14 DAY TRIAL // I was going to tell you about a really interesting new type of video game technology that I discovered recently, called augmented reality, in this editorial, but in the light of recent events that I had to powerlessly witness, I changed my mind. While coming to work today, I decided to talk about another type of reality, a bitter one, that we all have to go through on a daily basis, one that relates to a somewhat extent to the augmented reality.
First of all, what does augmented reality mean? In a few words, it is a new way of designing and improving game graphics, which will become all too real. Researchers predict that in the next decade, they will be able to pull graphics out of your television screen or computer display and integrate them into real-world environments. This new technology will further make the division line between what's real and what's computer-generated blurry, by enhancing what we see, hear, feel and smell. Between computer-generated environments and real life, augmented reality will be closer to the second.
As I said earlier, the bitter reality that we have to go through each day, borrows certain elements of the augmented reality, in the sense that certain events that we experience in real life, sometimes shock us to such an extent that we believe we exist in a computer-generated, false world. A world that possesses sense-enhancement devices, nevertheless. I, for one, have been living in this bizarre world that never ceases to amaze me. People's mentalities and the way they react or handle situations never cease to astonish me, or better yet, the way Romanians think and act is a permanent source of shock for me, even though I try to be as realistic as possible to the point of pessimism or cynicism when I analyze events. The conclusion I reached is that Romania is the best place for pessimists and cynics to be surprised!
In a country where decision-makers and parliamentarians are more preoccupied with their inner or inter-party power struggles than with what happens with the rest of the population, where the economy, the agriculture, the industry, the educational system are in as bad shape as they could possibly get, where senior citizens' pensions are not enough to pay bills, let alone food to survive, forcing them to go out in the street to demand their right to exist, where public office clerks, who work for the government, for the Financial Administration, or whatever other office, treat you like dirt, I wonder how one is supposed to still feel this is real life, instead of a surreal one. Real life is supposed to offer you choices, where part of which are bad, part of which are a bit better and part of which are good. Life in Romania, this never ending bitter, computer-generated, science fiction, soap opera kind of existence offers you no alternatives, or better yet, the choice of a "no choice", meaning all but bad, or even the worst of choices. The kind of feeling I'm constantly getting is that of a mean computer programmer who devised a type of "augmented reality" with life-enhancement devices for us, Romanians, and who keeps us locked in here forever, in a kind of weird twisted experiment, to see how far we can reach, with no choices at all, but to "swallow" and internalize everything that comes our way.
Romanians' worst mistake, as a nation, is the way they have shaped their popular, most basic type of every day mentality; and no, I'm not talking about the much disputed "Miorita" ballad type of mentality, but of something I cannot quite define, a much more diabolical version of (in a word by word translation from Romanian) "may the neighbor's goat die too", a kind of envy on the one next to you that makes people do such vicious things they would not and should not be normally capable of. I'll give you an example of such a vicious thing, something that is probably unique in Bucharest, at least for the time being; yet, taking into consideration that bad things catch faster than good deeds, who knows? Unfortunately, perhaps there will be other cases, although I hope not.
Here's a story that happened last night and that affected me so much, though indirectly, that I felt prompted to write about it and express my grief towards a world I do not think I understand anymore, not even the bit that I used to understand before: I have a good friend, who is very passionate about motorcycles and who, up to two weeks ago, had a really old motorcycle, a Simson, the ones that used to be made in the 50s. But he wished for a better one, with more power and one which wouldn't have to be repaired every 2 days. He made sacrifices, he struggled and he successfully made a bank loan, and with the money he got from the bank he actually managed to buy a motorcycle that he was satisfied with, two weeks ago. Unfortunately we're living in Romania so nothing good lasts too much. The area he's living in Bucharest is mostly populated with senior citizens, cranky old people, and people who passed their forties, but up to last night this didn't seem to be such a great disadvantage. At 1.30 in the morning, my friend was woken up by screams and noises, neighbors pounding at his door: when he got out (he lives at the ground floor) what he saw was incredible: his new motorcycle was literally on fire, his old bike he hadn't managed to sell, taken farther away from the block of flats, firemen trying to cool the fire, police officers and lots of other people. He called on a good friend who lives two blocks of flats farther away to tell him what was happening; his friend (also a motorcyclist) goes out to come and help him, and what do you know? His own motorcycle was almost set on fire as well; he could see the pieces of burnt newspaper near the tires, plus a bag full of gasoline close to them as well. He was luckier that, given the fact that his motorcycles was old, with lots of iron on it, it did not burn, but my friend lived to see his motorcycles going up in smoke.
Now he has to pay the bank loan for something that does not exist anymore. Police took photos, interviewed everyone, took what now seems viable finger prints from the old motorcycle, as well as from his friend's motorcycle and said that, based on common voiced suspicions regarding a certain person in the area, they will be able to catch the culprit. But who can be sure? If they don't, my friend will have to suffer the consequences. Things like dirt, sand or rocks have been found by both guys in their motorcycles' gasoline tanks, in the oil filters, but nothing like what happened last night ever occurred. Could it be envy, the "had enough with you guys and your stupid motorcycles" feeling or mental disturbance? I don't know but what I do know is that whatever the reason, it does not justify such an action. Indeed, this is the type of reality that we are living, one of "stolen hopes" like my friend said last night when watching the fire, these are the people we are living next to and I'm amazed that there are persons who still wonder why young people flee this country to live and work some place else.
And to sum everything up, I will paraphrase something someone famous usually says: "We live in Romania, and this takes all of our time!". "And all our belongings, as well!" I might add?
I've said what I felt, now feel free to judge for yourselves!
