Rosie ruminates

Let's go back for a moment to the not-so-distant past, when Rosie was sitting at work in front of her computer. Rosie has a little spare time, and so she's drinking juice and surfing the Net.
She tapped the keyboard. The little faces of her virtual friends, imprisoned in the confined space of icons of standard dimensions, gaze absently into the depths of the room. They can't see the mess on the table. They can't even see Rosie's new haircut. Well, who knows, perhaps they can't see. How can she be
On the Net she goes under a fictional name. In the real world under the name her parents gave her. Which is the right one? From time to time she hears the question, : "Who are you really?" Hm... „really"...it's a strange idea. Why does everyone think it's so important?" Once she had doubted New York exists, for example. Yes, she had heard a lot about it, seen it in pictures, known it from the stories of people who had visited it. But why she should believe it really existed? Of course, there were apparently plenty of things to suggest that it really existed, but there still existed a very small but nonetheless not negligible possibility that all the people were lying and the there was no such city as New York...

It was quite possible that after landing at „Kennedy Airport" all the journalists, tourists and other visitors had suddenly fallen into the hands of merciless natives.
""Get the hell outta here, scumbags!" scream the natives, who are armed with flints, knives, bows and arrows tipped with poison. The surprised passengers stumble out of the aeroplane with their hands up. "Up against the wall!" the natives command them. The passengers cower by the wall and beg for mercy. The women and children are crying. "Fire!" A pause. The wailing reaches a peak. The natives listen with obvious pleasure. One of them, probably the Chief, barks the order: "At ease! Arms down!" The flints and knives drop. The tourists crawl before the Chief, promising him all their possessions, „Only spare the children!"
"You have only one chance of saving yourselves," says the Chief. "Look."
He makes a grand gesture into the distance. "What do you see?"
"We see mountains and valleys. A dirty village. Broken down huts. For God's sake, where is Manhattan?"
"You are looking at wonderful Manhattan," says the Chief, and holds a knife to a visitor's neck. "You see buildings that scrape the clouds. Millions of inhabitants. Cars on vast highways. Floods of light, thousands of shops and restaurants. You see splendour. Everything works. And if that wasn't enough you see a beautiful park right in the heart of the city. Imprint it on your minds!" "
Rather dreamily, the Chief lets the knife drop from his captive's throat. The tourist jumps back, his fingers flying to his neck as if he'd like to hide it in a safe sheath. "That's my dream," adds the chief, gazing sentimentally into the distance. "Unfortunately we've never had enough funds left over to make it a reality. It's a kind of vicious circle..."
One of the tourists tells the other passengers: "Don't worry, my friends, everything will turn out all right. This is already my third time here!" he grins.
"If you do as you're told, you'll live happily ever after like this gentleman here," says the Chief and gently strokes the eager visitor's head. „ And as a bonus you will all get genuine American dollars. You can use them to by souvenirs for your families in the local shop. In addition we offer you the chance to take your tourist snapshots in our fantastic photographic studio, absolutely free of charge.. Everything will be all right, but only, of course, so long as you never reveal the truth, you understand? If any of you start claiming that there aren't any skyscrapers but only cardboard pieces of scenery in a studio, then not only will people think you're crazy, since no one will believe you, but you, your family and relatives will all attract the unfortunate attentions of our extremely well-organised mafia! You will die in horrible pain, we will take care of it!"
Another airplane is landing at the airport.

Rosie took a sip of her juice and gazed dreamily into the depths of her monitor. She is imagining a meeting between two friends, Anna and Julie, meet. Anna visited New York two years ago. Julie has just returned from there.
"So, how was it?" Anna wants to know.
"It was a little weird, but pleasant," Julie answers cautiously.
"It was a shock, wasn't it?" Anna asks with an ambiguous smile.
"Er..., yes, it was." And Julie starts to tell stories about New York out of the brochure the Chief gave her. Sometimes she adds something she's imagined for herself, and Anna listens with a smile on her face, since she knows what comes from the brochure and what is a product of Julie's imagination. And the more involved Julie gets in her own tangles up in her fabrications, the more fantastic her stories become and the better they flow. Julie is revealing the world of her dreams. Everything she says she would like to experience in reality.
Suddenly she stops. She has suddenly remembered what she had quite forgotten in her excitement - that Anna has also been in New York and knows the Chief, the brochure and the cardboard scenery.
"Of course, anything's possible in New York..." laughs Anna...

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