A drink in Munich
Thinking at the lifestyle I have left behind me, there are seldom any complains. I will have to start from the scratch the project of a new established life, but no alternatives are available in the short term horizon. During the last days of democracy of my home country, before the Prime Minister had resigned and the Party took over the power, the opposition has been cornered and smashed into pieces. Brainwashing has followed. Just the necessary time to infiltrate men loyal to the new regime with key positions among the financial, cultural and military institutions. Some of my fellows have been already awaken, others will be soon shaken by the illusion they were living. It will be too late. I am far away, even their voices cannot reach me anymore.
I have just ordered a drink in a fancy bar in Munich, on the other side of the Iron Curtain, far away from the exhibitions on the positive contribution of the Communist Party to the democratic development of my former homeland. People are discussing all around me. Happy workers drugged by social security provided by a powerful state and a stable economy. I am quite puzzled that I still do not find myself comfortable. I will have to get acquainted to the local culture. Yet any link to the regime I have so closely managed to escape still gives me the chill and strengthens my will to fire back. Some days, somewhere, I will fire back.
It is an oath I have taken before fleeing my country, a promise never made to the only one who has ever loved me and suddenly disappeared behind the Iron Curtain. I still feeling some hatred, but in absence of a colleague spying on you, or friends who forcefully support the lynching of the latest elected scapegoat, on the ground of a message twitted by the reborn Symbionese Liberation Army, my life is acquiring different priorities. My spirit is going to forget everything about that.
I would have let the remembrance of a forced low income fade away as a nightmare. The waiter reaches my table carefully serving a small bottle of tonic and a glass half filled with gin. I took the coaster in my hands, turned it around and discovered that the liquor was labelled with the portrait of Che Guevara. Almost astonished, I realized that the war is not over, I am just playing it from a well trenched position