So this is the text.
"Hello, everybody reading or watching,
this is probably one of the most fascinating and maybe even touching stories you have ever heard and it´s not one of these hollywood stories, it´s a true story.
It´s at first, of course, a boy-meets-girl-under-a-silver-moon-and-then-the-moon-explodes story (a Douglas Adams quote and yes it has a lot to do with him), it´s the story about a guy - a nice guy, who believed in love and justice - who´s love was so great, that he wanted to give his girl the sun and the moon, if they were his to give (which they aren´t of course, it´s just an expression romantic fools love), it´s the story of his greatest love and joy and yet - at the same time, the story of his deepest and darkest despair.
(For, we don´t live in the times of Shakespearean romanticism no more, we live in the times of Meeto, feminism and wokism, in times Snow-White tells the prince, who had kissed her to get lost, that he "is a stalker" and that she never "consented to this kiss", which was "forced" on her.)
Well, so far, you still may think, you´ve read a lot of stories like this, but this is only where it begins.
So, the boy, and yes it´s me, the author of this story, met this girl and charmed her with a nicely done CD full of romantic cover-songs first - for I am sure not all too bad with the guitar and singing, though of course I still am an amateur - and so we dated and hugged and fell in love, but there were other guys of course - there are always other guys - and she kept me waiting, then.
So, of course, I wrote her a song, with the catchy phrase "I´m waiting, filled with longing, I´m waiting for a year, I´m waiting for half of my life, for I love you so much" and I also - for I am a writer - wrote her an entire book, for that´s what writers do, especially, when they are madly in love.
Again, you perhaps may think, well, yes, this is what artists do, they write their girls songs, they write their girls books, right, instead of working 9-5, like all others do. But - wait!
Anyway, artists are mostly poor, so was I, and so she was not that much amused about me not having finished my medical studies and becoming a trained masseur, instead (I mean, isn´t that what women always dream about, to have their own masseur?), and neither impressed her my four novels about cab-driving, that were so nicely written, that even our - leftist, admittedly - ex-foreign minister, who had also been a cab-driver like me, found them highly amusing.
(Oh, now you see! Who wants a cab-driver, even if he claims to be the, rightfully, most famous one in the world!)
Again, nor was she impressed by my re-translations of all five volumes of the Hitch-Hikers Guide to the Galaxy - Douglas Adams, there we go - nor my, unauthorised, sixth volume, that I had just freshly written, nor my English translation of it, for the book was originally written in German, for - you may have guessed already, why else would I write and talk in English - I am German. (So excuse me, if this language here may seems a little odd from time to time, it´s not my odd personality, it´s that I am not a native speaker.)
Yes, I was right in the process of translating this sequel, when I met her!
Translating the second best H2G2-sequel ever written (or else money back, hahah) - into English, when I met this ("kratzbürstige", we say) scratchy, but otherwise very charming young lady, in Germany, I met her, of course, and though I had already planned to go to England to become an international cab-driving writer, "Europe´s cab-driving writer", beforehand, there was this massive moment of broken-heartedness, when she said, yes, do go to England, for here - here, there is nothing to get for you.
And, so I did.
I took my four rabbits - she also had a rabbit (I mean what are the odds two grown-up people meeting owning rabbits, isn´t that... destiny?) - and gave them English names, named them Flopsy, Mopsy, Peter and Cotton-tail, went to bulldog-country, got barked at, did the cab-licence, after I found out that Brighton & Hove, the town I had picked, has the toughest licence, with the exception of London, probably in all the world, and then thus did my little cab-driving. ("No, we don´t hate the Germans. We hate the French." (And then that French lady, who was slagging of the English for all the length of that half hour cab-ride...))
Yet, as it was my intention to do as many European countries as possible, I then went to Switzerland - my third country - and did the licence there, for Zurich - probably the second toughest licence to get in the world, per inhabitants.
But then two really tragic things happened!
Between me and that girl things escalated, well, basically all hell broke loose and again - hell hath no fury like a woman scorned - and it didn´t help that I tried to involve 70 Christian communities in my German town - Freiburg - begging them for their help for reconciliation, no one answered, wich makes christian believe phony, btw - which then even involved the Pope, the only German Pope in all history, who, by "just another meaningless coincidence" - a Douglas Adams quote - happens to be a huge fan of Freiburg, a city he knew well, and happens to come to visit it at that time, a once in a lifetime chance for me to try to involve him in this matter. Yet, it only led to the Kripo paying me a visit, asking what it was exactly I wanted with the Pope.
And then - the second tragic thing happening, Eoin Colfer, the Irish writer, was officially authorized to write a sixth volume, an honour that to me was denied, though my book had intrigued even DA´s half-brother, who I met on the forum "Douglas Adams Continuum", that led, both, to him "yelling" at me, and, being mentioned in secondary literature to H2G2 as I would be "planning to do a media campaign of intergalactic scale".
So, Colfer wrote a truly dreadful sequel, not in any way up to the book, that I had written - yet probably due to the fact that I had already used all the possibly brilliant ideas, which he then couldn´t use (so, as much as I curse this man, he might curse me even more.)
And then - there was that point in time, when my battery was kind of discharged, when I was too depressed to continue my cab-world record. Well, I tried to set foot in Geneva, in the French part of Switzerland, but it didn´t work out, I even lived for half a year in Fribourg, the Swiss Freiburg, but it didn´t help - and so I thought I´d come back to bull-dog country, it would be good for my rabbits, for there are plenty of gardens in England and I still had that hutch, I bought for them, left in Brighton.
But then - there was this man.
This man, telling me that, since my licence had expired - I couldn´t renew it, for it involved a UK-driver´s licence and at that time I held a Swiss one - I would have to do this licence all over again.
Then a lot died, back then.
My rabbits died, though they might have lived a few more years. My hope for that girl died. My expectations about my sixth volume died. And my blind naive believe in love and justice died.
And then there was this man telling me they can´t make an exception, or better, they can, but they won´t, and "that rules must be followed".
And then something snapped, something inside me broke.
My former life had been destroyed, the love of my life had been taken from me, because of people like him, that didn´t care, for this whole thing between this girl and me would not have ended being so messed up, if people would have cared, who should have cared. I loved her and she loved me back and there once was a time when great and enduring love had payed off, but nowadays there are people who want to destroy society, so that chaos can take over and they made the hearts of those people turn to stone. And that girl was raised as a feminist, so a part in her loved me and the other part told her, that I am no good and I had to be punished.
I would have won her heart though, eventually, for I loved her more than anything in the world, but there are heartless and embittered and hateful people, who turned the loving kiss of Prince Charming into something wrong and unwanted, people, that would rather have Snow-White sleep forever and never wake up, than being rescued by a man, who loves.
For this is what those people are unable of - to love.They are unable to feel empathy.
Their hearts have been turned into stone.
This is what has destroyed my life and yet it didn´t make feel bitter, it only opened my view, even more, for all the struggle for peace and justice all over the world and this is what I have dedicated my new life to, for I am too old now to find happiness in a family of my own, with that woman, I love or any other, yet, it has not made me bitter, except moments of bitterness the bravest of men feel in their long fight - it has made me strong and determined.
And since then - I am just not willing to take it anymore.
So, sir, - you are saying we all have to follow the rules? And rules apply to all of us? So why does one percent of the world´s population has all the money, has all the power and makes all that rules - and the others have nothing, yet have to abide those rules, that one percent make?
No sirree! I won´t take it anymore! Take your rules and shove them... well, up to that place, where stupid rules needs to be shoved up!
Because I don´t want this anymore, this "oh, certainly, I know it would be very helpful and convenient for you if I would make an exception, so that you don´t have to lose another half year for doing the licence all over again" - and we all know a general exception from this rule for everybody in my situation would be very helpful, for everybody, even would people make go back to their home countries, instead of staying in Brighton, at times of slow business, renewing their licences each year - but - "I dont know you, I don´t like you and I just simply don´t want to grant you this favour. Because I don´t have to, because I have the power to deny it and I am backed by authorities and you can´t force me - for you are just one insignificant little [edited by admin], you don´t hold any power at all and of course the other driver´s won´t help you, because they just think for themselves, for the next day, for their takings and a little tip, there is no solidarity."
(Yes, that is, to anticipate the following, perhaps one of the saddest parts of the whole story, no one in the trade was enthused about what I had done then, at any point in time, most people never cared about it one way or another and yet - they should have, because there was something it it for all of them, it was the most beautiful display of civil resistance, leading the way to a better job for all, yes, to a better world. But, oh yes, they were all so absorbed in earning their little takings for that week and a little tip, perhaps.
Of course, this was entirely not an English/German thing, it has nothing to do with racism or nationalism, neither on my part, nor did I ever had the feeling they would do this to me just just because I am foreigner or especially a German (no one had any resentments about that, though I had talks about the war now and then, but it is long time now). Though of course a local guy in good terms with the HCO would not have had the same trouble, but this is another thing.
So don´t anyone British be thinking this guy is letting it out on us, he came to England, already p.issed off, because of things that had happened to him and then he thinks, why, the English are a rather high-nosed lot, so I pick a fight, why don´t I.
No I wasn´t , I had a lot of rage from the English actually let out on me, not because I was German, but a cab-driver, all these guy´s yelling, pointing the finger and honking, "you think you own the road, mate", never did this happen to me in Germany or Zurich, in Zurich least of all, Swiss people are still rather nice (in comparison) and have good manners.
Of course I preferred it to have happened in Germany, for it would make things easier and people might not be confused, but the British should think of it as England´s privilege and curse at the same time, English as world language - as people would come to England, in the first place, because English is world language (I did so), moreover, people will tend to make things public, more likely, that happened in England, than in their home country, well, because then it´s, right-away, a global thing, which can be shared globally.
So what happened, happened and couldn´t have happened any other way. (That´s a Matrix quote, btw., Morpheus said that))
To continue - this man, alright, telling me I had to renew the licence. Then I said, no, I will not comply.
I will not follow your orders, sir, I will refuse to do so and I will give you instead the finest single piece of civil resistance the world has probably ever seen, it has nothing to do with what we have to see, to endure, nowadays, that stupid and naive people pester other people by blocking roads, giving civil resistance a bad name (but this is only the super-rich and -powerful´s agenda of world-dominion and -control, they are using these naive fools for).
No, I wanted to do something so beautiful, instead, a thing that stands out for it´s own, that will catch people´s attention and admiration already only for itself!
I told them - I refuse to do the licence all over again, for it does not make any fricking sense, but I give you instead the thing a cab-driver needs most, I will give you the best English a foreign driver, who was not a native speaker before, has ever had - and that I had proven already, for people never could believe that English was not my mother-tongue, they knew that I wasn´t from around, so a lot of them placed me to South Africa, actually - (perhaps that was because my colleague and land-lord at that time was from there and his way of talking had rubbed off on me).
And the other thing a driver needs most, of course, is his road-knowledge of the town he is driving in.
So, sir, I want to give you instead the finest knowledge a driver has ever displayed, I want to know that old town map of Brighton & Hove so well, that I am going to be able to draw the whole thing from out of my head, to tell all the 3000 odd roads, to rattle them down, from out of my head, without any help, in under 30 minutes. (I can´t do it any quicker, for the mouth only demands enough time to nunciate all these names.)
And so I did and so that is why I have done all this, what you can see in the video, it is not only a Guinness World record attempt and a thing of beauty by itself, it is a powerful act of civil resistance too and, yes, it should light a fire that could be seen all over the world, that shines for all time, it should be a beacon of hope to everybody, that we don´t want to follow rules, that don´t make any sense, that we want rules, instead, that were made so well that all will follow willingly and even the rich and powerful will have to abide them, if then there still is a richer and a more powerful.
Please help to spread this by sharing it!
Yours, Jochen Lembke
_________________ Jochen Lembke, Europe´s cab-driving writer and author of the best Hitch-hiker´s-Guide-to-the-Galaxy-volume-six ever written. Or else money back (haha.)
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