Korridorium

♫ Ohoominogs ♫

17/398

I enter the corridor: One small hop for mankind, but for a little squirt like me, one giiiant step.

♫ New in the Area ♫

35/398

I enter the corridor. Once again. It’s almost as if I do it anew every day, stepping into the same corridor repeatedly: the one leading to the philosophy faculty. But is that even possible? No. It just seems that way. The self is no longer the one from yesterday, and even less so from last year. And although the corridor looks like the one I know and is very familiar to me—complete with the scuff marks left by the metal filing cabinets on the tiles when the secretary’s office moved, and including the stale smell from the time when smoking was still allowed here—it also cannot be the same one as yesterday.

The illusion is perfect. I could swear that I’ve already taken these exact steps here before, that these exact thoughts have crossed my mind. Even at gunpoint, I could not be forced to perceive all of this as new and unspoiled. Although: in a life-threatening situation or knowing that I am entering this corridor for the last time and will lose my life in a few moments, maybe then?

For, as the ancient saying goes, “One cannot step into the same corridor twice. Even the souls rise, as it were, from the corridors by exhalations.”

♫ Sneak Peak ♫

43/398

“I enter the corridor hostel at about midnite. If not for the late night, we would have moved to another hostel right away. The hostel is very run down (feeling of eerie) and luckily tow guys who happened to stay there came to help us with the luggage. And worst, we could not even found our room no! And when I went to use the bathroom, the doorknob dropped off and I was nearly locked inside.”

1 out of 5 stars Rooms
1 out of 5 stars Cleanliness
2 out of 5 stars Location
1 out of 5 stars Check-in/Reception

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♫ Big Descent ♫

53/398

I enter the corridor. The bathrooms have got to be around here somewhere. One last piss before the big show. In the hall, they’re going wild, dancing on the tables. My “business partners.” Time to fire them up and whip them into a frenzy. Soon, Tina Turner’s “Simply the Best” will blast over the speakers, and then I’m going to pull the strings.

Urinals are clean enough. I guess you can expect that from a five-star hotel, considering the price. Am I wired? Yeah, I’m wired! Love it. It’s going to go perfectly. The suit fits; this gold tie has always brought me luck. I’m going to blow them out of their seats. Do I have the talking points down?

“Better than any orgasm.” My opener. And then, for the 350 salesmen in the hall: “What happens out there on the front lines—that’s determined by you, by every single person in this room.” Briefly mention the firing of the executive board—don’t harp on it, obviously—just move straight to truth, justice, ethics. That’s what we stand for. “Either someone is a hundred percent committed to the cause, or they can go to hell. We want to enlighten Germany. We need personalities who serve as role models.” Always remember to swear the room into the company ethos: “We have one goal, and that goal is double-digits. We need to train new business partners for this war.” And if there are any doubters in the hall regarding the fund returns—aside from those vultures from the TV media—well then, here: “A product with double-digit returns—I swear to you: that day will come, as sure as I’m standing here.” Let’s look at it soberly: if they believe in me, they believe in the cause. And to finally make those press flacks shut their mouths: “We don’t make promises, we have goals!” Let them chew on that for a while.

Wash hands! I want to walk out of here with clean hands. And those assholes who throw dirt at us? I’ll tear them apart one by one. “Stupidity like that should be fatal.” But always remember that the broadside from the press is exactly what inspires and motivates me to fight even harder for what’s good and right. Crucial! Then I can really let loose, and no one can touch me. Just don’t screw up the belfry bit again. Bats, they say—bats in the belfry! Speaking of which, let’s see if I can work in that bit about the brothel. Hookers instead of a 401(k), if you’re going to piss your money away anyway. And we pull in more returns than they do, regardless.

Hey, that’s me in the mirror above the sink. Yeah, Strike! “I can look in the mirror every morning and every night—even naked—and say: You’re the man!”

If I lose my place, I’ll just rail against the Church again, or the lottery, or the media tax and public broadcasting. Works every time. The Wikipedia reference: “Christianity is the world’s largest cult.” Is that still on there? Whatever. “So: get out! Give me the money instead.” Guaranteed laugh. And when it comes to the lottery, take no prisoners: “If I were dictator, everyone in charge of that would be dead. Everyone should have three baseball bats in their car: one aluminum, one wood, one plastic. Swing away. Stupidity like that has to be eradicated. Where’s the radical with the airplane?” When I’m wired like this, there won’t be a dry eye in the house. “That’s how you have to deal with these assholes, right?” If it gets too graphic, I can always bleep it out of our promo video later. The main thing is that the room is boiling, and our crew can’t wait to swarm out and push our product on the masses.

At the very end, get all moral and harp on responsibility: “Where are we when there is injustice in the world?” Then off the stage with—uh, what was I going to close with? What was the big thing that welds us all together as front-line fighters? My new buzzword, the new mythos for us? Right: “This is how I see us now: the Robin Hood of financial services.”

Okay, one last polish of the company logo on the lapel. “Simply the Best” is playing in the hall at full volume. That’s my cue. Yeah, let’s get this party started!

Quotes: Daniel Shahin, Carpediem GmbH, June 5, 2011

♫ Arrivo tardivo ♫

59/398

I enter the corridor and pull the door shut behind me. The noise of the party is muffled into a dull murmur. Taking a deep breath, I remove my mask. I’ve never been in this part of the castle before. It’s likely a passage for servants leading to the kitchen. I open one of the windows to let the fresh air dry the sweat on my forehead. It feels as if we’ve spent weeks here behind closed doors with the drawbridge raised, indulging ourselves in unrestrained revelry.

In the window glass, I see a blue discoloration of the skin near my collar, but I attach no further significance to it. Instead, I curiously examine the small, tied bundle on the windowsill. I unfold a long black cloak in which a mask, a large hourglass, and a scythe are wrapped—the handle of which folds out. I drape the cloak over my shoulders and suddenly feel young and full of purpose again, even daring a few small dance steps and pirouettes. The mask depicts a skull. Mine has become useless; I simply toss it out the window. It lands somewhere in the depths of the courtyard, lying in a darkness the pale moonlight cannot reach.

The scythe in my right hand gives me a good feeling. The clock strikes. It is time to go back among the revelers.

♫ Sonochronic Contradictions ♫

80/398

I enter the corridor—the orchestra has already begun—and hasten into the hall. To reach my seat, I must squeeze through the otherwise fully occupied second row. As I do, the music crashes against me like a jungle of incoherent tones, following no recognisable form. Must I really endure this? “Avant-garde”—that subtitle on the programme should have made me suspicious. I truly wish to leave, yet I am as if paralysed, steadily losing the sensation of my own body as the music expands. It begins to flow between the intervals of the accustomed semitones—not merely into quarter-tones, but “centitones” and “millitones.” To the untrained ear, it is torture; but for me, within me, something has shifted. I now perceive with mounting interest the various musical forms bustling within the sound.

It is astonishing: these sound-figures live and move freely through the world of tones, drifting apart and drawing near to one another. I realise with amazement that the two dimensions of this world are, on one hand, pitch, and on the other, the timbres arising from harmonic overtones. Every living creature in this sound universe possesses its own colouration, even if some are adept at camouflaging themselves.

One of these sound-creatures seems very close to me, and suddenly the realization hits: That’s me! In this world of vibrations and frequencies, I possess my own body; I am part of this acoustic habitat! When one of the sound-beings nudges me and I feel a sharp pain, I learn that I can change my musical form and move through this jungle of tones, through the dense musical vegetation. I can even absorb small sound-figures into my own form—as if I were strolling through a garden, snacking on tasty-looking apples or raspberries.

A deep growl makes my heart skip a beat: a hunter is prowling the jungle, searching for prey with its whirring sound-tentacles. I flee, but the hungry creature has already spotted me. I hide my sound-body in the musical vegetation of our habitat, but my camouflage is useless. I narrowly escape a searching tentacle by climbing higher. I am limited, however; I manage to rise a few octaves, but then the sounds begin to thin out in the high registers. The predator rumbles restlessly back and forth directly beneath me in the low registers, until a tiny melodic fragment falls from the vegetation I’m clinging to and betrays me. With a piercing arpeggio, one of its tentacles reaches me and digs deep into the sound-pattern of my flesh. The greedy growl pulls me down toward it, octave by octave…

I let out a death cry.

The music dies away. A few violins play on, but the conductor has turned towards me, and the entire audience is staring. “I am sorry,” I mumble, standing up and pushing through the row to flee the hall.

I can still hear the conductor calling out a bar number to his orchestra to resume the piece. The music rises once more. But I run on, further and further, without collecting my coat from the cloakroom—simply away from here, into the open air.

There is no music here. The street noises are refreshing, washing over my ears like a welcome downpour. Everything is a rush of cars and roaring motorcycles; in the distance, I hear a siren, and above me, an aeroplane. I come to a halt in the midst of this wonderful clamour. A roar draws closer—the deep growl of a powerful engine. A bus thunders at great speed along the street, bearing down on the spot where I stand. I face it, arms flung wide to the sky, thanking the heavens for my rescue…

Based on Olaf Stapledon’s “A World of Sound” (1936).

♫ The Unsound Communiqué ♫

88/398

I enter the corridor, and immediately I encounter—how shall I describe it?—a shroud of glassy frost through which vision blurs and sounds, if they penetrate at all, are only muffled. Those who sit behind this veil—whatever I attempt to shout to them for dictation, for verbatim transmission, they commit to paper only reluctantly and, at times, obtusely.

How am I to deliver the proof to you while this remains my sole means of passing on the message? I cannot possibly know how much of what I send actually reaches you. How can I convince you? My ongoing efforts are met with untold difficulties, and this sense of dreadful powerlessness weighs heavily upon me. Oh, it is a dark and cruel corridor! But I will not—I simply must not—falter in my endeavor…

Myers

♫ Malinger’s Eldorado ♫

162/398

I enter the corridor that other wanderers before me have chowed into the mountain of rice pudding. Side passages branch off, but I scurry along the main tunnel, trying to outpace the viscous mess slowly oozing down.

Once I make it to the other side of the mountain, a fantastic world unfolds before me. I always thought it was just a fairy tale: the land where roasted pigeons fly right into your mouth and a quick “Psst!” makes fish leap into your hand. But it’s real! Around every house is a fence woven from bratwurst, you get a guilder for every hour you sleep, and yawning earns you a double thaler on top!

Still, as much as I wander around searching, I can’t find a single hotspot. Not even a modem connection can be found. When it comes to tech, this place is a real backwater—or back-mountain, if you will. Well, back I go, I guess. Hopefully, the tunnel through the rice pudding is still passable.

♫ Fabelbeben ♫

171/398

I enter the corridor, clutching a loaf of homemade bread. Misfortune dogs my every step, but today, I intend to turn the tide of my destiny. I will finally confront the Fate who has plagued me with disasters of every kind throughout my life. Will I succeed in winning her over? Will my offering soften her heart?

Ignoring the countless side passages, I follow the main corridor hewn into Mount Dikti. It leads deep into the mountain’s heart, where the Fates are said to dwell. But even here, I sense impending doom. She will not leave me in peace, not even here! The familiar, hateful constriction tightens in my chest, growing stronger and stronger—a sure sign that she intends to make life miserable for me and everyone around me once again.

With what this time? Wild beasts? A flood? A drought followed by famine? A plague? Pirate raids? Defeat in war?

No.

An earthquake. The mountain roars and shudders, throwing me to the ground as the bread slips from my grasp. Terror-stricken, I crawl back toward the daylight. I narrowly escape the falling debris, and no sooner have I made it out onto the rocky ledge than the corridor leading to the Fates collapses. I hear screams—or is it the screech of shattering stone?

Suddenly, all is quiet. Only a few small stones trickle down the mountainside. I can hardly believe it: the oppression that has ruthlessly shadowed me my entire life has left me. It feels as though it will never return.

Filled with new courage, I begin the journey back to the city—to the palace, to my deformed brother, and to my family.