Monday, 1st November 1999
Early in the morning, an incredible conjunction of circumstances hastens my decisions:
I get up at 7:00 am, as usual, full of anxiety lest I should be late for work. Due to excessive mental anguish during the night, I haven't slept more than four hours.
I have breakfast in a hurry, I leave half of it on the table and run like crazy to take the bus to Athens.
I have forgotten to renew my monthly pass, and I don't have a ticket.
Nobody at the bus stop has a spare ticket for me to buy.
The bus number 154 comes, but I don't get on it.
I walk along the avenue, looking for a ticket to buy in haberdasheries and kiosks. Strangely enough, none of them sells tickets.
Rather disappointed, I return to the bus station. Once again, none of the people waiting there has a spare ticket.
Nevertheless, I stay there and wait patiently for the bus, determined even to pay a fine in case an inspector gets on and finds out I have no ticket.
Half an hour later, the bus is nowhere to see.
In the meantime, the time is 8:30 am and I begin to worry: What now? I will be late for work and they will yell at me again!
All of a sudden, there comes a realization: The above freakish adventure is an ordinary situation for any employee! Indeed, what a ''wonderful'' way to begin your day until you end up in a black grave, while the sun is shining outside! Inside the grave called ''work environment'', you are obliged to toil continuously, breathless, obedient and distressed, patiently enduring insults, backstabbing and intrigues from your ''dear colleagues'' until the sun sets. And this is your entire life, day in day out!
Fortunately or unfortunately, coincidences guide me and I decide: I will neither go to work today nor join the others in that taverna in the evening. I am not at all in the mood for having dinner with Andromache, Tsamados, Parisis and the rest of the ragtag and bobtail who have worked for the “Unknown History of Christianity”. Tomorrow morning, as soon as I get to Pangaea, I will go to Gryparis' office and announce to him that I quit my job at the end of the month for personal reasons. I feel this is the right thing to do...
Tuesday, 2nd November 1999
As soon as I get to work this morning, I see Gryparis in his office and I inform him coolly that at the end of the month I will leave the company for personal reasons. He pretends to be indifferent and frigid, and he gives me something to type. I don't intend to tell anybody else about it -a type of silent contempt towards all my ''colleagues''. In the meanwhile, I already enjoy a unique sense of freedom: I no longer care what each one of those dunderheads says, nor do I worry about the consequences of my supposed mistakes.
When the working day is over, I walk along the streets of Athens and I watch carefully the people around me: Their faces are grim, full of anguish, but they look perfectly adapted to the hell of the city: A hell full of dirt, noise, ugliness. But I don't belong here anymore...
Thursday, 4 November 1999
About a month ago I applied for the post of a secretary in an import company. They phoned me this morning and asked me to come and give them an interview in the afternoon. The company is situated in Argyroupolis, not far from my house, but I prefer to avoid it. I am not in the mood for becoming anybody's slave again.
Moreover: When humans try to harm me, my dark side wakes and I suddenly have wondrous ideas! For instance: If those jerks at work cause me any more problems, I will crash their computers with magnets! Evil to evil is good...
Everybody gets their own lessons from life. I've learned that work is satanism. Others learn that work is the greatest aim in life. No, I will never regret leaving Pangaea: It's better to live free for one hour than forty years in prison...
Monday, 8th November 1999
Another hectic day at work. At a moment Mr Pikros approaches murmuring to himself, kinda irritated because of some recent complications. Before returning to his office, he looks at me and says loud enough for everybody to hear: “It's a madhouse in here! I envy you for leaving, Yvonne!” They are all dumbfounded, while I blush with embarrassment because my secret has just been revealed.
“That's a turn up for the book!” Demetra utters in astonishment.
“I was about to tell you”, I reply calm.
“If I didn't have children, I would leave too!” she says mealy-mouthed.
Suddenly, all the unbearable heaviness in the air around me is gone for good. All at once, everyone seems to be relaxed in their vigilance. “So, you are leaving us”, Penny says a little later. “And who knows what kind of person will come here!” she adds thoughtful. You should have thought about this before, I reckon.
Tuesday, 16th November 1999
Early in the morning a hen comes into the bookstore and wishes to see Mr Nick Gryparis. She says she has come ''for the ad in the newspaper'' and she is interested in the position of secretary which is about to become vacant -mine. Soon she proves to be the managing director's cousin. Her name is Ann and she claims it was not her relative who informed about the imminent vacancy; she wants us to believe that she just happened to read the respective classified advertisement in the newspaper. Naturally, she is hired at once.
As about me, I will have to train her for the next two weeks. At a moment, Mr Gryparis summons me in his office and he asks me to stay one or two weeks more, so that I can show her the work better. I reply I can't stay any longer, not even for one more day.
This makes me wonder, though: Lots of employees have been replaced in Pangaea until now; most of them were ''invaluable executives'' such as editors and managers, yet none of them had to train their successor before leaving the company. Why do I, an ''insignificant typist'', have to give two-week seminars (or even more) to the genius who will take my place?
In the days to follow, all my colleagues in the bookshop do their best to cajole the new employee. They never stop fawning upon her, especially since Mr Gryparis appeared smiling in the sales department the other day and uttered a ''hello cousin!” ostentatiously enough for everyone to hear. As about Mrs Pikros, she is always looking for a chance to belittle me before her:
“Ann, I hope you know how to talk on the phone, not like Yvonne who always asks the customers ''Are you a bookstore'' instead of ''Are you a bookseller'' which is the right thing!” she said this morning ironically. Once again I acted the fool and I stayed silent. I would rather not cause any kind of trouble till I'm out of here...
Friday, 19th November 1999
Prophetic Dream: I am on a trip to Switzerland by coach, together with my friend Nineta, her parents and some other people. We see many beautiful places on the mountains, then we visit a big museum and we admire the Caryatids and other antiquities. Later we arrive in a big city; as soon as we get off, Xanthippe insists on our sitting at the nearest cafeteria; we forget all about sightseeing and we obey passively. Verification: In the evening I meet Nineta and she tells me she has travelled to Europe and Switzerland by coach, together with her parents...۩
Ann has followed a course of word processing in a private school and she has worked as a secretary before, she says. I don't have a reason to doubt her, yet I can't ignore the fact that she doesn't even know how to make the cursor move! However, she likes to be a smart aleck:
“I can see you work in a simple way; you don't use any complicated orders!” she told me at a moment. I gave her a stern look and she bothered to explain: “I mean, you do the job fine, but you don't use macro orders, for example!”
“I don't need to use complicated orders; that's why I am so fast!” I answered calm.
What then? Revolution is fine, but I have already started to wonder: What happens next? Surely, I will never seek a job in a company again. If I ever work in an office again, this will mean I am a dead loss indeed, entirely incapable of controlling the slightest thing in my life. But what are my alternatives, anyway?
Having pondered on various solutions to the problem (I am too bored to mention them) I have concluded that the best thing I could do is become a private tutor of foreign languages -English, Italian and German. I like the idea, yet there are some questions:
a) How shall I find pupils? Maybe I'll put in some advertisements in newspapers.
b) Will I earn enough money? I guess I won't find many clients near my home. I suppose it will take me about an hour to go to the pupil's house, the lesson lasts one hour too, plus one more hour to return home - in two words, each lesson will take me about three hours for 3000 drachmas approximately.
c) How safe is it for me to receive an amount of money every week without giving a receipt (especially during the first year, when I won't have many clients). This job is actually illegal, what if someone squeals on me?
d) What consequences will I suffer if some stupid kid fails in the Lower or Proficiency exams?
Maybe I am too apprehensive; however it has often proved that what never happens to others, usually happens to me. For the time being, I won't look for another job. Instead I will allow myself to relax and be on the dole until September. Then I'll see what comes next. There is no need to panic...
Tuesday, 23rd November 1999
The managing director has just agreed to sign a virtual dismissal (so that I can be on the dole) as well as a letter of reference for me -and this is as good as it gets.
Later on, I go to the accounts department and I see Lena, the assistant accountant.
“Really, now” she wonders. “You asked to work in the sales department, together with Kate Pikros? Everyone knows what a shrew she is! I've worked three years with her! You can't imagine what I've been through during those three years!”
“How could you endure her for so long?” I wonder.
“I was a heroine! A real heroine!” she answers unsmiling.
As far as I've understood, everybody in the company knows what kind of skunk Mrs Pikros is -everybody but me. I was the only one who had no idea....
“You didn't know; why didn't you ask?” concludes Lena.
Admittedly, it never occurred to me to ask about Mrs Pikros, but I had made clear my intention to work in the sales department right from the start; however, none of my dear colleagues ever bothered to inform me, although they all knew what a rotten egg that woman is.
“Got it! All those years you've worked for Pangaea, you were practically non-existent to them!” Urania said this evening, when we met and told her all about it.
Tuesday, 30th November 1999
Today was my last day at work. When the time came, I made my farewells shaking hands with each one of my colleagues and I hated every moment of that hypocricy. If it were possible, I would have left without even saying ''goodbye'' to anyone in there. Rita was the last person I saw, and she was kind enough to see me to the door. This is my last memory from Pangaea.
Right after liberation, what I feel is void: The seven years I've spent in there now seem to have lasted no more than seven days of a very distant past. Pangaea is already fading away in my mind like an elusive dream, as if it had never really existed in my life. But where have these ten years gone?
In the afternoon I got an unexpected phone call; it was from an import company in Glyfada and they invited me to give them a job interview for the position of a telephone operator. This job is certainly worse than the one I've just quit and I have no intention of going from one prison to another. Besides, I feel I can no longer endure the everyday anguish of ''Let's run or I'll be late at work'' or the endless ''Yes, Mr Boss, pigs can fly Mr Boss!”
It seems to me that fate reacted immediately to my decision for liberation, offering me this ''job opportunity'' right on the day of my escape! But I have changed now: I am not going to run into a dark hole like a scared mouse, in search of some doubtful security...
Friday, 31st December 1999
Strange, maybe fateful end of Millennium: Persephone has invited me to New Year's Eve dinner tonight, so as to welcome the new millennium together. There is a celebration all over the earth today -music, songs, joy, festivals everywhere.
We have roasted steaks with wine for dinner, while the television is on, broadcasting phantasmagorical festivities from various countries of the world: Fireworks, dancing and singing, smiling faces -all humanity has become one. However, I can feel a vague, strange sadness hidden within all that universal joy - the deep, unmentionable sorrow one feels when they know that the years of innocence are gone for ever...
Finally, Persa and I play ''Esoterra'' full of passion, and hours will pass in unique excitement: At this very night, the game has a different meaning inside us, as we both experience it as a paradox, magic ritual. What a wonderful way to welcome a new year, a new century, a new millennium...