The Prater is Vienna’s playground – an old-fashioned funfair, dating back more than a century. It’s perhaps best known for the Wiener Riesenrad, the Ferris wheel made famous in The Third Man (my favourite film of all time).
After I’d paid homage to Harry Lime and Holly Martins, Orson Welles and Joseph Cotten, we headed for lunch in a bakery on the fringes of the site. The manageress was brisk, efficient – the pretty young woman assisting her noticeably less so. We realised that they were mother and her daughter – at a guess, a student, helping out in the family business for the summer. (“But why can’t I go Interrailing with the other girls? Why do I have to help in the horrible shop?”)
The queue was long, weather hot, tempers rising. We imagined the girl losing patience with a customer: “But you asked for the soup.” “No I didn’t.” “You did, and you’ll damn well pay for it.”
Only, her mother would overhear, and the daughter would be the one “paying for it”. She’d be dragged by the ear into the back of the store, behind the trays of fresh bread. And the sounds of a belt being applied would ring out clearly – music to the ears of the disgruntled customers who’d heard the exchange, soon accompanied by the girl’s shrill cries and her pleas for forgiveness. And then mother and tear-stained daughter would re-appear, straightening their uniforms, and take up their positions behind the counter to serve the waiting queue without a word of what had just passed.
Oh, come on though, poor girl – wouldn’t you rather be interrailing round Europe during a long, hot summer than working in a stuffy bakery – have a little pity Abel!
But Eliane, haven’t you noticed? Abel’s old and bitter and mean. He doesn’t have any pity inside him – only evilness. Especially for girls trying to have fun. I think that’s how to defeat him – if enough girls have fun around him, eventually he’ll go up in a puff of smoke 😉
Smudge, you have such good ideas!! I think we should all try to have as much irresponsible fun as possible and see how much it takes to make him go up in that puff of smoke!
Well I know it goes against everything we strive for on the pick on Abel front, but I can’t really see anyone who has such a twinkle of fun in his eye as he does going up in a puff of smoke… worth a try though!
Smudge doesn’t seem able to decide whether I should be covered in ice cream or sent up in smoke!!