The apocalypse may take place in one particular country.

I bought the rocking chair oneSaturday in early January 1997. I had just got my salary and that chair rocked half of it off. It was the last one at the old, comparatively low prices. The incredible inflation that winter amplified the madness of my purchase. The chair was a wicker bamboo-imitation, not particularly heavy but ostensibly huge and hard to carry. It was unthinkable to give theother half of my salary for a taxi, so I hauled it like a basket-seller and started on my way home. I was walking, carrying the chair on my back and getting the angry stares of passers by for the luxury I had afforded myself. Someone has to describe the miserable winter of 1997, as well as all the other miseries - the winters of 1990 and 1992. I remember an elderly woman asking for half a lemon at the market. Others searched around the empty stalls at night for an accidentally dropped potato. More and more well-dressed people overcame their shame and reached into the garbage cans. Hungry dogs waited aside or gathered in packs to attack late pedestrians. When I write these sentences I imagine fat newspaper headlines in bold letters.

One night I came home and found my flat had been broken into. The only thing missing was the TV set. Strangely my first concern was the rocking chair. It was still there. Perhaps they couldn't get it through the door -? it was too wide, I had moved it in through the window. I spent the whole night in the chair. When Emma came back she started trying to call the police. To no avail. Nobody paid attention to burglary signals anymore. Fuck it. I sat in the rocking chair, caressed my two cats who were scared by the mess (where had they been hiding when the thieves came?) and smoked a cigarette over the ruins of whatever was left of my male dignity. I was unable to protect even Emma and the cats. I wrote a story.

A flat is broken into. At the time of the burglary only the wife is in -? fortyish, slightly fading, watching a soap on TV. The intruders -? young and normal looking guys -? have not expected to see anybody in, but they quickly get their bearings. The woman is frightened enough anyway. She takes the money out of the wardrobe herself. She does not resist when they tell her to give them her jewelry. Wedding-ring too? Yes, the wedding ring too. She removes it with great difficulty as it has cut deep into her finger. Suddenly when the thieves try to take away the TV set (the soap is still running by the way) the woman puts her arms around it. She speaks up for the first time, pleading that they take anything except the TV set. She just stands there with her back to the two men, clasping the screen to her breasts, ready for everything to protect it. The thieves could easily throw her aside, but they are startled by her sudden reaction. She senses their hesitation and mentions ambivalently that they could do anything to her if they only leave the TV set.

The deal is struck. Well, fuck you, one of them says. Shedoesn't move. They lift her skirt deftly. No reaction. Her bum is still tight. The first one comes quickly. The second takes more time. The woman clasps the TV and doesn't move, only asks them to get on with it as her kids will be back from school. This finally puts the second one off and the men leave the flat.The soap is over. Relieved, the woman lets go of the TV and heads for the bathroom.

How are the 90s going to end -? as a thriller, as a gangster film, a black comedy or a soap opera?

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