The power of novelty
The economy spins thanks to innovation, this is perfectly well known. Economists have pointed out that innovation can take various forms, product, process and the litany goes on until a given sacred number which is in its turn presented as an innovative discovery, because a new theory also constitutes a sellable product.
All things new have always aroused the attention of customers who rush to come by the latest rage and thus distinguish themselves from those who fall behind or cannot afford it. Often it doesn’t really matter if a novelty is an improvement to the previous situation, because large swathes of the public would do anything in the name of social distinction, a goal they are prepared to attain by investing whatever amount of superfluous money they deem worthy of this. Fashion, hi-tech and every other industry sector are driven by the buyers’ irresistible craving for novelty that only partly brings about a genuine advantage in their welfare. Most products on sale pretend to introduce innovation, but in fact only respond to the manufacturer’s and the seller’s logic of making money. The pandered consumer is not always the victim, but is often the one guilty of uncritical behaviour, apart from being one of the natural driving forces in the mechanism of consumer economy.
I sent him a text message on the occasion of the Great Bairam, but I received no reply. He’s usually slow in responding, so I didn’t take much notice. Then, about ten days later, he called me. The delay was explained by the fact that he’d just got back from his country where he’d spent his annual leave together with his family, like usual. We exchanged our respective news. I didn’t have much to tell – my mind goes blank when the limelight turns towards me and I have to talk about myself, but he had more things to say. He nevertheless sounded evasive, and said that so much had happened since the last time we’d met. Some things were good, and some others were bad.
When I outlined the itinerary for this Morocco trip, as it was going to be my fourth to the country, I knew I’d be seeing places again, but I didn’t mind.
As I left the cinema after watching the Spanish cartoon film Arrugas, I was more convinced than ever of an inconvenient truth: life is a lonely experience. The story depicts the years in a person’s life when this circumstance is felt in the most tragic way, old age. In fact, the film is a pitiless account of the encounter with the retiring home environment as seen through the eyes of an old man whose son and daughter-in-law believe he has become an unbearable burden on their family life. He is forgetful, not independent anymore, and feels alienated from everybody’s daily routine.
It’s been a while since the Couchsurfing site started to send out periodically lists of travellers looking for a host in the area. When I travelled to Spain last June and was invited by a local CS member to stay at his place in Roses I was positively surprised. There would be no more need to browse through profiles and send requests – all of the sudden I was fixed up! Last week, when I saw that a Spanish guy was on the list, I offered to put him up, maybe in exchange for the kindness I had received while I was the same situation in his country. I was also excited to meet someone from the places I had visited roughly a year earlier. It would make me feel like reliving the experience.