WG 5 Travel Writing

By Marianne and Anders

The ingredients:


2 overheard conversations:

A: hi

B: hi, how are you?

A: I’m okay. Sore.

B: Yeah, I know. Remember when I fell down those stairs.


1: he’ll only pee if somebody’s standing next to him.

2: really?


3 species of birds:

Sparrow

Duck

Heron


2 brand names for food:

Heinz

Betty Crocker


Text from 6 signs:

Danger! Men in trees.

No trespassing! Violators will be shot, survivors will be shot again

No hooking anytime! This is a no hooking zone. You are being recorded and will be reported. Your
Vehicle can be taken away.

Children left unattended will be eaten or sold for slavery!

Do not feed the squirrels!

Warning: Children left unattended will be sold to the circus!


The name of a planet or a star:

Mars


The name of a lipstick:

Berry


1 time of day:

10.30 pm


The title of a book of fiction:

In the miso soup


The title of a painting:

The Boat Studio by Monet


The Name of a dead politician:

Oluf Palme


2 types of onion and 1 type of potato

Charlotte onions

Red onions

Sweet potato


3 items from a hardware store:

Hammer

Nails

Saw


A make of gun:

Beretta over-under


Something a child would say:

Look Mommy! I made a pretty poo poo!


1 Sentence from a newspaper to act as title:

Calm, serene and looking forward to going home



The Writing:


Calm, serene and looking forward to going home

As I sat down in the shade of the trees, the first thing I heard was a boy shouting “Look Mommy! I made a pretty poo poo!”. He was by the water’s edge and his mother came running, a piece of Betty Crocker shake’n’bake in her hand, her Berry coloured lipstick half gone from eating their brought picnic. The blanket was filled with the left-overs of a red onion and charlotte pie, and the crumps of the sweet potato pie they had for desert. A bottle of Heinz ketchup had spilled where the boy must have been sitting.

I tried to block the image of the floating poo from my mind, and looked towards the edge of the forest instead. I imagined a hunter shooting ducks with his Beretta over-under, though the only birds I could see was a heron hiding and a small sparrow scrounging bread crumps.

The sound of a faint conversation broke my train of thought. Two girls were meeting up; “Hi” “Hi, how are you?!” “I’m okay. Sore.” “Yeah, I know. Remember when I fell down those stairs.” The girls' conversation was drowned out by of a couple walking by. They caught me by surprise when all I heard was “He’ll only pee if somebody’s standing next to him.” “Really?”. As I was pondering who it was that would only pee if someone was standing next to him, my eyes again wandered to the forest edge. My eyes caught the colourful lettering of a sign which read “Do not feed the squirrels!”. I started thinking about all the signs I had come across during my many travels: “Danger! Men in trees.”, “No trespassing! Violators will be shot, survivors will be shot again”, ”No hooking anytime! This is a no hooking zone. You are being recorded and will be reported. Your Vehicle can be taken away.”, “Children left unattended will be eaten or sold for slavery!”, “Warning: Children left unattended will be sold to the circus!”. I happened to look at the water of the lake and thought to myself: “In the miso soup”. The mix of all the lake plants growing in the edge of the water reminded me of this. Even further out on the lake I saw a small boat which got me thinking of The Boat Studio by Monet, the boatman in it was doing repair work, sawing and hammering in nails.
For some reason these sounds brought the image of somebody making a casket to my mind, and for some reason I thought of the late Oluf Palme, and how his casket might have looked.
Strange how your thoughts can suddenly veer off down a tangent, I had hardly noticed the time: 10.30 pm. It would be dark soon, and the moon the stars, and perhaps even Mars would soon be visible. Tomorrow would be the end of my journey and there would not be any time for people watching. I was going home.