Friday, December 7, 2012

They don't take, they bring!

There are those funny coincidences. One morning at the subway we met with the girl next door, who, on seeing that I came with bike, asked me whether I was not afraid to leave it there closed down all the day. (I touch wood, but for ten years nothing has happened to it, although I use it a lot.) On the same day, by late at night, when I picked it up in front of the plaza, someone left a nice little lined cap on the package carrier.

Then I also love when people are kind only for the sake of the good feeling, like this morning the public worker who wished me a good way and told me to watch out because the roads are very slippery.



the Peace Fountain at Tahi Street, on 7 December 2012 in the morning

Monday, December 3, 2012

Something is missing from here


To be sure, it’s primarily the economic crisis, and only secondarily the environmental thinking which causes such profound shifts in cultural consumption. But this change also has a positive side, such as the appearance of the “book stations” spreading from Western Europe. The simple idea is that everyone can bring the book he/she does not need any more to the bookshelves set in a public space, without getting any money for it, and he/she can also take from the books left there (take a book / leave a book). I guess it will sooner or later run out, as more people want to take out from the public goods than as many want to contribute, but this belongs to the structure of the thing. The measure of the success is whether their consumption runs down in hours, days or weeks.

So, on Friday we were glad to see that they have established a Book Station in the Danube Mall.
We also made a couple of rush photos – later all of them resulted unfocused –, as a preparation to write about it here on the blog. The first mall of the capital has never belonged to the really busy shopping centers, but nowadays the buyers just linger in it, sometimes I have the impression that the people working there are more than those going there to buy.
A sign of the restructuring of consumption is the spread of second-hand clothing stores in the malls. Here, a Háda shop runs a spectacular traffic. And now it seemed to me that with the bookcase a real community social function has also appeared, which does not produce profit, but can increase a little bit the popularity of the place and through it, the traffic as well (smaller exhibitions are also usually here, all kind, from lego to old timers).

In the weekend I have also collected some books, which I felt I do not need, but I was surprised to see this morning that the bookshelf has disappered, and the place was now occupied by a Santa Claus with dishevelled teeth, a representative of the popular Prof or Hobo series. He was kindly regretting when he saw that I carried a basket of books in vain.


On the way to work there was another book station at the Kassák Lajos Museum in Óbuda (the book stations in Óbuda also have a facebook page), but when entering the yard, I felt that nobody would ever come here, so I have finally put them down in the depressing Flórián Square, I think they will quickly take them away from here.
How good it would be to have such a permanent place, don’t you think? Where could we find a place for it, where many people go up and down, and they would also spread its fame?