critical field behind the barn, behind which you throw away everything that gets in your way, but you still have to go through it later. Some short-sighted absurdity, which is deepened by the voracious capitalism instilled in the media. This Poland looks as if everyone accepted the old/new communist/capitalist law, as if they had permission to cheat, and only humor governs it. The only difference is that there was nothing in the communism, but people helped each other more. What damned SHIT. The boundaries have become blurred and intelligent people call this status quo, sometimes communism, sometimes unfinished capitalism, probably based on their own unpleasant memories. What can I say… Excellent.

A JOURey IS like a journey, if you don’t stop you will see similar pictures along the way. Slovakia is poor and monotonous. People dressed like they came from a communist second-hand store. Farms worse than in Poland. Hungary the same, Budapest is a mess, my camper was parked on Rakoczi Street for 10 minutes, I had to dig around for something, then a drunk came up and told me I couldn’t stand here in the middle. It’s shabby and grey, dull and gloomy all around. And this is the main street. These postcard, representative objects are probably glossy grease. But for the EU to take care of this post-communism somehow, no possibile. Food market in Siofok, prices 4 times higher than in Poland. At Lake Balaton, the police caught someone sleeping on a bench and a key cutter tried to rip me off. Weaky weaky.. The drive through Croatia is similar. The mountains are nice everywhere, you know. But how many of them can be seen from the forced highway? RIJEKA is also damaged. It didn’t look like the “Super Developed West”. Nohow. Already 35 years after the overthrow of communism, and post-communist countries somehow still remind us of it. The Germans didn’t particularly care about the DDR either, BTW

RIJEKA

In the morning, before leaving Rijeka, I went to Spar to do some shopping. I enter, empty, and suddenly Depeche Mode in loudspeaker: “Can You Feel A Little Love”. Afterwards I couldn’t get it out of my head.

TRIEST

The landscape began to change as with the entry of Italy. Cleaner, more tourists, like in the first city TRIESTE. Even close to the city center there is a free parking lot for campers, but it is surrounded by huge empty buildings near the sea. A girl who played the violin beautifully, no one listened.  When I finished exploring the city and passed one church, I heard singing. When I got there, a group of several people were rehearsing “All you need is love”. I was listening and the dog was looking at me. Strange.

And slowly the endless vineyards began to appear. Small towns, plantations of various sizes, enoteques, restaurants and tastings, etc. Like those in LISON. I slept there at the back of one gas station, waiting for the gas pump to open, because not everywhere in the evening you can serve yourself from such a pump. And so far, so to speak, the most original stationary decor. Gas in Italy is the cheapest of all I filled abroad, in a rather expensive country.

LISON

SOMEWHERE NEAR ROAD NOT FAR FROM VENICE

RAVENNA

Before I took the first photo in Ravenna, a girl riding a bicycle suddenly stopped in front of me and looked at me carefully. If a raven could also be an angel… that’s what came to my mind. Black hair, red lips, black dance practice clothes and big attentive eyes. The lips looked soft, the skin a little pale, the bike black. It lasted for a while, I didn’t make any move. It also didn’t occur to me to take a photo. After a while, she started walking past me. This seemed unusual to me. Like another angel, on this journey. Time showed that I saw / met more of them. When I went to the sunburned city, the streets were completely empty. Actually, nothing to be surprised about. Just constant associations with the desert.

CONTEMPORARY MOSAICS IN RAVENNA

Federico Fellini, the author of my favorite “Eight and a Half”, said that his hometown Rimini is a dimension of memory. A very interesting wording from a director who elevated the dignity of the director’s profession above the dimension of a factory production machine and has changed its perception. Besides, “Eight and a Half” is about the dimension of memory intertwined with the litmus paper and the filter of human civilization, which in my opinion is the main character, the film director Guido. For this main reason, I wanted to see this famous resort. But when I drove there with a camper, I almost went crazy from the cramped space, crowds and the flood of consumption. Like in a crawling chaotic anthill swirling around. While trying to escape, I almost drove into a low tunnel. And there would be no roof over your head. I withdrew in time with a terrible acrobatics, backwards against the flow of the clogged street. Pretty inconvenient in a car that is almost 7 meters long with a trunk and 2.3 meters wide with mirrors. But it worked. Even when I turned back in the evening, I found myself with a difficult view of the sea. Everything is shared / fenced in hotel style. The beach is the reward of consumption.

MEM(ENT)O MORI

In the village of NOVAFELTRIA, the engine suddenly starts to die, I turn into the first street with a beautiful sounding name and try to stand as close to the curb as possible, as it turns out, opposite the cemetery, close to the church and quite rare mulberry trees. What a suggestive coincidence. I’m checking. Not the dome, not the cables. I call Poland for assistance and the hell as usual: the website doesn’t open, they can’t find the insurance number, they change the operator and they have to go through the same thing all over again. And wait. And wait. Polish reality catches up with you. Finally, we somehow come to an agreement, a tow truck arrives and takes you in the opposite direction than your direction. A funny tow truck driver, speaking in mixed Italian and Russian, says it’s probably the dome (it. bobina) and tells me four times that I should take a spare one with me. Well, it’s getting more and more miraculously weird. And it turns out that even though you have a petrol engine listed, they take you to a diesel service center. Where, before they check anything, they explain that there will be a problem anyway because they do not have access to parts of different engine. Well, who cares the emperor is from Sweden. The lack of professionalism of the Polish insurer is an understatement. I finally manage to convince them, I enter the channel, they check the dome, it’s OK. They check the cables from the bottom and it turns out that some of the contacts are tarnished. How is this possible while driving? Everything is possible 😉

It would be honest to admit that initially my most important goal of this trip was Tuscany and Florence. I have seen many large, different, more and less interesting cities in Europe, including Italy, but somehow I have never managed to reach this Pearl of the Renaissance. And as the sun began to set and the road leading through the mountains was getting narrower, I decided that with such a large camper, less traffic on the roads would make the journey easier. Driving at night was obviously a big risk. Especially since it’s an almost 40-year-old car, the roads in the mountains are narrow and winding, sometimes serpentine, without any protection, and the high beams are often capricious 😉 But ‘no risk no drive’, as they say.