R94

Bird has to fly, man has to dream. My friend Sergiu and I were close to fulfilling our dream. Monkette Kelsang Namtso was also on the brink of her dream. It happened one autumn morning high in the Himalaya.

Last base before Cho Oyu peak was near the Nangpa La Pass. Some mountain climbers thought that Turquoise Goddess was therefore a less of a challenge. That morning, refugees from Tibet were traveling trough Nangpa Pass.

To Sergiu and me, this morning was about the final test. Snow and ice of Cho Oyu was challenge to us, just because "it was there". We were grateful to Edmund Hillary for putting the essence of mountaineering in this concise sentence. To hundreds of frozen people that we saw as thin thread of hope in the distance, Cho Oyu was the cruel goddess. They prayed to her to let them pass trough Nangpa La.

The climb was exausting. Thin air was draining our energy fast and we didn't bring our oxygen tank. I chiseled ice and glacier retaliated with snow dust that stung at my cheekbones. I was panting into the jacket and marveled at the heat that made me sweat, eight thousand meters high up in the mountains. From above, I could see row of freezing refugees. They snaked down the glacier, trying to find the easiest way to the valley below.

At the last stop, Sergiu was panting like a tired puppy. I manged to smile and pat his back. Though we were exhausted from heights, cold and wind, we felt some kind of magic that was pushing us upwards and onwards. We moved slowly, like in a dream, like in a slow motion. Down there, refugees were moving trough the pass. Little Kelsang cheered her friends and smiled to them, her cheeks all flushed up. Their hearts were pounding, their desire to see Dalai-Lama gave them strenght to fight their way trough the snow. The Spirit was guiding us, The Body just obeyed.

Finally, we advanced step by step, inching towards the top. And then we just climbed to our dream. We made it to the peak! Sergiu removed his hood, we kissed and hugged. Squinting at the sun we enjoyed in quiet ecstasy. I didn't have the strength to scream, nor to laugh, nor to feel happiness.

Then shots echoed trough the valley and filled our universe with dread. We rushed down the cliff, towards our base. Soldiers appeared on the far ridge. They took potshots at refugees, as if they were hunting rats or rabbits. Thin line kept going on, like enthralled. To them, bullets were not important, only their pilgrimage was. Shots were falling closer to the column of people. Sergiu reached the base and grabbed his cam. Refugees broke into run, slow, painfully slow, much slower than the bullets were falling.

Glacier turned red. Young monk-girl Kelsang Namtso dropped to her knees. She looked into the sky and her soul started to ascend to heavens.

As if the wind from Cho Oyu scattered them, refugees split up. Frantic people swamped our base camp. Like a pack of wolves, Chinese soldiers fell on them, picking on those who strayed. I felt anger but I was unable to react. I turned to the mountain peek and felt as if the entire Cho Oyu is standing on my chest. I gasped in the thin Himalayan air, too petrified to cry. Shots kept echoing, glacier was still bleeding.

I couldn't believe what I was witnessing. Pain rose from my guts. Pressure was pounding in my temples. Bowl of sufferance gathered in my central chakra. I wanted to breathe air, to inhale hope, but cries of children and rattle of gunfire cut deeply into my soul.

Base camp Crew were enjoying the autumn day in the mountains. Chinese soldiers were just a nuisance, a minor menace. Mountaineers were having their coffee, lazily milling about. They chose to be invisible to frenzied soldiers. No one helped the fallen man, no one fed the hungry, no one sheltered the hunted.

I found Sergiu, he was giving some biscuits to the kid and showing to refugees how to evade soldiers, how to reach Nepal quickly. I fought trough my pain and horror and I joined Sergiu. Thin thread of hope was was broken, eight of them were lying dead in the snow. Thirty of them were captured by Chinese soldiers and herded across the border, like cattle. Half of them reached the valley, some of them died on the way down.

Day was reaching it's end. But for me it will never pass. Sergiu and me decided to speak up. It was the only way to save our souls and fight back at the doom of Turquoise Goddess.

-

Dedicated to Matei Sergiu and Gavan Alexandru, two Romanian climbers who taped the massacre of Nangpa La and forced Chinese government to admit the crime. This story is also dedicated to all those mountaineers that did not 'mind their own business', to those who spoke out and helped Tibetan refugees.

Also, this story is dedicated to monk girl Kelsang Namtso, seventeen years old, who left her body eight thousand meters high up in the Himalaya.

R93

Some people just don't have a story in them. They just don't. And they live without a story. They maybe have some anecdotes, but that's it. However, what is a writer to do if he or she has no story? That's hell, right?

I can't create a story. I feel empty. But not just empty, I feel like I have a leaking holes. It's not a tragedy if artist is empty. They can fill up. I don't claim it's an easy task, but it is doable. You listen to the classical music, or read good books, or go to excursion, collect the impressions. You get filled up. But when a man is hollow, full of holes, you know, then the story just leaks out. And if you are trying to be a writer, then it's pure hell. Stories just elude you, they wiggle out of you as if you were a rotten apple abanoned by even the worms.

So what else can I do, but record my dreams. They are the stories from the other side. I hunt them carefully. Gently wielding my net. But dreams are like creatures from the bottom of the ocean. Brought to surface they decompose with suprising speed. Rotting almost instantly. Then only the jellified bits remain. I try to stitch them together. Taxidermy them. Decorate them. Color with random colors, I have no idea what I'm doing there. Then I wait for them to dry and solidify. They don't turn bad. Almost the real thing. But they are not stories. I can sell them to a naive tourist, but not to real experts. I can't even show them to everyone. What if there is an expert among the crowds?

Sometimes even the dreams die. Sometimes they don't survive the journey to the surface. They remain without form. Like untold prophecies. Just hints. Some dull impulse.

And what if I told everything there is to be told? What if the whole story expired and there will no more be any. That's it. You had a pocket able to hold a single story and now it's gone. And you still want to write. Then you fill the void with anything, evn trash. Sure, the stories will be trashy too, but they will at least be stories, don't you think? Maybe there is something there... But what kind of writer am I, if I write trashy stories? Is that writer any better than the one who robs from his dreams?

R92

Start writing, she said. Without any plan or preconception. Suprise yourself, just see what comes out. What a bunch of crap. Who ever writes like that? Kids... well there it goes, she says herself that it's not working out any longer. What am I to do? I am no longer a kid. Maybe she is right, though, maybe I should just relax and write whatever comes to my mind. But it's not easy! What if my story bends. I did write like that once and then suddenly my story ended up in a ditch along the road. That's so frustrating. I mean, really... no one should write so recklessly like that. Seriously.

At the other hand, I am itching for writing. Without any plan or goal, just to write. Is that too much to ask? Can't a man just write and let go at the sweet flow that wells straight from the subconsciousness, without even pronouncing each word as I write them.

Because once I reach that level, it will be a different kind of writing, because under the treshold of conscioussness there are treasures hidden, naked people, spurting blood, kidneys and tallow, gosh how can I even start to explain this, you see, you shouldn't be ashamed of your subconsciousness that's why it's called sub-consciousness, because it's underneath, and yet it is strange how humans can neatly manipulate it, as if there is a band between consciousness and subconsicousness, maybe in ths band the things can be shifted...

Where do stories come from, at all? Deo they arrive from subconsciousenss or preconsciousness or unconsciousness? I'll never understand...

R91

I sit in the bath tub and watch the water flowing out. I didn't do it in quite long time. Since childhood. I am enthralled by whirlpool that just disappears, the gurgling sound when water goes away. I was again amazed by the speed which bath tub loses the liquid. It seems like there is ample water, then suddenly there is none. Just a bit of foam, silver creeper that wiggles up and down the tub's spine.

Today was different. At the very moment when the drain gurgles, I hear slurred whisper. How odd, I think to myself. Imagine if at that moment when tiny black hole of the bath tub dies, imagine if then a connection with another world would form. I think to myself, hey there it is, that will be my story. Like... there is a character... like me... and he is also admiring the whirlpool in the bath tub.. and then he also hears the whisper from another world and then becomes obsessed with the maelstrom of the bath tub and repeats it countless times and records them, explores them, and then he finds words in the whispering gurgle, and then tries to communicate with the being or beings across the horizon, but he fails and sits alone and sad in the bath tub.

Just like I sit and grow sad right now, because I begin to understand that I will never write that story...

R90

I feel death.

It's not in a single of the many blades of the army that storms our castle and puts it to flame.

They are after us, hunting us. But death doesn't ride with them. Although it would probably be the end of us if we get caught, death is awaiting for us elsewhere.

I climb the wooden palace set high in treetops. I look at you in the eyes and shiver when I realise that you don't see it's the end. Deat is leaning against the rail of the balcony as we watch the rowdy enemy patrols trying to hunt us down. She just smiles at me and sips her strong turkish coffee.

"You get it now, don't you?" she looks at me with pity.

I shake my head, choking on tears that fall inside me, filling my lungs with sorrow. I am afraid of hopelesness, but even more that that, my chest was bursting with loneliness.

R89

I fell in love with a snake.

Stepping in her world I found it full of rain, mud and narrow passages. Buses crammed with children slowly traversed the barren cliffs, leaning and shaking when climbing down, empty towards abandoned sport arena.

Snake was sad, but I didn't pay too much attention to it. Thats why I didn't listen to her too carefully as I was snaking and roaming up and down the mountain side just like the buses did.

At one moment I took her and cradled her in my arms. She was surprisingly warm and instead of scales, her skin was soft like plush blankie. She went even more sad.

Tracks and clues swarmed, criminals I came to stop were at the verge of breaking. Only then I noticed that the snake is dying. Only then I realized how dear she was to me. I wrapped her gently around my neck, petting her. I cooed softly at her and she was too weak to even coil around me. She just complained that she minds the mushy words and how it would be the best if I just shut up and hurry to finish my mission.

Luckily, I woke up before she died. It gives me hope that on the other side, we are still running between the boulders and rocks, washed by the rain. That touch of my skin against her is feeding her and that she will recover enough to hiss the witty remarks once more. That she will slither away from me, pretending I didn't help her at all.

R88

I dreamed of woman with fiery hair, scary and beautiful at the same time. In my dream she was childish and serious at the same time. I wanted her to be naive and jaded at the same time. That she doesn't need me and that she can't do without me. I yearned for her to see me and that she is confused as to what is she supposed to see.

I rushed towards her. Maybe she will go away. But now I know she exists.

R87

Young slouched man enters an office decorated with diplomas, certificates and framed cover pages of magazines. His nervous tic is to remove greasy tussock of hair from his forehead while nervously blinking behind glasses rimmed with thick black nerdy frame. In youngster's tow shambles, tightly bound in chains, his novel.

In the office, behind a desk is a fat man. Seeing the youngster he almost jumps off his chair, starts stroking his beard, which could put many woodsmen to shame. He likes nerds and their shabby stories. They always fall for well practiced combo, stab or two of harsh critique, pinch of friendly advice, some balm for the ego, then comes a bait which they always swallow like big fat twats they are.

"Mladen, I presume?" asks the fat publisher, offering hand.

Very weak handhsake.

"Yes, and you are mister Zarkovic?" youngster speaks shyly.
"Of course, now sit my boy. Let's see what you have here..."

Publisher walks around the writer and his hideous story. And indeed it is even more horrible than many scribblings that fat man sees these days. Tragicomically serious title, bumbling introduction, rehashed ranting, three quarters of religious crap, six ninths of stunted ideas and preconceptions, all that coated in same kind of fantasy writer probably sucked from tv and internet, sticky-shy sex scenes, cardboard characters and very very much of whirling senselesness.

Fat man pats the withers of the story and caresses it's stinky curls flowing down the novel's back.

"Well... well... Look here. We get a lot of stories like this lately", publisher shrugs. "Everyone wants to be the next George R.R. Martin."

Youngster nervously smiles, embarassed and honored by the comment.

"Your story really needs more work, you see. Lenghty descriptions, not really making sense there, what's even this? See this spikes on the elbows, needs to be filed and chopped off, skin on the neck needs also grinding and you need to lose the tail and sixth thumb."

Every suggestions sends searing pain across youngster's face.

"However, you were smart to pick our publishing house, we can fix all of that. We will work on it, don't you worry. Overall I would say it has some potential... see you started off nicely over here..." Fat publisher points at, probably only, smooth patch of otherwise scabby and scaly monster.

Then publishers goes silent and pretends to inspect the story once more.

"So... does it mean you will publish it?"

Publisher giggles.

"Look, we already pushed several fantasy novels this season. I'm not sure there is space for one more. Although... it would really be shame to hide this beauty from the audience." Publisher stops and sighs. "How far are you ready to go..."

"Far... I'm ready to go all the way..." youngster rushes to confirm, excited with the prospect of having his writing presented to the audience.

"Well, how about this... you will pay the printing expences, which is not too much, then we will provide promo and..."

Youngster almost jumps from the chair and shakes publisher's hand. Fatso chuckles while inside he is shaking head and thinking: "Thanks God for pop-culture and all the geeky fanboys!"

R86

I'm  made of holes.

There is almost nothing between the two holes, so I lie to myself that void fulfills me.

I can't even be sad because sadness drips through the gaping emptiness and leaves me.

Sometimes, I sing. Then my voice trembles and then I am proud of myself, because I can feel something.

Fuck you.

R85

Longing
Spiderman
Rug
Love
Society
Huge
Lunch
Good smell
Deception
Choice
Dawn
Long
Sad look
Death
Church
Midnight
Hospital
Room

I felt longing when I sit on my rug. Spiderman was looking particularily happy, though of course, I couldn't see his face - it's covered with mask, you know - but he did feel so happy and filled with love, which is understandable, he is a huge hero of the society he protects. Anyway it was time for lunch and I caught whiff of very good smell, my sister, she really knows how to cook.

You know, she also looks like someone very happy and full of love, but that's a nasty deception. She is a big meanie. And I mean, everyone can be a meanie, but it is always her choice. She would spend long hours of dawn waylaying young men with their sad look and puppy eyes. Then she just breaks up with them, and I bet each of them just dies... you know full death experience, proper church burial and all...

But one midnight she just fell on the floor, noone could help her, we called 911, whisked off to the hospital. I managed to visit her once in her room and she finally didn't look happy. I was so happy for her, she could be real for once...

And now I miss her... sitting on a rug, watching Spidey smile at me...

R84

I woke up from a nightmare with kick and shout. Hugged the pillow tight despite acrid stench of sweating it over the night. I stirred under the heavy cover. Morning was peeking in through the window, but I couldn't tell the time. I hoped that I will have some time to lazy about, but then my spine tingled with discomfort.

I moved in my bed and looked at Lela at the door. She was bringing two cups of coffee and a smile. Tingling subsided leaving only itch.

"I told you not to stay up late", she giggled as she passed my cup to me.
"Hail alien" I scoffed.
"You are really looking for trouble, are you?" she smiled and slurped the sip, whacking my knee playfully. "Down that coffe, then off to wash your theet, else you get another zap!"

R83

I wanted to start with: Oh, how wonderful the dream was, but it's too much like pop-song or something equally slimey.

Thing is, it was a wonderful dream indeed! It eludes me, I can't grasp the dramaturgy. I just have flashes remaining.

There were gods and paralell universes, meditations and emerging from the water, big revelation that worlds can be traveled even without the reflection in the surfrace of water. There were gossips and intrigues and secret meetings, as well as pool parties and cocktails.

Oh, there were godesses, too. Long legged, totting firm juicy busts, there was playful splashing, laughter and debauchery that never spills into the tasteless.

Someone would say, too bad that this wonderful dream eluded me, becuase there was even a hint of a novel in there, but too much like Gayman's work, which is NOT a good thing if you ask me. So all in all, this dream is like observing the table after the feast, and those sights always bring fond memories.

R82

If he knew that it would come to this, Rustam would never ever start writing. When his sandwich bled curry spiced ketchup on his brand new shoes, inspiration struck Rustam so hard, he had to call the boss and get a day off. Rushed home and after making sure that his Italian, leather beauties will survive without permanent damage, Rustam opened his laptop.

His whole life he thought that writing is something sublime, beyond grasp of ordinary accountant like himself. It turned out it's easy-peasy. Whiteness of the screen he filled with so much symbols, so easily as if he was pouring himself wine. He didn't pause to read or correct typos that were result of his nearly hysterical tempo of typing.

Story was pale at first. Then claws, legs, feathers, bust, thin arms and wide wings that barely fit the only room of Rustam's tiny flat. Finally she nodded at him with her catlike head and showed him her hungry teeth which drooled saliva. And Rustam kept feeding her, writing line after line.

He didn't catch the exact moment of change. He would even completely miss the smudge if it didn't appear covering letter F , where starting point for left hand's fingers was on the keyboard. Under fingertips he felt something moist and thick, like curry spiced ketchup. He lifted his head just in time to duck. Story missed her clawed blow aimed at writer's temple. Rustam dived under the desk, and feathered monstrosity jumped at his desk, slamming the laptop shut.

Writer crawled, scurrying to the coat crumpled on the bed, manically seeking his phone. Story perched on the table, licking her lips. If I could only remember the phone number of Literary Police, thought Rustam.

R81

Ian Pilsudski dragged passionately the last smoke and tossed the stub out of the car window. His projectile missed the street trashcan. He tapped twice against the car door and whistled. Skinny blonde guy at the wheel nodded sharply, grinned and gunned the throttle. Moment later there was purple and yellow rotation lights and wailing sound of the siren. Literary Police was in pursuit.

"Car 451 to the Central", mumbled Pilsudski at the radio.
"Central to car 451, come in", hissed the Central.
"We report for 261 at corner of Kemish and Augustine', almost screamed Pilsudski to stay louder than siren noise.
"Central to car 451, crime in progress is 594 not 261, please confirm", screeched the Central.

Pilsudski dropped the mic and snorted with laughter. Driver joined in too, hitting the wheel a few times.

"Lazarus, can you believe these bozos?"
"Yea, boss, I'm with you, boss", chuckled the driver, overtaking a few car and running through the junction.
"Some berk is about to finish the novel and they are going soft on me!"

Ian was again on the mic.

"There better be some backup when we fly in, over!" barked the big headed detective and continued to mumble to himself "...mother.... fuck... as if we don't have enough trouble with runaway stories, neglected novelettes and wild essays, now they started writing novels, for fuck sake..."

Detective grasped the handle above the window, as Lazarus turned sharply to left and with meaowing of tires, they entered the Kemish avenue.

"Shit, my shotgun is thirsty", Pilsudski thought to himself as he reached for the weapon tucked in the holster just under his car seat.

R80

In the city, building are flourishing,
We see them when they die.
And that's it.
Death is hidden, otherwise.

In the countryside, everything is flourishing.
And dies, too.
That's why in the morning, we first count each other.
Almost as if it doesn't matter who died and why.
They simply roll you a few times in their hands.
Then they fetch the spade.
Put you on the bottom of the hole and cover with sand.

Countryside death is not less painful, just because there is so much of it visible.
But whoever dies, gets at least a few farewell tears.

R79

I love almonds. I don't nibble on them. I don't even chew them. I crush them like that machine which gobbles up a rock and then poops gravel.

As soon as I get up, before breakfast, I eat at least handful of almonds. Then by lunchtime I destroy at least half a cup. Afterwards, I fry some and use them to spice up my lunch. No nap time after lunch for me, so while I wait for the meal to digest, I crush another handful or two.

When in the late afternoon my sugar levels drop, I remedy it by drinking almond milk. It's thick and sweet. In fact it's not sweet at all, but that's my impression. It's as if it could easily be very sweet.

Before almonds, I had huge problems with my tummy and digestion. Food was simply sticking with me, while my poop was runny. But since I am eating almonds, my poop is like gravel, too. I don't want to go into details there, but it's obvious that almond saved my ass.

Thank you, almond!