We Were Here! I Will Never Forget
It started off as a bet. The idea was simple. I had to fly to England, to stay for a week and to spend less than one hundred Swiss Francs. The reward was a keg of beer and a party organized with one hundred Francs. I knew I could count on you, as you are always up for such endeavors and would never let such a glorious chance for fun pass. A week later, we were on the plane to London Gatwick. We spent thirty Francs on the tickets and you even dared to spend five Francs on a Coke. I remember how much fun we had playing cards with a brothel owner from Feldkirch. He talked to us about his business and how he intended to open up a tanning studio. He was the first to write in our travel journal. He wrote "if you want to make something out of nothing, you have to sell yourself like a cheap whore". We both remembered this quote and used to tell it to each other every once in a while.
The notorious 'bling' sound wakes me from my slumber. Fasten your seatbelt; straighten your seat; the usual drill for landing. "If you want to make something out of nothing, you have to sell yourself like a cheap whore" is written in the journal on my lap. I will always remember it, don't worry.
At the airport we tried to hitch a ride to the city. After all we did not want to spend the entire week on the airport, even though, I must admit it had crossed my mind. After countless disappointments, we finally got a ride to the city with an obese Londoner, who had just come home from Cyprus, as he told us. He dropped us off somewhere in Brompton. As a parting gift, he gave us his city map and wrote "good Luck, wherever the map might take you" in our journal. The journal was your idea of course, as you preferred to gather words instead of pictures.
I'm glad that this journal will always be there for me, now that you are gone. At the moment, I'm at the restaurant we ate in return for washing the dishes. Do you remember? I said it would never work again, like it did on our trip around Lake Constance. But it worked again, thanks to your charm. I put one of the roses on the side of the doorstep, as I leave the restaurant. What we did after that I cannot recall. I suppose we started walking around town looking at the sights and tried to find possible places to spend the night.
As the parks were locked at night, we walked around the city, trying to find another place to sleep. After rejecting your idea to sleep in the center of a roundabout, we eventually found 'our' graveyard. It was a spooky place to spend the night, but it was central and for free. You volunteered to keep the first watch, while I slid into one of the tipped over, green rubbish bins to protect myself from the heavy rain. Every two and a half hours we switched places.
I might propose to your mother that this graveyard could be your final destination. I don't know how you feel about this. As for now I can only leave another rose behind, at the place we spent three nights, got soaking wet and scared each other much too many times to actually catch a good night's sleep.
In the mornings, we went to a bakery where we got free breakfast. We had to be there at five o'clock and had to unload the truck for half an hour, but it saved us a lot of money. Fred, the bakery owner, sang all the time about love and football, which seemed to be pretty much the same to him. In our journal he wrote "live life like a French king, as life will behead you soon enough". If he had known. If he had known.
I tell your story to the salesman, who is working today and he promises me to keep my rose in the staff room until Fred gets back. He is on vacation for another few days. Although he seems sincere, I cannot stand his consolations and the sorry look on his face. I have seen it far too many times. It makes me weak. I want to be strong. I still have some way to go.
After we ate breakfast at the bakery, we went to the youth hostel. We did not intend to stay there of course, as our money would never have sufficed for such luxury. We only went there to take a shower. You were such an audacious bastard and so was I, I guess. That was one of the reasons you were the best friend I ever had. We were both a bad influence on each other and our lives improved because of it. Pretending to be regular tourist, staying at the hostel, we walked up to the second floor, where we used the shared bathroom. Since we already slept like hobos, we did not intend to smell like them too.
Some images linger in my brain, but I cannot connect them. We were in a huge room with an immense quantity of books, one of us, probably you, wanted to see. The antique map store somewhere in the East of London is another of those images. I bought an old map of Africa there. It is a decent map but no comparison to the leather map you brought me from Prague. Thank you again. The pub, where we wanted to convince the keeper to let us "guard the place from inside throughout the night". I recall that the carpet was red and fluffy and the keepers name was Beth. She had written "It is always darkest before it gets brighter" in our journal. I could not find any of these places again. Looking back, a real journal, a map or pictures would not have been that bad an idea after all.
We spent our evenings in a cheap pub and walked from table to table. We did not collect wise thoughts about life this time, but a collective story. Every person continued the story by one sentence. This way we got to talk to everyone in the pub and some of them offered us ales and stouts. Although pretending to be embarrassed by those offers, we never refused. I recall that the story we collected took a dramatic turn in one sentence. Suddenly, our two main characters wanted to commit suicide. The weird smelling Scottish trucker had written this sentence. Had it not been for the genius idea of the young couple at the next table, our story would have ended in tragedy. Eventually, we sent the story to Jeanette, who both of us were trying to impress back then. Please remind me to ask her if she still has it.
We had so much fun in that pub and on the third night, we met lan, who offered us a ride to Southend-on-Sea. Of course we could not decline the offer and traveled to the sea with him on the next day. At the pier in Southend-on-Sea, we sang Swiss Boy Scout songs and the hat in front of us filled up quicker than we had anticipated. Today, there are no street artists at the pier, since it is a cold and rainy winter day. The rose looks lost in the middle of the pavement. It will soon be destroyed by the rain and all that will remain is the memory of our trip. I hurry to the cinema, where we spent our hard earned singing money. I go straight to the bathroom and put the rose on the hand dryer. It is still the same one that we used to dry our sleeping bags with. On the side of it, our vandalism is still visible. It reads "If cats sing ugly, why is Cats a famous musical?".
Sleeping in Southend-on-Sea was much more pleasant than in London. The weather had cleared and we slept in the middle of a cornfield. For the first time, no one had to stay awake to guard our belongings and we could sleep until the midday sun burned on our skin. The happiness did not last though, as I realized I had lost my glasses the night before. It soon became clear that I must have lost them, while jumping across a swamped little stream, which separated the cornfield from the road. We searched the mud for half an hour before you finally found them. Our arms and legs covered with mud, we ate breakfast at the gas station.
I am standing at the gas station now. Triangular prefixed sandwiches were alf they had. It was the first time I had eaten them and until today the last time. They still have a huge selection of them and not much else. I buy a sandwich and in its place I leave a rose in the fridge. I can assure you, the sandwiches still taste terrible.
We still had enough money to board the train back to London. On our way back, we suddenly saw a lovely castle ruin on the right side of the track. Spontaneously, we decided to get off the train the next time it stopped and walked back to the castle. I remember we were all walking barefoot and were jumping around like playful puppies. The castle ruin was so beautiful. While you went shopping in the nearby village, I gathered firewood and piled it up at the west side of the castle, where the original main building once stood. As it got dark we made a huge fire at the spot with a tag "blacksmith hearth" and buried all our food, wrapped in aluminum foil, in the ash. As the fire stopped burning, we could not even find all the potatoes, chicken legs, and corn cobs we had hidden in the fire. It was the most delicious meal I ever had, as we had no worries at all and just felt free.
It takes me quite some time to find this castle again. It is called Hadleigh Castle and looks huge and empty today. It is not quite like I remembered it. Only the landscape seems familiar. The wall near the fireplace is still black, maybe because of our huge campfire. Why am I here alone now? This is just not fair. The place is empty and cold. Even though the memories should make me feel happy, they are painful, extremely painful. I put the remaining three roses in the fireplace and prepare to sleep next to it. At eight o'clock it starts pouring, my sleeping bag gets soaked within minutes and I start to feel cold. I could have stayed home but I owe you this trip. Nevertheless, I also do it for myself. Maybe I can finally get on with my life after it. Maybe I can stop crying if sad songs are played. Maybe I can run around barefoot again, without feeling guilty that it is me, not you, who can still do this.
Does it matter that we won our bet? Does it matter how much fun we had? Does it matter what people thought of us?
You were the best friend I ever had. The roses, which I left, will perish within days and some people might even forget just as quickly. Our joint trip was the happiest time of my life, the trip I'm on right now is plain sad and empty. In a few hours I will be on my flight back, back to my daily routine, which keeps me going until it gets dark. As a last deed I chisel the castle wall.
"We were here! I will never forget"
the castle