025 II. Now Here. Asian Dub Foundation, Bcn, 1995. It is a hangover Saturday morning and I sneak into the subway as effortlessly as usual. It only takes a little shrink of my flat belly to slide between the metal barrier and its anorexic-friendly gap: more than this, nothing fits; more than this, there is nothing. Actually, more than this there is a slightly unprofessional sense of timing. It is 4pm and the interview is set in fifteen minutes. I’m sleepless and late: I’m twelve underground stops from my destination when I realise I don’t have batteries in my borrowed tape recorder, the fundamental reason for the tachycardia that is about to hit me. I saw the band playing live last night in a venue named after a sandwich, which was poetically fitting, since one of the members is named after a Turkish roll, Shuarma. It was a roaring, thunderous gig. The crowd let rip: they danced with their fists and knees raised, as if celebrating the fusion between ska and ragamuffin; slavery and freedom. At one point, Shuarma grabbed the microphone and said something that no one understood. Then he put his hands on his head and began to sob. The fragility of the prophet conveyed the public’s empathy, rather capable of translating his body language than his words. Shuarma had a lot of sad things to say about their adoptive country, a gloomy place called England. He used the words of a greater prophet: “The Revolution will not be televised”; then added: “the island will be gutted.” It was a very fine gig, but it lasted until 1am, and I missed my bus home. I had to wait six hours for the next one and it was too cold to sleep rough, so I had the brilliant idea of going to the closest squat house to get some rest. I met a bunch of Saint Petersburg anarchist drinkers of endless nostrils, and passed out around noon for ten minutes, before realising that they were bleaching my hair and tattooing my arm with a rather predictable, encircled A. “Don’t get so carried away, it will help you with the interview”, they said when I started shouting. Today I could have them jailed as tattoo rapists and hair offenders for that. But back then; you could even get away with paedophilia if you were wearing a Catholic robe. Before passing out, I told the Petersburgers that most of Asian Dub Foundation members were of South East Asian background, and that they were well known as outspoken and efficient political activists. Last year one of their lyrics went viral and its protagonist, a freedom fighter from Bangladesh, was released from prison due to the global impact of the song. I reflect on what I did last year and I feel even more weightless. I count an abortion, one arrest and no love. Nobody wrote a song to get me out of jail, but then again I didn’t have to go to jail, it was just a house arrest —for stealing three Spanish Constitutions, a few criminal codes and a few books on Roman Law, all of them seized from the fanciest legal bookstore in town, in order to subsequently selling them at half price to my Law Degree classmates. Petersburger.
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