One thing is really typical of the UK: the streets and their identical side-by-side houses. Boring redundancy or architectural perfection, I let you judge. But something puzzled me when I walked through the neighbourhoods on the search of my next flat: the large windows that let you peep into one's privacy.
My stereotype of British people was that they were very cautious about their public image, trying to hide away their feelings and intimate thoughts, and eventually release them in the very deepest secrecy of their cosy homes. However a glance at the drying panties and other tongues was enough to scramble any conviction. Where was the secrecy gone?
24/7 entertainment.
Without digging a peeping hole through the wall, you actually discover intimate information about your neighbours just by walking down the street. Everything is exposed in the lounge of these apparently harmless homes. The fine lingerie lover from house number 223. The Australian and his flagged bathing suits from house number 236. The couch potato from garden flat 68. The beer drinkers from houses 123, 124, 125, 127...
Not that I care. On the contrary, it is amusing to realise that the boring-looking clerk is not the one she pretends to be. I can even be quite funny to imagine what can be the existence of these people from which you capture a slice of life. Why this guy across the street lives 24/7 with his backpack on? Why the girl on the opposite building is posing in underwear in front of her laptop webcam every night, answering calls on her mobile every three minutes? Why this French Blog-writer keeps on looking at passers-by from his window?
Maybe it’s about time to get some curtains to my French-windows... And to go back to a "safer" Windows, one Mr. Gates sold me so expensively.
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