Desperate for a pee, Sjaak Langenberg and Rosé de Beer find themselves down a side road somewhere in Normandy. As he’s peeing against a tree, they discover an information sign showing a watercolour by Eugène Delacroix.
This completely randomly picked piss-stop turns out to be hanging in the Louvre. So, are there any places left that have never been written about, villages that aren’t in the guide books?
In his forthcoming book which has the working title Wildplassen met Delacroix (Taking a leak with Delacroix) Sjaak Langenberg investigates how one can relate to one’s predecessors now that even the back of beyond has been provided with several layers deep of meaning and Google is making a brain scan of our planet every millisecond. Each object, every place, each and every person has been captured in the thousands of interpretations of objects, places and people that exist. Everything has snowballed, each and every idea is immediately estranged from its origin.
‘Through Monet we see the sea for the first time in all her facets,’ claimed a critic in his time.
Nowadays, liberating things from their interpretation seems to be the motto.
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More travel essays (Dutch only) |
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‘No waiting at any time except taxi’s’, says the sign next to the reserved parking spaces at the market in Richmond in the English county of North Yorkshire. We have arrived in Richmond by way of the Yorkshire Dales, where I continually expect to see a concealed James Herriot in position behind every sheep crossing the road. I have raced through this historical market town, around the outer walls of Richmond castle, through the covered market, past the queue for the Georgian Theatre Museum, and back to the market where The Green Howards’ Museum relates the history of that regiment, which is still stationed here. Richmond is not just a beautiful historical place but also a place of military significance. At the edge of the town is an enormous military complex where the 2nd Battalion of The Yorkshire Regiment is stationed. In the museum, the campaigns and wars in which the regiment was involved, are commemorated: the Crimean War, the Hazara Campaign, the Battle of Ginnis, the Tirah Campaign, the South African War, the Battle of Paardeberg, the third Afghan War of 1919, WW I and WW II and the Gulf war. Beyond the walls of the museum there is the reality of Iraq and Afghanistan and Richmond is situated close to the battlefield. Yet because barracks are an unconquerable stronghold successfully excluding the gaze of the outsider, one can remain almost unaware of this fact. Somehow or another, my association with barracks is not of shooting, but of waiting. Soldiers are trained chiefly in this art form.
Waiting is for me also the main occupation - as Rosé takes her turn exploring the town, I guard the car full of holiday luggage. Whilst waiting, I watch others who are waiting; the taxi drivers of Richmond, their cabs lined up neatly before the entrance to The Green Howards’ Museum, Trotters Tearooms and Williams Coffee House - ‘simply exquisite’. People who stay still are good for watching. When they’re not busy chasing after life, filling their hours with activities which appear only to camouflage the pointlessness of existence, they suddenly reappear from the fray as real people. From a guidebook I learn that in 1132 thirteen monks came to Ripon, North Yorkshire, to lead a simpler life. An isolated valley thus became the place where one of the wealthiest abbeys of the Middle Ages would arise. Waiting is no easy task. A lot of people have great difficulty with it. The taxi drivers in Richmond do it with zeal.
In front of the door of Peter’s Bakery, roles have been reversed: Superman has been rescued by a woman with shopping bags. A middle aged man in a Superman T-shirt is being kissed passionately by the woman. Not a single taxi driver notices. The word ‘Slow’ on the tarmac warns drivers in England of approaching bends. The taxi drivers of Richmond have taken this warning to heart. Life passes them tranquilly by.
Watching more closely, some ripples do appear on the surface. The taxi stand is a barracks. Taxi wars are being fought here. The most important indication of a feud is gleaned when I observe a one-man business on wheels. This cab driver obviously doesn’t belong. His colleagues are chatting a few cars ahead of him. He opts for solitariness. He bites his nails, sends a text-message, turns up the music, rolls down a window and rolls it up again, and stares into the middle distance. An older woman stumbles and falls, her right knee thumping the cobblestones of the marketplace. The taxi drivers are so deep in discussion with one another that they pay her no heed. Only once the woman has been helped to her feet and, clutching a mans hand, staggers in the direction of Barrie’s Soft Cornish Ice Cream, do they look up. A customer? One of them detaches himself from the discussion and opens the door for his temporary guest. The taxis all slide one place forward. They’re putting kaizen [Japanese business philosophy] into practice: in order to achieve big things, take small steps, the better to lead your fear reflex up the garden path. The solitary cab driver moves his taxi forward without putting his hands on the wheel. He’s reading a book, and does so even whilst moving the car. Now there’s a ‘Frontline Taxis’ cab behind him. The letters of the logo are set off against a camouflage background. Richmond’s taxi wars are being fought in silence. .
© Sjaak Langenberg, 2010. All rights reserved. This text is intended solely for personal use. No part of this publication may be reproduced or displayed without prior written permission from the author.
