Blog no. 23: What plan?

  Have you ever ridden a bike with a friend on a rocky road with no regards for safety, him yelling to "hold on" at the top of his lungs and you knowing that it's gonna be a bumpy ride which will probably end up badly? Yeah, that's life for ya.
 

 I came to a realization the other day that I have no idea what I'm doing, and that's OK, because nobody really does. Some might think they know what's up, some might pretend they do but in reality, most of us are just winging it. Like a good choose-your-own-adventure book, we just make choice after choice, day by day, hoping we don't fuck up and regretting it at the very usual occurrence that we do eventually fuck up. You can call it Murphy's law or just bad luck, but making the wrong choices and getting punished for it is perfectly human and will happen a lot, so you better get used to falling on your ass. Thing is every time you fall on your ass it's a lesson to be learned, so by the 100th time you will have ass muscles strong enough to support your fall and make it a bit less painful. Or, y'know, put a damn pillow underneath if you are that prone to failure.
  Personally, I feel like the world moves faster than my ability to comprehend it. I feel like I'm in a perpetual state of catching up. I think I understand how things work and the status quo suddenly changes and I'm so lost I can't even understand myself sometimes. It's no use to try to wrap your head around how things work really, the world is evolving so fast by every passing moment that you can't actually keep yourself up to date. It's like an NVIDIA drive in that sense, there's always something new you have to account for, something different that fucks the whole system up. One of the most important traits you can have nowadays is the ability to adapt; without it you're just a 20/30/something-year old model running on outdated software.
  Planning for things has never been my thing, partially because I'm really really bad at it and partially because it's not my style. Even when I'm forced to think ahead, I'm the sort of guy who will lay down a very elaborate and well drawn plan, will write exact times and dates for each step of the plan, and will abort everything once the first step is not accomplished, making the whole thing crumble in a wreck of regret and missed opportunities. That's why I don't do New Year's resolutions anymore, I always fail them within the first week. I'm envious of people who can make a plan and stick to it, they are the kind of people that I would like to have in my lab assignments so I can have somebody to encourage me to follow said plans. Then again, isn't it a bit restraining to be forced to follow a certain path, whatever the circumstances might be? In a basketball match the coach lays down the positions and job of each player before the game, but once his team is trailing by 10 with 1 minute to go, it's all back to the drawing board with some impromptu, hopefully game-changing play. A friend of mine decided to write down some short term goals for herself 3 months in advance, with some of the bullet points being romantic relationships and mental state, so I asked her quite nicely: "How the fuck do you plan on these things in advance?" Short answer: You don't. Long answer: You really, really don't.

  It's fine to plan stuff that you can actually mostly predict like your financial state in a few months, but after a certain point planning about easily variable stuff, forces you to act in a very unnatural fashion. When you're forcing situations that should not normally be forced, you're setting yourself up for failure. This even applies when talking to people: it's perfectly reasonable to think before you talk if you're afraid of saying something stupid, but when you're close to someone isn't it better to just, you know, talk? 

  We had this exercise during my trip in Madrid where we had to make a short presentation about ourselves so that they could tell us what we could fix about our body language and since none of the stuff I said were practiced or pre-planned, I said some truths about myself that I hadn't really thought about before. Since my mouth was running faster than my brain what I said was pure improvisation, and I realized how I perceive myself unconsciously. I mentioned in an earlier post that when you stop thinking about stuff, that's when the real thinking begins. I still very much stand by that belief, but now I also have personal experience that it's actually true.

  When I write stories, blog posts, poems or even when I'm doodling something on a piece of paper, I never think about what I'm doing until I'm halfway through. I don't put any thought on what I'm writing, I just lay my hands on the keyboard and let my fingers do the talking, and that's why all this is so real for me. That has always been my goal really; if I can't be real myself, why should I expect anyone else to be? Here's the thing though: if people like the real you, you know you've done a damn fine job. And if they don't? Well you can't make everyone happy, can you?

Something borrowed

"Where did you find this?" asked Cara. She walked towards me wearing a long white sundress with pink-and-yellow stripes, her straight long hair covering part of her beautiful face. Where did I find that jewel? I honestly couldn't remember by the time she approached me and tapped me on the shoulder.
"I...I think I just found it on the floor by the post-office." I replied awkwardly. "Is it yours?"
"No but it's strangely familiar. Is it a necklace or something?"
I held it in front of Cara and I to examine it briefly. Our eyes reflected its silver-ish glow and scanned it quickly front and back. It reminded me of the sort of treasures Nathan Drake would find in one of his adventures in Shambala, it was very decorated for such a small piece of jewelry. It had beautiful blue details and on its sides there was some sort of writing which we could tell was not English or any latin-based language we might have been familiar with, but a rather strange string of symbols we'd never seen before.
"Think it's Chinese or something?" I asked Cara.
She grabbed it from my hand in one quick motion and passed her fingers through the engravings. "Nah, I don't think so. If anything it's probably hieroglyphics: see that feather-like thingy and the ring?"
"You mean the cursive T and the incredibly round O?" I answered sarcastically. "I see them."
Cara gave me a mean glance and rolled her eyes, as usual. Whenever I made one of my stupid jokes she would look away as if someone was looking at us and she'd feel embarrassed of me, which should normally make me feel bad if it weren't accompanied by that cute little smile of hers. God, I swear that smile made my heart skip multiple beats.
  The way she looked at the jewel with her big brown puppy eyes made you realize why half the school was in love with her back then, and the rest of her made you ask why the other half didn't. She touched every inch of it carefully with her silky fingers, almost caressing it, trying to make it speak to her. I couldn't but stare at her more than the weird-looking relic we'd found.
"Do you think someone will be missing this?" she asked.
"This old thing? She's probably resting in a sarcophagus wrapped in towels and stuff."
She gave me a legitimate laugh and punched me lightly on my arm, and I let out an extremely fake "ouch" noise to see if I catch another glimpse of that smile.
"We could take it to a police station if you want." I suggested. She tilted her head to the side and held a blank, silent expression. "Or we could take a picture of it and ask around on the internet first. Who knows, maybe it's magic." I added.
"YES!" she exclaimed enthusiastically. "I mean yes, that's a good idea." she said in a more serious tone, clearing her throat.
  We walked towards our bikes and started pushing them back home to appreciate the amazing weather we were gifted with. My house was a 30 minute walk from the promenade and Cara's wasn't much farther than that. I noticed that the beach was empty as we walked by; even though it was rather hot for an April afternoon people were still weary of the sudden storms we had had in the past couple of days and preferred to stay at home for the time being. Seeing it so empty and calm was very rare and eerie, so I suggested we stopped for a while to catch the sunset. Cara was instantly on board with the idea, her being a sunset enthusiast. To be fair, who isn't?
  The beach was a large stretch of gold sand and a stone wall on the back that led to the promenade. Cara took of her shoes and set them on the side and her bike against the wall. She took a moment to appreciate the wet sand on her toes, letting it sink her bare feet a few inches while trying to maintain balance. The necklace took place on her neck while she was playing with the sand. I sat on a beach bed I found laying around and after looking over at her playing like a small child, I closed my eyes and leaned back. It reminded me so much of my teen years, when we used to come with our families and once the sun was down me and Cara would lay on the sand, look up at the starry sky and make up stories with aliens and space cowboys and whatever our then imaginative younger selves would come up with. We would talk about life, the universe and everything and I swear at least half of it made sense. Nowadays we didn't really have time for that, being busy with the university and whatnot, so occurrences like this one were to be treasured.
  Suddenly I felt her lips on mine. I opened my eyes slightly and saw her shadowed figure standing on top of me, and her leaning gracefully against the bed, messing with my hair with her free hand. For a second I flinched; I wasn't expecting that, no matter how much I wanted to I wouldn't do anything to jeopardize our friendship because I didn't know how she felt about me. I always thought there was this more-than-friends quality about our time spent alone but I was too afraid to do anything about it, and then I didn't have time to do so. It was the first time we went to the beach after those warm summer nights. It was the first time I felt she wanted me back. It was the first time we'd ever done something like that. It was my first time kissing a girl.
"Emily?" she said. "I..I didn't mean to..."
Before letting her finish her sentence I pulled her towards me and kissed her back, and then she hugged me and smiled playfully, before lying next to me and wrapping herself around my arms.
  We sat around that bed and talked and kissed and laughed all night. She confessed that she always liked me but her parents were too strict and she wasn't sure if they would accept her if she came out back then, so she hid it from everybody until now. Her eyes filled up telling me, but she was determined and hopeful that they would accept her for who she is, just like my parents accepted me. And when I held her in my arms, she knew everything would be okay.
  I had forgotten how good it felt to be around her and to finally find out that she actually likes me back. I had given up on the idea long ago but now that it actually happened I wasn't sure whether to believe it or not. Nobody knew if it would last and nobody really cared. We just had each other, the stars and the sea. At that moment we had everything.
  During one of our kissing sessions the necklace fell next to the bed and got buried under a thin layer of sand after a soft breeze. The next morning we left holding hands, heading to Cara's house to confront her parents and had forgotten all about it. I still don't recall where I'd found it. Maybe it was magic after all, passed on from a mysterious ancient tribe to make people's dreams come true. Maybe someone else will find it and it will help them too; all they have to do is look for it. The ones who do are the ones who want it more after all. 

Blog no.22: Wanna go to the movies?

Dear film enthusiasts,

  Yesterday was international cinema day and thus I'm a day late at this, but since I've been *cough* busy with studying *cough* I figured I might as well do it now. "Buy the ticket, take the ride" says Hunter S.Thompson in the trippy "Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas", and that's what you get yourself into whenever you step a few metres behind the big silver screen.
  We all watch movies, film buffs or not, even the least enthusiastic-about-film people have probably seen a bunch of them. Most of them download the majority of the films they watch and I won't be the kettle and call the pot black, if pirating was a crime I'd be facing several lifetimes in prison, and then some. Thing is, going to the cinema is just a much better way to go about it if you want to see a movie, because you're not just watching it, you're experiencing it.
  I find it hard to rate movies I have seen at home because I don't think I'm doing them justice at all. You always have a distraction, chatting on Facebook during the slow parts, probably pausing and unpausing every so often to grab a snack or take a bathroom break and you never really experience it the way the director meant you to experience it. Every time I watch a Tarantino at home I can feel Q over my shoulder, judging me for looking elsewhere instead of watching Pitt scalping a Nazi or Travolta and Thurman doing the twist, I can almost hear Fincher yelling at me to put the damn phone down and carefully study the hundredth take it took Gyllenhaal to get the shot just right, and I can see Linklater's disappointed look whenever I pause one of Delpy and Hawke's intimate conversations. Submarine got it exactly right: "How do they know? They just do."
  I dated this girl last year, really great and a film enthusiast, much like me. She was probably one of the biggest influences in me becoming so passionate about movies because she didn't just like them, by the (paraphrased) words of Anton Ego, "She adored them." Most of our dates included watching a movie or two, that's how we actually started dating in the first place, and it was always a treat. One of the best movie-going experiences I have ever had was watching The Nice Guys with her, in a cute little open-air summer cinema in Plaka, Cine Paris. We weren't doing so hot as a couple due to external turbulence and were kinda distant at first. It was mid-May I think, and the movie was starting at 8 pm sharp. We grabbed my favourite beer and some popcorn and took our seats silently, waiting for the movie to start. The sun was still creeping above our beautiful view of the Acropolis as the movie was starting. Half-way during the movie we watched the sun set from the west to give way to a lovely summer-ish night and light breeze, and half-way through the hilarious Crowe-Gosling induced shenanigans my girl and I were holding hands, laughing our asses off, kissing during the break, enjoying one perfect date. It's like all the problems we had and all the distance between us had vanished. How could they not, really?
  One of the reasons I love Athens is because of the cinema culture it provides. Coming here I wasn't much of a film buff, I watched movies regularly but I never thought of anything beyond that, watching them was just a past-time whenever I was bored gaming. Growing up in Cyprus we didn't have a lot of cinemas, just a few big multiplexes that showed the latest blockbusters so when I came here I was introduced to a whole new world of small, one-screen theatres, summer cinemas, community theatres and film festivals. It blew my mind how many movies from all around the world I could watch, not just Disney-owned properties (which to be fair are quite good in their own right). It's mind-boggling how much choice you can have here, and I imagine how much more there is in bigger cities all around the world. We're so lucky we're able to experience all these things, but unfortunately not a whole lot of us care.
  A few months ago I got into the habit of going to the movies by myself. I just got really tired of having no company after breaking up twice in the span of a year, and since most of my friends aren't huge on the whole "going to the cinema" thing I have going on, I figured I might as well try it on my own. It was pretty awkward at first, I had never done something like that because it seemed such a lonely, desperate thing to do and frankly, I was a bit of both. I went to see La la Land for the first time and I was so damn emotionally invested by the end of the movie, I was literally speechless for a few moments after the end title, and I had the luxury to just sit there by myself and contemplate my feelings for a bit. I didn't have to scoff, laugh, comment or get up immediately, and so I did none of those things. I just sat there for a bit until the credits rolled, stared at the screen for a while, and then took all my stuff and quietly  got out of the room. It wasn't sad or lonely, it was just very, very real. I watched a bunch of movies by myself after that, Arrival, Nocturnal Animals, Patterson, La la Land for a second time from the top of my head, and all of those were amazing experiences on their own.
  Looking back, I'm really disappointed at myself for being scared to do this earlier. I realized that it's not shameful or desperate to go to the movies by yourself, and that sometimes it's okay to spend some time alone. It's not awkward unless you make it awkward, and showing that you know what you're doing and that you're not afraid to do things alone and take some time for yourself is a fantastic trait to have. That being said it doesn't always have to be so profound, going as a group is always a fun ride. Just gotta find that group that tolerates your snobby "film-enthusiast" ass.

Your friendly avid movie-goer,
Stelios Zesiades.

P.S. Since it's Valentine's day and all, I might as well list my favourite romantic movies:
1. Before Trilogy
2. La la Land
3. Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind
4. Wall-E
5. The Lobster
6. Tangled
7. When Harry met Sally
8. Amelie
9. Crazy, Stupid Love
10. Definitely, Maybe

Honorable mentions: Casablanca, Music&Lyrics, Roman Holiday, In the Mood for Love, Blue Valentine and many many more. 

Blog no. 21: The airport shuffle

Dear travelers,

Whenever you're planning a trip what you have in mind is always what you'll pack before the trip and what you'll do during the trip; never what you're doing inbetween.
  You see, the airport shuffle as it's going to be known for the remaining of this blog, is the transitional period between the time you arrive at one airport and the time you leave from the airport of your destination. It can be somewhere between 2 hours to a whole day if you have a connecting flight with a long waiting period, and it's a time where you're practically a ghost. You don't have any responsibilities, you have nowhere else to be at so you just sort of linger, wandering around because nobody will look for you, for a few hours you are neither here nor there, for a while you just don't really exist. I've been in this situation many times and I actually enjoy it, as unconventional as that sounds. It's a time where I can do whatever I want without "wasting time" because that time is practically wasted already.
  It's endearing, really, sitting around at the airport and just watching people come and go, trying to figure what their destination is and what they're thinking about. What baggage do they bring along? What's their story? You just observe with keen eyes, trying to figure everyone out. You're so into it that you forget your own baggage, your own destination, you forget all about your story. Maybe that bearded dude is flying to England to propose to his girlfriend. Maybe that Asian-looking lady is flying to Germany for her job interview in a law firm practice. That couple is probably going over the Atlantic for their honeymoon in Cuba. That sad-looking middle aged guy might be visiting Italy for his father's funeral. That annoying group of kids might be playing in the junior international handball finals in Sweden. And while you're doing all this thinking you're invisible, so you can keep on doing your thing and nobody will even notice (unless what you're doing is bumping into people and calling them names and stuff).
  I've met a lot of interesting people in airport shuffles, I've fallen in love multiple times with beautiful strangers I never talked to, I've listened to songs on repeat so that my trip would have an official theme song. "We Believe" by Good Charlotte was the one when I was stranded in Mallorca for the whole night with no money and no food, "Sing about me I'm dying of thirst" by Kendrick Lamar was my jam when my flight was postponed for an hour in Stuttgart, "4 da squaw" by Isaiah Rashad was played a lot during my overnight stay in Schiphol Airport in Amsterdam a few days ago and "Chasing cars" was the song that started it all, after my 5-day field trip in Salonica, 8 years ago.
  My favourite airport shuffle story though, is the one with Sofia from Chicago. So, one time I met this girl who was in my bus on the way to the airport with her friend, sitting right in front of me for the whole ride. She was really pretty, had this great smile and beautiful green eyes but I was listening to music, too shy, and too into "The Great Gatsby" that was in my hands to talk to her and her friend. After a while I took my headphones off to seem more approachable and she immediately asked me if I was enjoying the book, so I told her that it was great. She asked me if I got to the point of the huge party in Gatsby's house in which I replied that indeed I had, and she told me that was so wild. We talked for a while and she told me that her dad was from Chicago because I noticed she didn't have the traditional Greek accent when talking in English. When we arrived at the airport I was still a bit shaken because it's not something that happens often to me, a pretty girl talking me up is quite the rare occurrence, so - the idiot I am - I didn't continue the conversation. At that point she came close to me and grabbed me by the arm as if we were going on a date in some fancy restaurant. She leaned in and almost whispered in a very cute voice "My name is Sofia, and my friend is -" actually I don't remember her friend's name, silly me. "My name is Stelios, nice to meet you" I replied. We were both supposed to check in so I told her that I would check in my flight and we could meet somewhere afterward to continue the conversation. After what seemed like an eternity, Sofia wasn't at her check-in and I figured she was done before I was, so I started looking for her. I searched everywhere, walked every inch of the (admittedly not very big) airport but she was nowhere to be found, so I convinced myself that it was never gonna happen and, defeated as ever, I crawled through the security check and went on to my gate to painfully wait for my plane to depart. A few minutes before my departure I see her and her friend boarding their plane; their gate was right next to mine and she was sitting right there for the whole time. When I finally found her it was too late, so I just called her name out and waved her goodbye.
 Even though the story doesn't have a happy ending it's something I will remember it for a long time (and if I meet with Sofia again by an incredible amount of luck, it'll be a love story to write home about). Not every story has a happy ending unfortunately, but the ones in airports have a definitive beginning and end. The whole "it's not the destination, it's the journey" thing is amazingly true, although that shouldn't take away from the fun you'll have at your actual destination. Here's the thing though, you just know that whatever happens in an airport stays there and, you see, being in an airport shuffle is kinda like being in a vacuum; everything that happens is isolated from the whole world, and much like everything else around you, it just sort of lingers.

Your friendly airport-shuffler,
Stelios Zesiades.

P.S. Don't be afraid to travel solo, you might just make a memory or two.
  

Blog no.20 - A year of firsts

Dear disappointed dudes/dudettes,

  THE END IS NEIGH! The end of the year at least, since Giant Meteor 2016 didn't win the american presidential elections after all. It's been a year of experiences, a year of celebrity deaths, a year so full of chaos you'd think that the world was actually coming to an end. Well, the year's almost over and we managed to survive it all fairly decently, albeit a little bit bruised. The end of the year shouldn't find you recalling all the fuckups you experienced with dread, but with positivity. All the stuff that went wrong in this shitty year is in the past. It should be a time of remembering what you accomplished, no matter how big or small it was. And for god's sake, none of that "New Year resolution" crap, I'm talking about things that matter. Good or bad, everything you experienced will shape you into the person you will eventually become, just make sure it always leads to a better version of yourself year by year.
 It has been a year of firsts for me. I hosted strangers for the first time and had the time of my life doing so. I played music in the streets in front drunk tourists who danced to our ethnic sounds, I visited places I hadn't visited before with some vary sweet (and occasionally barefoot) travelers, and I confessed my feelings to a girl for the first time ever. I formed friendships (and other -ships), and despite all the heartbreak, anxiety, and negativity it oozed throughout, it's been great. Why is that? Under the stream of horrible TV news, breakups and some really awful days it has been a year of experiences. I found out that no matter how much shit I've been through in a single year, it always leads to something better.
  We live in interesting times ladies and gentlemen, all we can do is sit back and try to enjoy the ride. Everything we go through will eventually become something to recall in hot summer nights on the beach, or under a warm blanket with only just the Christmas lights and the moon to guide us, or maybe sitting on a bench in the middle of a packed square while waiting for our next adventure to begin. "This is not the end, this is not the beginning" says 21st century philosopher Chester Bennington in Linkin Park's "Waiting for the end", because nothing ever truly ends, it just becomes a memory.  
  There will always be good and bad days - everybody has their rough patches - but if you endure them all you might come up with something amazing in the end. That's what life is basically, a really difficult and complicated game full of twists and turns that not even Shyamalan could think of. It's trial and error, it's falling down over and over and over again and then getting up only to find yourself down again. After you find your stride though, it will be much more difficult to fall and even if you do so, so what? Getting up for the 101st time will be so much easier than the first hundred times. Just gotta keep playing, you know?

"Merry Christmas ya filthy animal, and a happy new year!" - The Home Alone guy in the fake movie. While shooting some other guy. Maybe not what I should've gone with. Oh well. 

Here's to another amazing, shitty, tiring, awesome year, and yet another year of firsts. Keep your head high and your beer hand higher, and keep on keeping on.

Your friendly dude,

Stelios Zesiades.

Blog no.19: I hate ticking clocks

I hate ticking clocks.
Whatever you're doing,
No matter how you've been
They just tick tick tick.

They distract you from your thoughts
They bring you back to reality
They make you wonder how time flies
They remind you of every passing second

It's really unfair how it all moves so fast
But still not fast enough
How am I supposed to have the time?
I wish I could be a ray of light

I really hate to be reminded
That for one more day I did not shine
I see no shadows on the walls
I've been in the dark for so long

I'm still just a speck of dust
A drop of water in the rain
A complex of molecules
Trying to figure themselves out

Everyone sees time
Moving in a straight line
But all I want to do
Is to go back and rewind

I hate ticking clocks
All they do is take time away from me.


P.S. I'm not depressed, I just really fucking hate ticking clocks.
P.P.S. This was all inspired by the one in the guest room which I have no idea who it belongs to. 

Blog no.18: Back to the future

Dear time-travellers,

You know how back in your day you probably thought of the 21st century as the century that would make everything we ever knew until then obsolete? (Assuming you're from the past, if not what the hell are you doing here? You know how things will work out.) We would have flying cars, we would have colonized a few other planets, achieved interstellar travel and teleportation or even travel back and forth through time. People were so fast to dream big, so excited to fantasize about a futuristic era with floating cities and underwater ones and since we haven't been able to do so (yet!) they don't appreciate what we have achieved in these few decades, or they heavily critisize it as a step in the wrong direction. What have we achieved so far you ask? Well, person living in an internet-less era, you'll have to sit down for this one.

  In just a few decades we have not only created a world wide web that connects everything and everyone wherever they are (except my stupid apartment elevator, of all places), we are now able to control it in the palm of our hands. We have these little devices that can give us any piece of information we like in very minimal time, and we're very much addicted to them as anyone would be if they had the chance. We live in the age of information, where everything is possible and you can learn about whatever your heart pleases in a heartbeat. And what we use it for you say? Well, we mostly argue about stuff and call each other names, as is tradition in human nature but we have started getting better at it for sure. We are so preoccupied to our future not living up to impossible standards, we didn't realize we are actually living in it, so spoiled by being able to control everything through a little piece of technology which a few years back would be a glorified walkman at best that we don't understand how to harness its true power through something we've always been great at: learning. Talking to a friend living hundreds of miles away without paying incredible amounts of money or relying on the post office to actually locate your friend in Middleofnowheresville, has become a novelty, really. Truth is, I can't really blame anyone on how they use the internet, since it's not something people consider a tool, but rather a convenience. That's not gonna be the case for long though, and here's why. 

  In my mind there are three generations of people living currently on this planet. There's the older generation that was born before the internet was even concieved as an idea, much like you dear visitor from the past. You lived in a post-WW2 era, when the dust was settled for the most part, you lived a happy albeit boring childhood, your toys consisted of plastic soldiers, footballs and bicycles and your games were always outdoors. You didn't have to worry much about learning stuff since the job market was at its peak when you graduated, so you were able to do just fine with a college degree and a knick for settlement. Most of your knowledge stems from encyclopedias, books, newspapers and occasionally stories you were told by your parents or grandparents. During the explosion of the internet you were already in your 30's or 40's, you didn't need anything else and were just fascinated to hear about the advancements, but since you didn't need to use it, you didn't bother to. Now it has taken over the world and you're so technologically incompetent that you don't really understand how to use it properly, so you rely on the second or third generation to help you with that. You are slowly learning though, and now you're at a point where you can use it by yourself, just not at its true potential. Which brings us to the second generation, the generation that I will name "the transition generation".

  Gotta say I'm biased, being part of this "transition generation" but here's how I see it: We lived in the era where the internet was starting to become the powerhouse it is now. World was starting to get unstable after 9/11 but it was still mostly safe. We didn't have super fast lines and we had to hear a symphony of alien music to be able to go online but we actually could do so in our houses and in our disposal. We used it to, of course, download music, movies and, other, well, "stuff", and we discovered so much things we wouldn't be able to do so otherwise. We stretched our imagination to impossible lenghts since we knew the potential of this and we were told by our parents (the older generation) to "stop playing video games and just go outside". Truth is we did both equally, and we couldn't be happier about having a choice between those two things. We learned about technology first hand, we adapted to it and actually noticed the massive difference of the 00's to the 10's, we experienced the transition of the novelty of the internet to the necessity that it is today. We did our fair share of stupid shit using it, we've all caught all sorts of viruses and accidentally downloaded porn instead "Shrek 2" (was that just me?) We appreciate the tools we have right now, because we lived without them, we lived with them and that way we learned how to use them wisely. 

  Now for convenience I will just name the third generation "the information generation" since they were born in the "information era". Mostly consisting of people born after 2000, these people are just now becoming adults, living in a very unstable environment, with news of bombings, fires, killings and natural distasters every other day. Not to say that these things didn't happen before, but being able to know about them surely makes things look a lot worse than they used to. They were kids when my generation first started getting acquainted to the internet but in their teens they already had smartphones, when all the previous generation had was regular phones, and the one before them had two cans and a string. They've always been able to find whatever they wanted whenever they wanted, they had so much stuff going on at the same time, and they were so overwhelmed by the amount of things they could do at such a young age, that they started to neglect it. This is in my opinion the most wrongly accused generation, since they're the ones who have to work the hardest to achieve what the previous ones were simply given for free. Having facebook in their teens meant their embarassments were engraved online forever, which thankfully wasn't the case in my generation. Now, learning from their past mistakes they are actually using the internet how it's meant to be used: with caution. They are fast learners and will probably the most hard-working generation if they wanna dig themselves out of the mess that the first generation caused for the next ones. 

  Best way I can describe all three generations is the swimming analogy. The first generation didn't really have to learn how to swim since they weren't needed to, but as it became a necessity to learn how to swim they had to do so at a very difficult age. The second generation lived in the period where people started taking their kids to swim, and gave them the opportunity to adjust from not being able to swimg to being highly competent swimmers in their young years. The youngest generation was thrown into a pool with no lifejacket, and nobody to look after them except the occasional "don't go in too deep" from their parents. 

  As the time passes though, we have seen that all three generations have done what humans always did best: adjust. We are now just learning how to use this powerful tool that has been given to us and I gotta say, we're getting pretty good at it. We might not have colonized the moon, we haven't found the Atlantis yet and we still haven't been able to perfect our social skills but what we created, this interconnected universe we now have is just a marvel to look at. Now, all we need to do is stop blaming each other for the fuckups that brought us to this mess, and just work towards solving the problems we have instead of creating new ones. Will be easy enough, right? If anyone from the future is reading this, just make my laptop screen blink once so I know we start doing that....................................................................................................................................................Shit. Beer, anyone? 

Stelios Zesiades

To Sir Tim Berners-Lee, who made all this possible.