Diaries Of Panties In A Twist: Shitland Pt 1

This was supposed to be a guide of the city I live in but I guess it’ll stray a little bit from it.  Guess you expected it, or not, I don’t know. Anyway, as you realized I didn’t break my tradition of straying from what I said in a previous entry and that because I keep myself occupied and busy with other things.

Things that happen in the actual real world, like feeding my cats, playing the guitar, trying to organize stuff, completely letting go of the hope of finding a job in Athens GR, noticing that this place is filled with cops and how I was told that “nobody cares” and that I “should be quiet” once again when I tried to tell the following story.

It’s been almost two months since I started driving again. After the car accident I was in I was kind of afraid of driving, but then I said “fuck it” and started again. I drive when is needed as I’m not really fond of it. And from my drives around the town I noticed one thing: There are more cops units out there than acne on a teenager’s face.

There are cops everywhere for absolutely no reason. They keep popping up and whenever pass them by they look at you, check you out, up and down, like you’re the next top terrorist. Hick accent or demanding voice, sleepy-cow eyes and the attitude of the king of the jungle.

A week ago on my way home, in the radius of 5 blocks I saw 3 units in their cars and 3 police units on scooters. Last night I got pulled over and searched. It was just like a movie. There was a flash light lighting my face on the left window and one on the right lighting my hands. I went to turn off the engine and the guy on the left says “Don’t do that sir! Stay calm and only do whatever we tell you to”. I said alright. Then he says “Okay turn off the engine. Driver’s license and i.d.” he demanded. I had none with me, so I said.

I was asked to step out of the car and after I explained how I forgot my wallet at home and amongst other excuses they said it was okay, they asked me to step out, open the trunk and let them search the car. So I did. I open the trunk and step back. Then one of them starts checking me up and down lighting with his flash light while the other 4 were searching the car.

As I was standing there one of them pulls out a bag with a tag that read “baking soda” from the back seat of my car and says to me: “what is this?” I look at him and before I have the chance to reply the guy behind him says “it’s baking soda…can’t you read?” Then the genius who was holding the bag asks me again “are you sure this is baking soda sir?” “You can open the bag and try it…” I say. As the other guy behind the genius chuckles a little.

One of them asks me to show the car’s insurance. I walk to the front seats and start searching for the insurance book and as I find it he says “it’s alright, forget about it.” Long story short, they searched everything. They even made me open my guitar’s hard case saying “haha most terrorists used to have one of these and hide Kalashnikovs in them while riding  on their bikes.” While I was thinking, “cause I look like a crazed up biker that would carry around a kalashnikov in a small suburb of Athens just in case…”

This hell is meant for us. Should we be thankful that something was meant for us and was built for us? But it’s mostly sunny here during the year, so who cares...

P.S: I still love you all like Greek cops secretly love being called sheriffs or John Rambo and like I love to talk about meaningless things. 

Diaries Of Panties In A Twist: Shitland Introduction

Well let me get this straight here before all the big mouths start doing what they know best. There’s a love/hate relationship for everyone with the town/ city he grew up in. So after being a recluse for most of my teenage years keeping myself to myself and having only a few friends, I always dreamed of leaving this town. So I did.

After finishing high-school I went away for studies. Though I never really got homesick, I did miss some faces and wished they were there with me to drink coffee, chain smoke, get stupidly drunk, fail miserably and get back on track again.

Well, these years passed now and I returned in Athens GR. The city, which everyone where I was had visited and loved or wished they visit some day in the future. My reply to their questions about the city was mostly the same, “it’s quite alright, I guess”.

Now I’m here experiencing the adult life, have my own cubicle, screen and headset stressing more than I should for the worth of it and at the same time trying to find a job in the “field of my expertise”.

But every day I find myself cursing and thinking that instead of walking in the streets I’m just floating in a sea of nut jobs and “wise” fucks, that they only thing they’ve figured out is how to lie to themselves and not giving a fuck about anything else but their own precious little lives, while their own little lives have turned to monsters and are ready to devour them at any moment.

From the way they’ll scoff and hiss if you ask them to wait for you to exit the bus/metro before they get on, to the way they’ll make way for you if you want to walk faster on the sidewalk. It’s either that a) they were born with the curse of a pair of panties scratching and annoying their genitals 24/7 for their whole life, b) they ended up burying their dreams and becoming another cliché but still hold on to their biggest of dreams but in an arrogant way or c) maybe it’s just me.

But on the other hand, every week or so you discover all the little things you like but never had a clue about. Like little joints or coffee shops, record stores, streets, graffiti art, people. And after you discovering these you think, “meh…it might not even that bad as I imagined”. But then one day BOOM! An asshole thing comes to sweep you off your feet and land you back in reality and make you in a way appreciate more these little things.

Anyway, as you’ve imagined this will be something a lot like a Carrie Bradshaw column minus the sex and relationship advice and more about what gets on my nerves in this city. Hopefully it’ll be monthly, giving myself the time and opportunity to gather all the information needed to write it all down for you to understand better and hopefully relate. Because every town has its assholes, every town has its weird and fucked up days, every town has its nut-jobs and every town has its perks. 

Thanks For The Party Music

Last night I heard- read- the news through a friend’s post on facebook. Tony Sly, the lead singer of the punk rock band “No Use For A Name” died at the age of 41.

It’d be a lie if I said that the news didn’t phase me but it’d also be a lie if said that the news left me devastated. But surely it affected me in one way or the other.  

No Use For A Name, was one of the first punk rock bands I ever listened to and got introduced to by a friend of mine back when I was 15. Even though Sly’s voice didn’t excite me his lyrics surely followed me through my high-school years and I still consider him as one of the most honest and talented lyricist in punk rock.

I could go through the whole cliché in a way ordeal saying how much he meant to me and all that crap but I won’t because it’d be a lie. But I can surely say that from that one time that I interviewed him he was one of the friendliest and kind people I’ve ever met.

Thanks for all the party music, thanks for all the shared emotions, thanks for all the lyrics and thanks for everything you left behind Mr Sly! 

Keep It Simple

Hey hey whaddup! Well you must be wondering "what's da dealio wit dis muddafucka and he hasn't updated dis shizzle fer a while now?" Well, since I asked this question to myself too I'm here to say do not worry. Do not panic. Everything's under control!

I've just been too bored lately to update you on what's been going on, plus I'm putting together a zine. What's that you say? "A zine?!" I hear you ask? "But you're way too lazy..." I hear you say again.

Well, buddies of mine that's true. I'm putting a zine together with sloppy poetry and short stories with a friend of mine. I'll be doing the writing and he'll be doing the drawing. The name of that zine as it was decided will be "Keep It Simple" and if everything goes according to plan it will be finished and done at the end of August maybe mid of September.

If not it will never be finished and you'll end up crying and probably need tons and tons of ice cream and sedatives to calm you down. Since I do not want that to happen to all you lovelies out there, I'll do my best. Now I have to bounce and finish off my coffee! 

Till the next time, keep it simple and keep goofing it up!

As Cliche As A Rom-Com Can Be

Time flies, right buddy ol’ pals of mine? It’s as cliché and cheesy as the worst of rom-coms, but hell it’s as true and hard as a heart-attack. Time flies,  -for me- people don’t change but they learn to adapt, some things change for the better others for the worst but whichever the case might be I’m of the opinion that whatever happens we bring it to ourselves –minus some cases-

As weird as it may sound I wrote this intro to begin telling you what I talked about for 2 hours with that 45 year old or something German bar owner when in Berlin.

We were staying in West Berlin as I might have mentioned in the previous entry. We booked in advance at a cheap hotel in a very posh area of West Berlin without knowing. In an area where the prices from the shops’ windows didn’t fall beneath the 250 euros and the price of a watch could pay 2 days’ meals and clothing of 2 families.

When I asked what was the deal and all the bars were empty or closed she told that once West Berlin used to be the place to be. It used to be full of artists, painters, bohemians and “free spirits” and students.  She also told me that once West Berlin used to be “alive” 24/7 and the bars were mostly packed every hour around the clock.  Now people travel to West Berlin to do business and then they leave.

The shops’ windows are there for those who can afford these kinds of things, only because, people who can afford these things come around that neighborhood anymore. That’s when I finished my beer and asked for another one. And as the bar was empty she said that the next one was on the house.

She said that she misses the days like 10 or 15 years ago when every bar in West Berlin was never empty and people didn’t have to work 2 or 3 jobs just to get by. The unemployment rate was low, everyone had a job and could get by just fine.

Nowadays there are more than 3 places where you can get daily meals for 3 euros and the buildings for homeless people are usually packed. From supermarkets to church donations, more and more people get sacked or remain unemployed and the lucky few, like one of her friends, have to work 14 hours a day –factory and old people’s homes- and still get some kind of welfare just to get by and be able to pay rent and send their kids to school.

She also told me about old neoclassical buildings in East Berlins, with big houses, which are now inhabbited by two or three families each house and 14 year old pregnant girls with baby-trolleys, high-school degrees to get and a baby to feed.


Now she might did exaggerate a little bit she might didn't. But either way, even if the situation is half as bad as she painted it to be, to me this still sounds as scary as a quadruple anal scene does to even the most experienced of female porn-stars out there - as I'd like to think it does.-


Till next time, keep goofing it up and bababooee.

7 EUROS WORTH OF WATER AND ME AS BEARDED LION

I went to Berlin, ate hot dogs or "wurst", drank german beer, walked around always with my back-pack, saw the sights and spent a night at a bar talking with the 45 year old bar owner about the state of Berlin and how it was 20 years ago as the bar was empty and she had nothing better to do. She also gave me a free beer and told me I'm a nice kid. This is what I'll be talking about, or I'll try to talk about in this and future posts.

But, first things first and I must say this to get it out of my chest: German people have serious issues with water. I don’t know how it is where you’re from whoever’s reading this, but water at a café or a bar is not charged. I believe that in most parts of the world is the same, in the most parts of the world except from Germany where a small bottle of water costs minimum 2.50 and in most cases 3.50 and last but not least you also have to pay for water at a bar.

Needless to say I didn’t even touch the bottles of water from corner shops no matter how thirsty I was. I’d rather literally eat 350 1 cent coins and break my teeth than give them for water. I’d eat them good and digest them like it was the finest of meats.

One night we sat a bar opposite our hotel to have a couple of drinks before we go to bed after a long day walking around the city of Berlin. Going through the catalog, trying to decide what drink I’d have I saw that the gin prices were pretty low, 2.90, so I decided to have some gin as I wasn’t in the mood for beer or whiskey.

The waitress comes along and takes our order, brings us our drinks and I decide that I’d like some water. I go to the bar and ask the bartender if he could give me two glasses of water, for me and my friend. He gives me a weird look and says “fizzy or…” and shows me two small bottles.  I don’t return the weird look and I say that I just wanted some water in a glass. I didn’t want to buy a bottle of water just wanted some tap-water in a glass to drink as I was thirsty. Again he gives me a weird look but he takes my order.

Half an hour later and after finishing my drink, I decide to get another one. When the waitress comes along I give her my order and I also ask her if we could have some more tap-water. More specifically, I ask for a pitcher of water so I didn’t have to go back and forth at the bar.  She looks at me and says “No”. That’s when I decided to return the weird look the bartender had given me half an hour ago.

After further explanation she tells me that she can’t just give me a pitcher of water but I’d have to buy it. I think to myself that a pitcher of water couldn’t cost more than a couple of euros, even though it shouldn’t cost a damn thing as it’s just water, and I say “sure…we’ll have it”. As she goes to leave I ask “uhm before you go could you please tell me how much it’ll cost?” And that was when dinosaurs came alive, dragons started flying low, Conan the Barbarian started dancing the polka waving his sword and many other crazy shit went down. She looks at me and with a smile like it’s normal she says “that’ll be 7 euros” and then me I say with the most normal look I could have with that answer “okay that’s fine then, I’ll just have the gin.”

At the end she brought me a pitcher of tap-water for free but she asked me to hide it so the manager wouldn’t see it and everyone was happy. I had my water. I had my gin. I had the red blanket wrapped around me, complimentary from the bar for everyone who sat outside and I had my cigarettes.

Coming back home I wanted to drink all the water I'd find. Bathe in it, eat while bathing in water, drink cold water, warm water, boiling water, eat ice cubes, lick ice cubes etc etc. More to come from my Berlin experience in the next post. Till next time, keep goofing it up!

P.S: German girls have big breasts and I congratulate them for that. Plus, I looked something like that lion while I was in Berlin.

Quickie

We drove fast down the open road, pas two motorcyclists who were being dickheads racing each other and testing their bikes. With a vroom vroom and a lot of noise it’s so easy to be a prick, it’s unbelievable.

It’s started smelling like spring/summer already and Mr. Dylan is on my speakers. I haven’t gotten paid yet for the work I did for the magazine, so I guess I celebrated too fast for getting a job. On the other hand, I’ve been playing the guitar a lot more, lost some weight and hang out with people I hadn’t for a long time. I also met some new ones.

I went to a gig, had a couple of drinks, screamed my lungs out calling names the friend of mine who was playing and accidentally walked in the toilette while a girl was putting on her tampon as there were no men/women toilettes. She didn’t realize, I closed the door quickly so, no harm done.

Now in a couple of weeks we’re planning on recording some acoustic songs. So keep checking back for updates.

p.s: if you have nothing better to do, like feed your dog, scratch your belly or give a chimpanzee a mighty hand-job.