Farewell to France

     I worry. Not about myself, for I have seen the Maktub before me. Yet all around I see others within their minds doing anything in the name of Money. They say everyone has a price, mine it seems is nil. A good prix, I think.
     We watched the Classic Grand Prix here, old cars roaring their song loud and proud as they careened around the track, spectators and commentators alike watching to enjoy the purr and the roar, I spot the cars on one lap then focus on the growling around me, eyes all focused on the mountains in the distance, where I should be, cold but content, actually sharpening my mind rather than sharing my thoughts and giving away my esprit to the collective.
     Spent the weekend at Pau, duped by some police acting as Russian gangsters on the lam like me, I made them early but they were still fun, using their old tricks to keep me walking with them, false camaraderie, a bruise I can't help but stab gently with a needle of longing.
   
     Things happen the way of The Way, and it was pleasant to see this old city, it's rich heritage the pride of everyone within, even fellow tramps and vagabonds cannot clutter the clean streets. Cleanliness is not always a virtue - slim pickings even for the dog-ends that others cast aside, over-zealous cleaners before me wasting the leftovers from society.
     Waiting to head back to Bayonne and still further West before breaking South to Espana, my mind recycles and re-sees events from the last two days, sat on stone stairs under starry sky, passers by tripping literally while mine remains internal. One shame-faced retiree, smack on his back before me, a moment before I could reach and catch him. He waved his ache away and stood and talked, saying whatever was on his mind content he would never see me or the others with me again: How he wished he could talk to his children, to pass on information to them, what information that was he could not say. I looked at him, weighing up the gold he had hoarded over the years - his occupation in finance taking him all over Africa, working for conglomerates squirrelling away their gold in the havens. They had paid him off handsomely and he was living the American dream in France, his eyes as sad as any other who has devoted their lives to the money God.
     He ended up giving Cabu, a fellow from the Congo who had joined the other three Baltic people a 50 euro note.

Good man Cabu!

I remember Cabu's face as he stumbled up the steps towards me, waving the paper at me like it was the Last Will and Testament of Christ, eyes as wide as a child's. "You money money man! This you! You money money!" in his Anglo-Parisian drawl. I said nothing, only shouldering my pack with the others and reclimbed the steps, once more rich people in the eyes of the world, able to walk into a shop without shifty looks and downward glances. We bought vodka, drank the bottle between us and then slept in the park. Ah, but that was the day before last, and in my reverie I forgot how I woke alone again this morning, and my train arrives in four minutes.*
     Onward, such is my dharma.

*five minutes later*

     Chagrined, I return to the waiting area. I make it to the train as it pulls in to the station, and politely wait behind the people queueing for the train. As the train stops I focus my attention on the hair of the woman in front of me, my eyes intently taking in every detail, the colour, the style, the few flecks of dandruff. I glance up and the train departs, the people still stood in place, in a line on the platform.
     As I realise they were waiting for the train after mine, the woman turns around and smiles at me. I close my eyes so as not to accidentally spread anger, and stride back, my English politeness seemingly the recipe for anguish.
     After receiving a number of messages, some public, others private, all pointing me towards Leckter (e.g. Facebook, Christine, "Remember Hannibal Lecter", apropos of nothing), I watch the first episode of the new TV series sat in the station while I wait. I enjoy it, notwithstanding the touch of the marketing department, that ensures a mass appeal to the largest demographic possible. The scene that stands out is the noble stag in Graham's dream, steam billowing from it's nostrils as black feathers start to unfurl around it. The pop psychology of labelling him as Autistic/Asperger's for being sensitive is the same paradox as labelling the cannibal as a sensitive psychopath - an emotionless person with strong emotions. The very term psychopath is merely another label to try and neatly categorise a person as an outsider to society.
     As a layman, I would say that Lecter cannot find love with anyone, regardless of gender or appearance, as the fundamental desire is  not that of lust, but of mutual interest, appreciation of the mind before the physical. Why can he not find love? What person can stay with him happily without feeling the energy he gives off, the penetration of the soul that sees too deep, repels that which is meant to help, and in it's rebuttal turns the love to hate.
     A naturally healthy interest in the physical insides of bodies is regarded as a danger sign by society, instead of nurturing this instinct towards the sciences, he finds greater love alone, his own mind the playground for happiness, but as any child knows, an empty playground is only fun for so long before loneliness sets in and the child will wander looking for a playmate.
     If the child is spurned, he will learn sadness as a reward for kindness, and is pushed onto a different path, where cruelty is key to a whole new world of pleasure.
     Remember Hannibal, they say to me? An interesting case study, no more. Ten minutes to the train. Enough catharsis for now.

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12:45, 13 May 2013, Pau, France

* On the train to Figueras, felt the need to write more. The morning after the vodka in the park, I awake with Edgar, Jean and Yvetta, Cabu having disappeared in the night. We head to the Supermarché and take a wholesome breakfast - baguette, salt butter, Camembert, herring, crisps, chocolate biscuits. We eat heartily in our previous bed for the night; nestled between some trees, and wander around to the station, to charge my laptop and their phones, and while away the day before we should head south to Spain together. I already know this isn't going to happen, but I feel it to be in everyone's best interests if I pretend to be ignorant.
Cabu wanders in after about an hour, smiling and clapping. "Let's go let's go! Mange!" swigging from an coke bottle. "Whiskey!" We pass the bottle round and take the lift back into town.

View from the Cable Car. Not taken while having one of my turns.

In the lift I sit with Cabu, a mother and her two children enter next to us. Cabu starts talking happily with the children, they respond, happy but shy. I say bonjour to the mother who tells me she lives in Espana.
"Donde en Espana?" I enquire.
"Lyon."
My head hurts. I haven't slept the night before and my isolation feels total. "Lyon es en France." I say, rubbing my temple. "No no, Lyon en Espana. Near Orleans." I feel my anger building, yet once again powerless to direct it outwards I turn around and stare out the rear window of the cable car, trying to focus on the panoramic view that would cheer me normally, although this time I find myself speaking something to Cabu. I don't remember what I was mumbling but I remember him urging me in French to remain calm, that we were nearly at the top, etc. Normally I would laugh at the treatment but I hold on to the rage, striding out immediately as the car reaches the top of the hill next to the grand prix course. I still don't know why the woman said what she did, or why it had the effect it did.
Perhaps because I wanted to shout at her, don't treat me like a infant, I'm not as stupid as you all want me to be. I pull the straps of my backpack deeper into my aching shoulders, the pain a welcome distraction from the uncomfortable emotion. We wander for an hour, me picking cigarette butts off the floor and emptying them into my pouch, the rest bumming them off random passers by. We head to another shop and buy some wine along with some food, then back to the jardin for the afternoon.
After our meal Yvetta rolls a joint and passes it round, me not getting any after everyone else has smoked. I think so that's how it is, and decide to climb the tree we are sitting near. I climb for 10-15 minutes before jumping down and wandering off. I sit on a bench next to two guys from Georgia and have a joint to myself. Eventually the others wander over and they all talk in Russian. I follow some of the conversation but get bored of their gang music, different Russian prisoners and the stuff they have done apparently.
I walk out the other way leaving them all behind and see a man in the shadows of a bus stop and a heavy set French woman talking and smoking. After the typical "You want to buy?" shit we start talking and eventually the woman goes into a car opposite and brings out a box. "Gift for you" she says. It's a French army 24 hour ration pack. I can hardly believe my luck, and thank them profusely. The man gestures over the road. For the first time I notice the building is a prison.
I say goodbye to them both with hearty goodwill, and walk over to the prison, leaving my pack at the bus station, my head full of gratitude to the extended family. I hear shouts of "Salaam" from within the walls, mixed with the rest of the shouting. I shout back whatever springs to mind, the cries intensify. I start knocking a beer bottle against the wall in time to my steps around the perimeter, "Salaam" "Salaam" "Salaam". I pause for a few seconds then continue, changing the shout to "One love". One prisoner shouts "It's right!" and I laugh and dance down the road, feeling the anger at being caged up, at being treated like an animal. I smash the bottle to cheers, and walk down the centre of the road. A black car screeches round the corner, heavy bass pounding from the windows. He stays in the centre too, I'm high as a kite on the night itself and think pouillon!
Spinning round, singing and dancing the car swerves around me at the last second, the driver leaning out the window and shouting abuse. I flash the international sign for metal and kick at a railing like a muay thai champ. I walk around the block unknowingly, following my instinct, a cop car drives past and I leer at them, hood pulled up. They stare back stone faced, but drive on. I walk back to the bus stop, empty now, and see my pack with the rations still sat on top. I put away the supplies and walk back to the park. On the grass I start spinning around, my pack's inertia spinning me faster than I could normally go, and I circle strafe back to where we slept last night, thoughts of Sufi's in my brain.
Only Cabu is there, snoring soundly. I put down my pack and prepare to sleep for the night, not much to prepare since losing my sleeping bag and using a towel and two jackets as a makeshift duvet. A short while after, still awake, Cabu wakes and says something groggily I don't understand, before getting up and dressing. "Eau! Aqua! Come on let's go!" I rub my eyes,  telling him that it's Sunday night, all the shops closed at damn near lunchtime and there is no drinking fountain/tap in the park. "Gare! (station) Come on let's go!" I tell him I'll wait here for him and he walks off. I wake early, alone, and return to the station. On my way I find the pocket knife/corkscrew I lent them at a water tap next to the station, and smile briefly. Hmm...quite an addendum.

19:32, just passed the Spanish border, en route to Figueras