It’s been nearly a month since I’ve returned from Europe. I spent the about 27 days there, lost in foreign dialects, eating some rather lovely food, and trying to hang on to the moments and figure out how to make it last. But there’s no way to do that. It was the second time I had been and Europe lost all of its luster. Not just Europe, though…my entire concept of the foreign was polished, uncovered, and exposed for everything that it was not.
Things started sinking in a few minutes after I had landed in Milan. I had been in Europe for the better part of an hour, at most, and I had been making the effort to soak it all up, suck every drop of marrow from the bone, et cetera. That’s when it started. It wasn’t a ton of bricks or a sweeping epiphany, but a slow, steady corrosion. People are the same, intrinsically. I listened really close at the airport and heard a number of languages mix, mingle, and dance across my eardrums.
Upon closer inspection, though, I realized that this was the same inane, self-important, unabashed bullshit that America was full of. Italian businessmen–only a little thinner and much better dressed than their American counterparts–were discussing business training exercises and contingency scenarios. Sitting in Lyon and going out with friends of friends–most of them European or, at least, foreign–I found that the conversation wasn’t more profound, or heady, or worthwhile. It was, quite simply, the same old shit in a different tongue.
The last blow came just a few days into the visit. I walked into Carrefour, a rather popular French hypermarket. On one floor, all manner of foods could be found: cheese, bread, veggies, unrefrigerated milk (they don’t refrigerate milk, as I don’t believe it goes through pasteurization process), and a number of other goods–including “Mexican” food (bad tortillas, really thick corn chips, and a number of other things that makes a native New Mexican giggle and weep simultaneously). On the next, aisles and aisles of clothes, minor consumer appliances, and everything else you could want or need.
This wasn’t the romantic Sunday market with vendors lining the river peddling their wares. This wasn’t a local business located on lazy cobblestone streets. This wasn’t even the snooty French merchant looking down upon my Americanism. This was out-and-out consumerism–a teeming, seething, expanding mass of rampant capitalism. It was as if WalMart, engorged and excited from the never-ending orgy of consumption in America, had ejaculated across the Atlantic ocean, droplets of its seed splattering over my idealized plains of Europe. What’s more, people were shopping here.
That’s when it set in. It wasn’t a sense of revulsion, or disgust, or even mild distaste. It was sheer and utter disappointment at realizing that most everything is the same. It was as if Europe had been laid out before me in a shiny, “The Price is Right”-esque manner. I had chosen door number 1 and been disappointed. Bob gave me another chance. With frantic hope, I went to doors number 2 and 3–Prague, Amsterdam–and it was no different.
What happened in Europe was an epiphany, but it was the kind of epiphany that’s behind something like a magic trick. The beauty of a magic trick is in the not knowing. As long as you remain ignorant, the process is mystical and intriguing. Even if your reason tells you that nothing magical is really going on, you still like it. But the moment it is explained and the phenomenon is understood, it is no longer a magic trick. It is neat. Fun. Kind of cool. But the magic is gone.
And that is Europe, in a nutshell: neat, fun, kind of cool. The magic is gone.
But there is an irony here. The irony is that the same mystery and magic that lured you into Europe is the same thing that disappears as you satisfy it. Kind of like mediocre sex, the entire process left me spent, satisfied, but not thirsting for more. Not wanting to do it again right away, as soon as I can physically will myself back into a viable state. Instead, you roll over and go to sleep.
And that’s the way it is, the second time around.
February 11th, 2007
by Christopher
“It was as if WalMart, engorged and excited from the never-ending orgy of consumption in America, had ejaculated across the Atlantic ocean, droplets of its seed splattering over my idealized plains of Europe.”
Great quote. It is unfortunate that capitalism has made us all into consumeristic driven dehydrated man in the desert humans scrambling around trying to find meaning in that which is fashionable by the uber-capitalists who dictate through the advertising medium.
On the one hand, it appears that Europe is starting to play catch-up; on the other hand, we should weep for the loss of our innocence.
Capitalistic greed is slowly becoming like Original Sin. There will be no going back to any system before it because the poor want to believe that they can achieve this dream too, and so they don’t want to vote to penalize the rich that they so desperately want to become. This is our future and is sad.
February 12th, 2007
by bieblog
Maybe you should try someplace less …um… European. Capitalism will follow you everywhere you go in some shape or form but if you want a more alienating travel experience that will shake you out of your comfort zone, try West Africa, India, or some parts of Latin America. Yes, unfortunately Walmart is taking over China and Mexico and Carrefour is long established in Brazil. But if you get out of the main cities, you can leave those monstrosities behind.
And I agree with Christopher’s assessment of the quote above. Nicely put.
February 12th, 2007
by MyNameIsMatt
Capitalism is easy, culture is hard. Finding those great spots in a foreign country is just like finding great places at home, you need to search a bit, you have to go off the beaten path. The first time is usually easy because even the “Walmarts” of European will feel different. Still, I sympathize. It’s a saddening when you realize just what you have, but hopefully that’ll give you more drive to find those few, but precious places.
Great writing by the way.
February 14th, 2007
by Heather
I’ve been giggling under my breath for the duration of this post. It’s great isn’t it?
I was in a Billa ( an Austrian coroporate “supermarket”) this morning, thinking about all this shit.
In Prague I was pretty successful in trying to only go places that were not so Americanized and Coroporate. I went to the movie theater- and there was no way to pretend I was in the states- but all the differences were in the details- and could have been easily overlooked if hadn’t wanted to look for them.
I was talking to this Slovenian man over dinner about why I came to Europe… how I had been waiting forever to get here and now I was here- it wasn’t going the way I had imagined so much- it was different than in my head. He reiterated: “You had this romantic idea of Europe… like it was some magical place…” I could only smile. And while I have been cleaning my ass up out of the gutter of disillusionment on that one all week- I couldn’t exactly concede that all the magic was gone- it was just not as coruscant… like- I was slightly disapointed that when I stepped off the plane that the ceiling didn’t rain down in scintillations where upon refocusing my gaze I was suddenly in a luscious garden, reposed on a velvet chase lounge surrounded by Italian men bringing glasses of Monvedre to my mouth while kissing my neck.
Yeah- it was just a whole bunch of people with some place to go- and I was acutally there and all the images in my head of what it was going to be like sort of started fading right then and there.
But like I said- all the magic isn’t dead. Lost on the tiny cobblestone streets of Hradcany in the rain- it was- it was sort of magical- tainted somehow- maybe, because there was no point to the magic… “so I’m on the winding little street- and the setting has so much potential… and now what?” and you get that moment of just being there for three seconds or something and you move along and then you see the Golden Arch and the arrow (40km) and you think “fuck it” and consider planning a trip to Butan- ’cause it’s like the last place on the Earth that you can’t get a fucking happy meal.
I’m rambling in your blog. Sorry. Maybe next time you should go further into Eastern Europe. It’s cheap and covered in graffiti and I’m hearing great things. I’ll be saving all of my salary to take excursions there all year- the Adriatic coast in Croatia, Belarus, Bratislava, Ljubhjana, whereever- you are more than welcome to join me.
H
Oh and the bit about Wal-mart spunk was classic- fucking fantastic, really.