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THE LONG PATH TO NEARBY
First scene: 1980s, in a train travelling through the GDR.
In the compartment sits a young man, unusually well dressed for a second-class carriage: exclusive shirt, expensive shoes, brand name bag and elegant white jacket. He is reading a hardcover book in English. A young woman approaches along the corridor: a rocker, black leather jacket with studs, black boots, black leather miniskirt, black arm bands with silver studs, her face is heavily made up. She has a black rucksack on her back, a red sleeping bag peeps out of it. A passenger closes the door to prevent her entering his compartment. She sticks her chewing gum to the door. She looks at the compartments, taking a close look inside a number of them as though she were looking for them. When she arrives at the compartment where the young man is sitting she is obviously delighted. She pulls the door open.
SHE: “Hallo, is that seat free?” (She starts to put here things on the rack, with her back towards him)
HE: “Looks like it” (looks at her bottom)
SHE: “Where are you travelling to, Prague? Are you American?”
HE: “No ... to Budapest.”
SHE: “Everybody travels to Prague. It is really cheap for you Westerners (turns around) and the girls are nice (winks), or do girls not turn you on?”
HE: “Why, do girls turn you on?”
SHE: “Hmmm ... (stretches out her chin, purses her mouth as if looking at herself in a mirror) sometimes one way, sometimes the other. Want a beer, it's nice and cold?” (takes the beer out of her bag)
HE: “Great, give me one.” (she opens the bottle with the door handle, lays her legs on the seat, lights a cigarette, they drink...)
SHE: “You don't look like you're gay (he chokes on his beer, sneezes) ... the way you drink ... ”
HE: “You mean you can tell if someone is gay from the way he drinks?”
SHE: “Of course, gays hardly touch the bottle with their mouth, and they only touch it very carefully with their hand, as if were infectious. But you grabbed hold of it and took a proper swig out of it. You've passed the test.”
HE: (without any real enthusiasm) “I'm delighted, it would have been difficult to prove...”
SHE: “And everyone thinks I'm Czech just because I come from Czechoslovakia. Naturally I let them believe that, particularly if they are good looking, because everyone is crazy about Czech girls – Slovak, that's not like Prague. That is as if you were only the little sister of someone in the school that guys goes out with only when they can't find anything better … ”
HE: (honestly): “That must be really shit.”
SHE: “And the Slovak girls are far more passionate. (looks him in the eye)
HE: “Aha.” (Doesn't react)
SHE: “Where do you come from, handsome man?”
HE: “From Copenhagen.”
SHE: “Ah, Denmark! Oha! Tuborg or not Tuborg?”
HE: (confused): “Do you mean that seriously?”
SHE: “Ah whatever, I only know the types of beer, I once worked in the bar on a Danish ship, I even learnt something there: Jag älskar deg, I love you, is that right?”
HE: “That's Swedish.”
SHE: “Could be that it was a Swedish ship. And how do you say it in Danish?” HE: “Jeg elsker deg.”
SHE: “There's not exactly a big difference.”
HE: “It means the same ... Why, and how do you say that in Slovak?”
SHE: “Milujem t’a.”
HE: I see and in Czech?”
SHE: “Miluju tĕ.”
HE: “That's something different.” (takes a swig from the bottle)
SHE: “Only those bloody Hungarians have for their own word everything.
(he chokes on his beer again) You can't take alcohol, can you? ”
HE: “No, it's just that it is a bit cold.”
SHE: “What kind of music do you like? Are there any good Danish groups?”
HE: “Well, there are the ...”
SHE: (interrupts him): “I find that all of them ass-lick pop. You can only rely on Metal. Deep Purple, the best, but the Dead Kennedys aren't bad either.” (sings, imitates someone playing the guitar): “I don’t need this fucking world, I don’t need this fucking world, I don’t need this …”
HE: (sarcastically): Pretty cool.”
SHE: “Do you really think so?“
HE: „Mhm, above all the meaningful text ...”
SHE: “Bet that at home you listen with mummy to Vivaldi in four layers.“
HE: “Perhaps in four seasons.”
SHE: “Do you think I am totally batty? I played that shit on the piano for seven years, day in day out and sighed when I was doing it. If only I had been born somewhere warmer, where there are only two seasons or not even two. Incidentally it's not only the mentally disabled that go to metal concerts. Where I come from they finish their shift and go once a month to the opera.”
HE: (mockingly): “In my country the mentally disabled are on the radio.”
SHE: “In my country only elderly mentally disabled are on the radio, like when they are facially paralysed after a stroke so they can't appear on television.”
HE: “In Denmark mentally retarded with paralysed faces who can't appear on television and suffer from acute Alzheimer sit on the board of directors of large companies.”
SHE: “In my country mentally retarded with paralysed faces that therefore can't appear on TV and who suffer from acute Alzheimer sit in parliament.”
HE: “And travel with the special train.”
SHE: “And travel with the special train.”
HE: “And don't look out the window ...”
SHE: “By the way I think travel is the greatest, I love going away from where I am; perhaps never coming back, I love it when the city vanishes... with the last hideous pre-cast panel building ... I love trains, I love the way they clatter tfoo-tfoo, tfoo-tfoo, tfoo-tfoo, tfoo-tfoo ... when they travel sleepily across a field (slowly, letting her head rock): tfoo-tfoo, tfoo-tfoo, tfoo-tfoo, tfoo-tfoo... or race along at a hundred miles an hour, (she shakes her head, head-banging like in a metal concert): tfoo-tfoo tfoo-tfoo, tfoo-tfoo tfoo-tfoo, tfoo-tfoo tfoo-tfoo, tfoo-tfoo, tfoo-tfoo... (looks up) And what's it like in Denmark? Tell me about Danish trains!”
HE “Well ... in Denmark the trains don't have a rhythm, they simply glide along: schiiiiiiiiiii. (like the air streaming out of a bicycle tire) and above all they don't clatter. The railway stations gleam and twinkle, everything is clean, the trains are punctual. And they travel as often as the tram does in your country, then there are little tables at which people work.”
SHE: “Here no-one has any work, they all just behave as if they had, so there isn't any of this hectic. The train arrives or it doesn't. And if it is a few hours late, that doesn't upset anyone. Only when it is very hot. That's really shit.”
HE “In Denmark there's air conditioning ... I mean, it also works ... (he's sorry, he didn't want to be critical) that's why you can't open the windows, they are locked, which is rather stupid, you have the feeling you are locked in a glass container. I like to lean out, so that the wind blows into my eyes and shakes my face (shows how) ... like with a dog ... and to shout something into the wind
... or just to look out the open window.”
SHE: “How? Like this! (Pulls the window down, leans out, he has to grab her so that she doesn't fall out) Can you hold me? Hey hang me a little further out!!! Don't pull at me so much!!! (spreads out her arms). All these stupid flowers in the meadow, they belong to me!!! And all the cow shit!!! And all the inclined electricity masts (he pulls her back from a mast that is rapidly approaching) ... That was close!” (excited, laughing, wants to snuggle up against him, but he dodges, pulls up the window and tries to hide his confusion by continuing to talk)
HE: “But then everything isn't covered in dirt, the toilets are clean, there is toilet paper and it's safe to touch the door handles.”
SHE: “What's up, were you afraid? You said you like to lean out.”
HE: “Lean out ok, but not jump out! ... I hate having to run alongside the tracks!”
SHE: “I love throwing things out the window. If you don't need something any longer, throw it out the window and you will never see it again.” (with a gesture she loosens the piece of cloth with the words LOVE FOREVER on it from around her neck and throws it out the window)
HE: (it is too much for him) “Hey, the beer is finished, I'll get some more. Do you want onne too?”
SHE: “Yeah, bring Slovak Budweiser, that's the best (he is already in the corridor, she shouts after him) Listen, I can also vanish if I'm getting on your nerves .... hallo, aren't you afraid to leave you bag behind you here...?”
Parallel scenes in the corridor. He is with a stranger, she with the inspector. The inspector is looking for a well-dressed man from the West. The stranger doesn't reveal much about himself, but he speaks fluent English, Danish, Czech and every other language that is mentioned. The young man stops to smoke a cigarette, and then he meets the stranger.
THE STRANGER: “Hallo.”
HE: “Hallo.”
THE STRANGER: “Do you have a light?”
HE: “Sure!”
THE STRANGER: (looks outside) “Tempo, tempo!”
HE: “Mhm.”
THE STRANGER: “Where from?”
HE: “Denmark.“
THE STRANGER: “Kaduli tsjessisk öl?” (Danish: do you like Czech beer?)
HE: “I am not a Dane, I'm only studying there.”
THE STRANGER: “Are you Hungarian?”
HE: “Why do you think that?”
THE STRANGER “Well, you're not an Easterner, that much is clear. You are too well-dressed for a Czech; if you were from the West you wouldn't be travelling second-class because you would be afraid that the people might be smelly. You don't look like someone who is financed by his parents, and if you were a diplomat or a travelling representative then you would travel by car or by plane. So you are either a Hungarian or you have a Hungarian girlfriend or Hungarian relatives behind the Iron Curtain.”
HE: “Congratulations ... Sherlock! And you are always in dining cars? Or do you prefer to work on steamers?”
THE STRANGER: “Sherlock is always good in Eastern Europe.”
HE: “Try it in Russia!”
THE STRANGER: “I observe people. My old hobby ... So?”
HE: (not understanding) “So what?”
THE STRANGER: (in Hungarian) “Magyar vagy?” (are you Hungarian?)
HE: “How do you know?
THE STRANGER: “My girlfriend.”
HE: “And you, where do you come from?”
THE STRANGER: “Amsterdam.”
HE: “And what do you do?”
THE STRANGER: “I have interests.”
HE: “That's good.”
THE STRANGER: “Do you see the young girl there with the leather gear?”
HE: “The metal lady, yeah, she sat down beside me.”
THE STRANGER: “And, what's she like?”
HE: (cool) “Generous ... but hard.”
THE STRANGER: “I get you ... she really tried to come on to me. Do you think ...?”
HE: “Man, she's totally hysterical, when she gets going she'll cut your dick off, I swear to you.”
THE STRANGER: “Thanks for the information.”
HE: “If you want to swap ...”
THE STRANGER: “I was only curious.”
(They continue smoking ...)
The inspector comes, this time as a GDR conductor. Discreet uniform, glasses with frames, strange unsuitable moustache. He carries a hidden camera on his head that is not visible to the audience. The film recorded from his perspective appears from time to time on a screen, for instance when he enters a compartment, asks to see tickets etc. But from time to time he is faded in from the mixing desk as a conductor or a rail steward, as if he were present live. The inspector cannot be seen on the screen we just see things from his perspective. This is visually strengthened by the fact that the three roles are in fact one and the same person (inspector, conductor, rail steward). In the following scene he meets the young woman, just as she wants to use the toilet.
SHE: “Where are you coming from, Comrade Major?”
INSPECTOR: (calm, unemotional voice): “Shh! Incognito ... We are working hand in hand with the colleagues.”
SHE: “You mean that you want to scrounge something?”
INSPECTOR: “No, this is all completely correct.”
SHE: “Interpol socialist? Is this a new version of Wer wagt, gewinnt!(Nothing Ventured, Nothing Gained), Wenn Bullen brüten (When Cops Roar), or whatever! And can one arrest everyone or can one only make a phone call? (makes fun of him) attention, attention, the Iron Curtain is melting, attention, attention, send a company of plumbers immediately! Or is only he only here to check things ... the comrade?!”
INSPECTOR: “You're not the one who should be asking the questions, I'm the inspector here. Make a report, do you have our man and don't say sir to me, we're not at home! No tricks now! You have to make a report, ready ... You're the rocker, I'm the conductor. (aloud) What is that supposed to mean, that you won't give show me your tickets? Do you want me to call the police?”
SHE: (takes the tickets out of her back pocket, makes a dramatic gesture but speaks quietly): “I'm on to him, you idiot, but you can't rush that kind of thing otherwise our bird will fly the coop and then it's over and out … we have to let a feeling of trust develop or do you want me to land on the tracks with a broken neck like the last fool?”
INSPECTOR: (loudly) “Where did you get on the train with these tickets? (softly). You won't make the same mistake! You are in a different class, don't compare yourself with such a bloody beginner ... (loudly) they are valid only for the fast train!”
SHE: (loudly) “Yes, of course they're for the fast train. I don't want to stop at every cowpat! (softly) What you call a bloody beginner was ten years older than I and wanted to go join her family over there…”
INSPECTOR: (loudly) “Anyone can say that! (softly) Don't start with the tears, either you deliver the goods or you spend seven years behind bars. Anything else ?!”
SHE: (loudly) “I even paid a supplement, do you understand my good man?! (softly) There's nothing in his bag, books, papers, everything is so innocent! The guy must be a real professional if he's really the Little Prince.”
INSPECTOR: “Nothing is what it seems! ... (lost in thought) Above all when we don't even know what he looks like.”
SHE: (loudly) “What do you take for me for, granddad, a Rothschild? (soberly, softly) I have already dreamed that death comes according to the timetable, but that you should be the conductor, comrade Major?! That is a nightmare, that not even I ...”
INSPECTOR: (loudly) “Then you have to pay an additional charge! (softly). You should stand with both legs on the ground, comrade ... that means between the tracks … ha-ha … (starts to fill out a substitute form). An agreement is an agreement ... also in the underworld ... do I really have to explain that to you of all people?! ”
SHE: “Should I let myself get killed just for a few grams of grass?”
INSPECTOR: (stands in front of her) “Do you have a better idea?”
SHE: “What are you thinking of?”
INSPECTOR: “I've told you already, you shouldn't talk to me in that way! We must work, no tricks! You are a good worker, comrade, the fine future, the weekend house … don't spoil that for yourself … think of your fine future!”
SHE: “You could be more generous ... after all I'm selling my skin ...”
INSPECTOR: “Do you want a percentage?”
SHE: “Just a little start-up capital ... so that I can set myself up ...”
INSPECTOR: “Should I see that as a clumsy attempt, as a delicate reference or as crude blackmail?”
SHE: “Do I have the choice? ... Oh, what the hell, I'm not in a position to”
INSPECTOR: “If you need money, in prison you'll certainly earn some, with that body you'll quickly put together what you need for a cigarette. (loudly) Calling me a Nazi, you milksop, it's not me that has a skull tattooed on my arse!!”
SHE: “Comrade Major, I don't have a tattoo, don't build up your hopes! … Prison would be better than this predicament, at the least the rules of the game don't change there every second minute.”
INSPECTOR: “The rules maybe not, but the position, the way you spread your legs. With a butt like yours it's impossible that that they would pass you over. You wouldn't survive there a week, darling! A female guard would scoop you up as her playmate; you know what I mean, a big GDR Brunnhilde type, who hits the high C in every situation. She would gobble you up for her birthday. And you enter the big book of life! But with blotting paper, pet! No, no, no, no, no, no, no! Ones like you go to the dogs in prison. It would be better for you to squeeze your arse cheeks together and give your best. For you! For the country! (solemnly) It is for the nation, don't forget that! We cannot tolerate hostile subversion from the West in our peace camp. As soon as we have the stuff, we'll grab them.”
SHE: “Them? Didn't you say he works alone?”
INSPECTOR: “I didn't mean that literally, I meant that we will seize everyone who threatens our people's democracy.”
SHE: “And earn something doing it.”
INSPECTOR: “That is just redistribution of resources. The department doesn't have enough money. But modern methods are needed for the fight against crime.”
SHE: “A car, a weekend house ...”
INSPECTOR: “We guarantee our workers an appropriate lifestyle. We must be fully equipped for the race against the West. We'll sneak in unnoticed and when he least suspects it we'll tear his heart out.” (tears the ticket apart)
SHE: “Bravo, Comrade Inspector. At the end I have to get out on your account. How do you know in the first case that the big catch is sitting in this train?”
INSPECTOR: “The female informer is one hundred per cent professional. She can't afford to make a mistake.”
SHE: “Have you guys caught another one, then?”
INSPECTOR: “We didn't need to catch her, we have her child.”
SHE: “Comrade Major ... couldn't the impression arise that it's we who are the criminals? ”
INSPECTOR: “Crime comes from the West. We haven't got used to that yet. We have to use their methods in order to effectively counter them.”
SIE. “And who counters us...? (corrects herself) I mean how often have we struck so far?”
INSPECTOR: “In our country there are no drugs, do you understand!? Forget everything you have heard and follow the advice of the good old conductor: memory is worse that a drug – whoever remembers, never lives in safety … (loudly) You'll see when we are arrive at the border, you … odd fish!”
SHE: (loudly) “Well who does live in safety, if I may ask? Hallo, is there anyone here who has the feeling that they live in safety? You there, blockhead! Is your life secure? Honestly, do you have that feeling!? Hey, granddad, I mean you!”
INSPECTOR: (pacifies her) “Leave out the dramatics! Keep your eyes open, comrade, we have our sights on you! At the end of the journey we have to lock up someone, the statistics must be correct. It's not up to us. In the great script of world history everything is written in advance for five years. (looks quicly at his Rolex) Dear me, I must go, I'm already late.”
SHE: “But when the Little Prince is caught in the net then I'm an unknown quantity again, everything is over and forgotten, isn't it? Then I get a complete amnesty ...”
INSPECTOR: (removing himself): “Please have your tickets ready for inspection!!” (the sound of the travelling train: tfoo-tfoo tfoo-tfoo, tfoo-tfoo tfoo-tfoo...)
SHE: “Everything is over and forgotten, understood?! And I don't have to dance to your tune any more! No favours! … And you'll leave my parents in peace …!”
INSPECTOR: “Ticket inspection! Identification please...!” (the train: tfoo-tfoo tfoo-tfoo, tfoo-tfoo tfoo-tfoo ...)
SHE: (roars) “Fuck yourselves with your ticket puncher, bloody fascists! Do you thing you can do what you like just because of your armband?! … ”(the train: tfoo-tfoo tfoo-tfoo, tfoo-tfoo tfoo-tfoo- ...)
June 2005, PÉTER ZILAHY (Hungary)
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