Ethic Dilemmas in the Ivory Tower
How the scientific community opened up about animal testing.
On the day that changed his life forever, Florian Dehlmet calmly entered the laboratory of the Werner Reichardt Centre at Tübingen University to conduct a research experiment on a rat. There was the familiar buzzing sound of the dimmer switch as the fluorescent tubes flickering on. The white light illuminated the white benchtop where the white-coated rat calmly ground its teeth. A little plastic mask muffled the gnashing sound as the anesthetic gas sedated the rat. Scalpel in hand, Florian started the surgery. But a few minutes later a piece of equipment started to malfunction, reducing the amount of gas being delivered. Wiggling its foot, the rat started waking up. As the procedure dictates in case of unexpected reactions of the animal, Florian immediately stopped the experiment and killed the rat. “That’s when I decided to abandon animal experiments”, says Florian. It wasn’t that his position on animal testing had changed: “Unless we agree on only using the medicines that we already have, experiments are the only way to test drugs’ safety before they enter the market.” Florian stopped because he simply couldn’t stand the stress of doing it himself. The image of a researcher troubled by ethical dilemmas runs counter to that of scientists as éminencses grises, whose pure focus exempt them from moral considerations. “The prominent ideology is that science doesn’t have anything to do with ethics. But in the case of animal testing the moral implications are obvious”, explains Bernard Rollin, American philosopher and author of a number of influential books that made him a world-leading scholar in animal rights.“ A bewildering array of scandals, such as that over fume tests on monkeys commissioned by Volkswagen, raised massive societal concern that overcame this artificial separation.” Eventually, part of the scientific community understood that it had to break the silence and make an effort to explain what happens in their laboratories and why. Massive animal rights protests made it very clear. One such protest saw models parading with makeup that hadn’t been tested on animals, while others mixed with the audience, their naked bodies painted in cruelty-free makeup. She was dressed in white from head to toe; her skin a russet, golden-brown; her upturned eyes black waxy marbles. After the last stroke of scarlet lycopene lipstick, the model hugged a white bunny and carried it down the catwalk. This was 2000 in Portugal. Animal rights movements in Europe were making headlines after launching several synchronized and centrally coordinated protests across the continent. “Science must save lives without using lives”, says Maria do Céu Sampaio, who organized the demonstration. She is dressed in a cable-knit lambswool sweater over a blue velvet shirt, which gives a friendly touch to her professional look. Her confident and passionate tone contrasts with the weary gaze of someone who has spent more than 40 years fighting for animal rights. “Animals are not a useful resource to be exploited for our own advantage; they should undergo experiments only when they serve the purpose of saving lives.” In 2013, under growing public pressure and after assessing the availability of alternative methods, the European Commission imposed a marketing and testing ban on every cosmetic involving animal testing. “It is a perfect storm”, reasons Rollin. “On one side the scientific community doesn’t address ethics anywhere near as much as they should; on the other the public has growing ethical concerns. Clashes are inevitable.” Rollin has personally tested this ideological barrier. In 1985 he wrote the federal laws requiring control of pain in laboratory animals “under vicious opposition from the scientific community”. On another occasion, the scientists from the University of Edinburg who cloned the sheep Dolly asked for his advice to prepare the public for the announcement. Some of the ethical issues he warned about were not addressed and so shocked society. “The problem is that the scientific community has completely failed to attempt to educate the public. Many still believe that people and dinosaurs lived at the same time!” But it’s in everyone's interest to engage in a more open debate. ”Success, freedom, and autonomy are tied to accord with social ethics," says Rollin. In order to avoid inadequate regulations being pushed forward by ethical concerns, scientists must break out of their ivory tower. Internet has helped to breach some ideological walls. I went from congresses to hashtags!” laughs Giuliano Grignaschi, a researcher at the Mario Negri Institute for Pharmacological Research. Grignaschi is not your typical scientist. His slender body of a track and field athlete leaves a strong clue of his previous career as a 400-meter sprinter. Only when he registered as a conscientious objector from serving the Air Force Academy and was assigned to community services, Grignaschi found that sport and science have a lot in common. “Improving, improving, improving. That’s the key in both cases.” After twenty years of laboratory research, his profound love for animals led him to become the head of the animal care unit, with the task of supervising the correct application of procedures in all animal experiments. “While the internet has greatly contributed to galvanizing a legitimate curiosity in scientific research, it has also misinformed the public”, he explains. “Because the scientific community was too reserved on animal testing, the only information found online was produced by well-intentioned, but misinformed activists.“ Grignaschi recognizes that animal rights groups had the merit of engaging public interest, but one side of the story was missing. Science’s widening disconnection from society has brought exaggerations and imbalance. A few years ago, the situation started to change. Grignaschi – fifty years old – opened his first Twitter account and learned to condense useful scientific information into 140 characters. His experience reflects a wider trend. In the digital era, the success of every company and institution is closely tied to their public image. While Youtube videos shot covertly in laboratories have damaged the reputation of many companies, brands like The Body Shop have been wildly successful by totally disavowing such testing. “Research is not enough”, says Grignaschi, “a good scientist needs to be a good communicator as well.” But could such a change damage science by shifting the focus away from research? “Absolutely not. Real progress cannot be achieved at odds with ethics.” On the contrary, when quickly accumulating pressure for change encounters a major scientific challenge, innovation can make the fortune of a company. Such was the case for TissUse, a Berlin startup company which products can reduce the need for animal testing. Yellow strips of tissue-infused silicon pump blood to three chambers the size of a screw head which house living cell cultures. The humble chunk of see-through material looks like a supercompact VHS which film snapped off the reel, but it actually simulates the activity of human organs. They call it human-on-a-chip technology – and it’s not science fiction. “Since the invention of the first human simulation in 1991, the goal has been to simulate the activity of human organs. What we want is to reproduce you and me on a chip, without us feeling any pain”, explains Uwe Marx, founder and CEO. “All you need to do is give us a sample and we will be able to simulate all your organs.” Technologies like this are a rare example of a limited array of alternatives to animal experiments that have emerged in the last few years. “But although they are very promising, organ-on-a-chip platforms can only offer an indication of what the real result on a living being would be”, explains Dario Padovan, president of Pro-test Italia, an association active across Europe in favor of continued animal testing to support scientific research. “The complexity of a full organism capable of feeling emotions and with a real psychological life cannot be tested with a simulation”, he explains. The same reason that makes animal testing morally disturbing also renders their use irreplaceable. Two years after he left animal experiments, Florian reached the same conclusion. He realized that no computer simulation could give him the answers he was looking for. “My whole field of research is useless if I don’t combine it with animal experiments.” Says Florian. Today he works with zebrafish; a two-millimeter long, half-millimeter wide fish that has the rare feature of a transparent pigmentation. This allows scientists to study its brain without the need for surgery. “We often harm the fish in other ways, but even simply keeping it still while the noisy machine is at work can expose the animal to a lot of stress”, says Florian. He pulls an elastic net of sugar gel into the water and drops it onto a fish. Its strings are so viscous that the tiny animal doesn’t notice it has swum into it. Its tail keeps flicking left and right, but the fish is not going anywhere. Florian looks into the microscope, through the water and skin, directly into its brain. The opening up of a part of the scientific community about animal testing is a positive event. According to Grignaschi and Rollin, such a reconnection can be beneficial for society as a whole and help fight a widespread anti-intellectualism in fields like vaccination and global warming. But the contrast with ethics is unavoidable. “It never gets easy”, says Florian. “No one cares about my fish. But if you saw them growing up under the microscope, if you saw them breaking their eggs and swam free for the first time, you would care about them too.” He switches off the microscope and cleans the gel off the fish. But the tiny creature won't swim away and rejoin the shoal. The procedure prescribes to kill the fish after the experiment. The image of a researcher troubled by ethical dilemmas runs counter to that of scientists as éminencses grises whose pure focus exempt them from moral considerations. “The prominent ideology is that science doesn’t have anything to do with ethics. But in the case of animal testing the moral implications are obvious”, explains Bernard Rollin, American philosopher and author of a number of influential books that made him a world-leading scholar in animal rights.“ A bewildering array of scandals, such as that over fume tests on monkeys commissioned by Volkswagen, raised massive societal concern that overcame this artificial separation.” Eventually, part of the scientific community understood that it had to break the silence and make an effort to explain what happens in their laboratories and why. Massive animal rights protests made it very clear. One such protest saw models parading with makeup that hadn’t been tested on animals as other mixed with the audience, their naked bodies painted in cruelty-free makeup. She was dressed in white from head to toe; her skin a russet, golden-brown; her upturned eyes black waxy marbles. After the last brush of scarlet lycopene lipstick, the model hugged a white bunny and carried it down the catwalk. This was 2000 in Portugal. Animal rights movements in Europe were making headlines after launching several synchronized and centrally coordinated protests across the continent. “Science must save lives without using lives”, says Maria do Céu Sampaio, who organized the demonstration. She is dressed in a cable-knit lambswool sweater over a blue velvet shirt, which gives a friendly touch to her professional look. Her confident and passionate tone contrasts with the weary gaze of someone who has spent more than 40 years fighting for animal rights. “Animals are not a useful resource to be exploited for our own advantage; they should undergo experiments only when they serve the purpose of saving lives.” In 2013, under growing public pressure and after assessing the availability of alternative methods, the European Commission imposed a marketing and testing ban on every cosmetic involving animal testing. “It is a perfect storm”, reasons Rollin. “On one side the scientific community doesn’t address ethics anywhere near as much as they should; on the other the public has growing ethical concerns. Clashes are inevitable.” Rollin has personally tested this ideological barrier. In 1985 he wrote the federal laws requiring control of pain in laboratory animals “under vicious opposition from the scientific community”. On another occasion, the scientists from the University of Edinburg who cloned the sheep Dolly asked for his advice to prepare the public for the announcement. Some of the ethical issues he warned about were not addressed and so shocked society. “The problem is that the scientific community has completely failed to attempt to educate the public. Many still believe that people and dinosaurs lived at the same time!” But it’s in the interest of everyone to engage in a more open debate. ”Success, freedom and autonomy are tied to accord with social ethics”, says Rollin. In order to avoid inadequate regulations being pushed forward by ethical concerns, scientists must break out of their ivory tower. Internet has helped to breach some ideological walls. I went from congresses to hashtag!” laughs Giuliano Grignaschi, a researcher at the Mario Negri Institute for Pharmacological Research. Grignaschi is not your typical scientist. His slender body of a track and field athlete leaves a strong clue of his previous career as a 400-meter sprinter. Only when he registered as a conscientious objector from serving the Air Force Academy and was assigned to community services, Grignaschi found that sport and science have a lot in common. “Improving, improving, improving. That’s the key in both cases.” After twenty years of laboratory research, his profound love for animals made him the head of the animal care unit with the task of supervising the correct application of the procedures on all animal experiments. “While the internet has greatly contributed to galvanizing a legitimate curiosity in scientific research, it has also misinformed the public”, he explains. “Because the scientific community was too reserved on animal testing, the only information found online was produced by well-intentioned, but misinformed activists.“ Grignaschi recognizes that animal rights groups had the merit of engaging public interest, but one side of the story was missing. Science’s widening disconnection from society has brought exaggerations and imbalance. A few years ago the situation started to change. Grignaschi – fifty years old – opened his first Twitter account and learned to condense useful scientific information into 140 characters. His experience reflects a wider trend. In the digital era, the success of every company and institution is closely tied to public opinion. While Youtube videos shot covertly in laboratories have damaged the reputation of many companies, brands like The Body Shop have been wildly successful by totally disavowing such testing. “Research is not enough”, says Grignaschi, “a good scientist needs to be a good communicator as well.” But could such a change damage science by shifting the focus away from research? “Absolutely not. Real progress cannot be achieved at odds with ethics.” On the contrary, when quickly accumulating pressure for change encounters a major scientific challenge, innovation can make the fortune of a company. Such was the case for TissUse, a Berlin startup company which products can reduce the need for animal testing. Yellow strips of tissue-infused silicon pump blood to three chambers the size of a screw head which house living cell cultures. The humble chunk of see-through material looks like a supercompact VHS which film snapped off the reel, but it actually simulates the activity of human organs. They call it human-on-a-chip technology – and it’s not science fiction. “Since the invention of the first human simulation in 1991, the goal has been to simulate the activity of human organs. What we want is to reproduce you and me on a chip, without us feeling any pain”, explains Uwe Marx, founder and CEO. “All you need to do is give us a sample and we will be able to simulate all your organs.” Technologies like this are a rare example of a limited array of alternatives to animal experiments that have emerged in the last few years. “But although they are very promising, organ-on-a-chip platforms can only offer an indication of what the real result on a living being would be”, explains Dario Padovan, president of Pro-test Italia, an association active across Europe in favor of continued animal testing to support scientific research. “The complexity of a full organism capable of feeling emotions and with a real psychological life cannot be tested with a simulation”, he explains. The same reason that makes animal testing morally disturbing also renders their use irreplaceable. Two years after he left animal experiments, Florian reached the same conclusion. He realized that no computer simulation could give him the answers he was looking for. “My whole field of research is useless if I don’t combine it with animal experiments.” Says Florian. Today he works with zebrafish; a two-millimeter long, half-millimeter wide fish that has the rare feature of a transparent pigmentation. This allows scientists to study its brain without the need for surgery. “We often harm the fish in other ways, but even simply keeping it still while the noisy machine is at work can expose the animal to a lot of stress”, says Florian. He pulls an elastic net of sugar gel into the water and drops it onto a fish. Its strings are so vicious that the tiny animal doesn’t notice it has swum into it. Its tail keeps flicking left and right, but the fish is not going anywhere. Florian looks into the microscope, through the water and skin, directly into its brain. The opening up of a part of the scientific community about animal testing is a positive event. According to Grignaschi and Rollin, such a reconnection can be beneficial for society as a whole and help fight a widespread anti-intellectualism in fields like vaccination and global warming. But the contrast with ethics is unavoidable. “It never gets easy”, says Florian. “No one cares about my fish. But if you saw them growing up under the microscope, if you saw them breaking their eggs and swam free for the first time, you would care about them too.” He switches off the microscope and cleans the gel off the fish. But the tiny creature won't swim away and mingle back in the shoal. The procedure prescribes to kill the fish after the experiment.
Why comedians go into politics
Nico Semsrott’s perspective sheds light on the crisis of the German left
Many entertainers animate today’s politics. Former comedian Beppe Grillo is leading the major opposition party in Italy. Russell Brand campaigned for the Labour party in the UK’s last elections. Jan Böhmermann’s “poem” on Erdogan caused a political crisis between Germany and Turkey. But why are comedians going into politics? “I am a disillusioned social democrat,” says Nico Semsrott, comedian and front man of the satirical German party Die Partei. His perspective sheds light on the crisis of the German left. Semsrott’s party shocked German public opinion with controversial posters reading: “a Nazi could be hanging here”. They raised public funding by selling money. They sneaked into 31 Facebook groups followed by AfD’s supporters, and kicked out the administrators shortly before the elections. Their program includes re-erecting the Berlin Wall, and their leader, Martin Sonneborn, now sits in the European Parliament. By all accounts, it was an intense year for Die Partei’s members. If you were to observe a professional public speaker such as a comedian or a politician before a performance, you would likely see them engaging in a series of basic warm-up exercises. They are fundamental to “place the voice in the mask” and to loosen the muscles. Not Nico. He simply stands behind the black curtains, a beam of light shining on his face, which is twice as strange because Nico is both a comedian and a politician. Matthew Stratton, associate professor at UC Davis and author of The Politics of Irony in American Modernism, has long studied the interaction between these two fields. Since irony functions by implying the opposite of what it says, it can also be used to put politicians on the front line, hence becoming a powerful weapon in the protesters’ arsenal. As a result, comedians often do a better job than journalists in covering ideologically oriented statements. “Journalism has its rules, and for a reason. But the engagement of satire can be beneficial for the system,” Paul Hockenos, a Berlin-based journalist and political analyst, defends the profession’s role, but agrees that the newsrooms’ tendency to look for scoops as a means of reaching bigger audiences can promote fake news and defeat the purpose of informing the public opinion. Comedians, on the other hand, can just call bullshit and make fun of it. “I am an improviser, but there is something political about it. If you break down how improv works, it’s built on the same premises as political rebellion. It’s an exercise in subversive behavior. It’s all about taking an idea and flipping it on its head to show how false or ridiculous it actually is,” explains Noah Telson, founder of Comedy Café Berlin, a major hub for improvisers in the city. “Populists don’t play by the same rules. In this new fight, irony is a much more efficient weapon.” Idealistic and outgoing, Chris didn’t rely on his friends’ opinions 4 years ago. He paused right before sending the email and realized he would have gone anyway. “It’s not about being fair or not. It’s about doing what you need to do. And right now we need to stop the extreme right.” After one last intimidating glance at the VGA cable connecting his old, dusty laptop to the projector, stiff and wary, on the alert for banana peels, Nico goes on stage. “Because politicians are going into satire – he explains with a smile – this is one of the jokes I forgot to use tonight.” Politicians like Boris Johnson, Nigel Farage, Donald Trump and Silvio Berlusconi are also performers. In a deflating moment for dignity as a political currency, they owe their success to the authenticity they inspire. “It has to do with the culture of a country,” says Andreas Rinke, Chief Political Correspondent for Reuters and German politics expert. Anti-intellectualism, understood as a strain of mistrust of expertise in favor of populist ideas, has many systemic causes. And although social media is clearly playing a crucial part, other factors are not to be forgotten. “Cable TV has a big influence on politics. Private channels will grant more air time to figures like Trump simply because he will secure higher ratings.” Moreover, “An electoral system based on personal votes will tend to promote strong personalities at the expense of the political line of the party”. Interestingly, none of these elements are at play in Germany, where public TV is still very well followed and the electoral system is mainly proportional. “Here it is still the case that success is based on credibility – continues Rinke – most of AfD’s leaders are trying to present themselves as serious. On the other side, the SPD wasn’t paid back for its policies arguably not because it is too serious, but because it is too similar to the CDU”. The relative decline of the social democrats in a country with a relatively healthy political and economic situation is intriguing, but it also offers a unique perspective on the reasons behind the political disillusionment that is driving comedians into politics. “We are disillusioned social democrats – explains Nico – we don’t feel represented by the SPD because they work against the poor and the young. Schröder did the most horrible things to the social system.” Moreover, ironic statements don’t offer any practical answer (the Die Partei manifesto pledges to “further complicate the German tax system so that large companies can no longer find money-saving loopholes”). It is clear that its use cannot represent a solution. “It’s not good for the discussion. It’s not good for the debate – admits Nico – but that’s not the point. It’s a reaction.” Although Die Partei doesn't have significant political weight yet, their growth is noteworthy. Disillusioned by the SPD and scared by the rise of the right, they represent a stress indicator of the left. “There should always be serious politicians, but perhaps the situation is so desperate that I will be drawn more and more into politics.” Nico speaks hesitantly; his eyes wander around the ceiling looking for the right words. His statements are obscure and dense in meaning, a jumbled mix of rage and hope. “This is my enemy: the radicalization and simplification of every aspect of our life. The whole of social media works on yes and no – thumbs up or down. But there is so much more! Irony unveils the ambivalence. It’s the tool of the powerless. An act of defense. A call for help.”
A self-indulgent but honest memoir
Looking back to my time trying to be a movie director in Los Angeles
I was twenty-one then, drained in my bed at 7:43 am as the alarm sounded from across the room, inside the cupboard, on the highest shelf - a strategy I adopted to force myself to wake up. Three minutes to stop the loud buzzing sound, eight to shower, three to heat up three slices of toast and squeeze two oranges while listening to the news. Six minutes to enjoy breakfast so I could start studying at 8 am. Last weeks before my graduation date - feeling like an octopus on roller skates. Still on my bed, the alarm still buzzing, eyes wide open as if the sound had pulled me back from the underworld, I grabbed my phone. A long message from Natalie. Quite too long actually. Sent at 3 am, not a good sign. I scanned through it trying to understand what happened. She was rambling, but the meaning was clear. I stopped the alarm: I was awake. Out of my window, Viale Monza was already congested. Clerks’ cars and Supermarket’s trucks were stirring up the pollution and fog of another grey day in Milan. Soon it would have rained. I dropped my phone, ignored my schedule, and went out jogging. The constant pace of my steps, the rhythmic sound of my breath, and the refreshing rain weaved my thoughts with an illusion of peace and progress. Natalie betrayed and left me. Tough luck. I had things do to, I would not have slowed down. I would have graduated, become a movie director, and then forgot about her too. Looking back, I see that those are the days that reshaped my character. Teenagers break their hearts easily, like they didn’t care. But the first time it hits them they become more careful, and this moderates their idealism. Thank God I was proud enough to remain half-blinded! People forget how important self-deception is. Lonely and confused, I would have never kept running without some lies. Natalie might have had my heart, I kept telling myself, but never an answer to all those messages that she never sent. Meanwhile, the next weeks - the busiest of my life - would have been a marathon on Ramadan. Besides finishing my thesis, in order to graduate in time I had to pass four exams – one every month – and to get to a proficient level in Spanish from scratch. Despite my strong motivation, something kept me from fully dedicate myself to my studies. I would spend hours scrolling through old pictures. One especially was often calling my attention. Riccione 2010, the slightly sulfuric smell of the seashore mixed with that of fried fish from the canopies. Flip flops, a volleyball, and nine friends at the beach looking at the camera they auto timed at ten seconds to have a photo of all of them together – that’s how you did it before the selfie era. Looking at that picture three years later helped me forget about the cold and humid temperatures of Milan. But it also made me a bit nostalgic. That was our last holiday all together, right before we started university. Interestingly, it was also the summer before the financial crisis hit the Italian market, suddenly turning us into the perfect candidates for the so-called “thousand-euro generation” club. No registry needed to be part of this group; the trouble was in fact to leave it. As youth unemployment reached fifty percent, TV and newspapers started to tell the plights of overqualified Italians living hand to mouth on just one thousand euro a month. They called us the “the lost generation". So arrogant, I thought. Speak for yourself, I am not lost at all. In fact, I plan to leave this country altogether. I have a fresh degree and a few hundred euros saved from my bartending, that shall be enough to buy myself a good airline ticket and an opportunity elsewhere. I starred at the picture for a few more seconds, wondering why all my friends were still here. We all grew up together, but I was always the most unsettled. I scrolled down before closing the laptop and posed my eyes on the capture under the photo. It simply read: “Us”. One year later, after I finally managed to finish my university, I was looking at the same picture from a computer screen in Los Angeles. Shortly after my graduation I found an internship in an American postproduction company. After six months the internship turned into a job, and after a year my company filed the application to give me a permanent working Visa in the US. It looked like my hard work had finally bought me an exit ticket from the infamous “one-thousand generation” club. Then my phone rang; the boss wanted to see me. “It’s not easy to say this. But I want you to know that we did everything we could.” I never liked Michelle’s office. It was too dark. It had no window and three sides of the room’s wall were painted in a dark brown color. On the forth side was a glass wall with a glass door. Why the human resources office resembled so much an interrogation room is something that never occurred to me. Shoulders against the glass, looking at the big blond woman through the diffused light of her lamp desk, I felt observed and guilty. “Teddy, come here!” Polina, my landlady, came back home from work with her big black dog just after I finished dinner, and found me sitting on the table, dangling my legs for who knows how long. Teddy brought over a gigantic tree branch, which it had been resolutely dragging all the way from the park to play with me, but I wasn’t in the mood for engaging activities. “How was your day?” Asked me Polina while she was spreading some butter on a piece of bread. “’Alright. Or maybe a bit weird.” “Why?” “They told me I can’t stay.” “What?” She asked alarmed raising her thin long Russian eyebrows. “The deadline for sending my Visa application was yesterday. My company was paying a lawyer to file all the documents, but only today they found out that his office was shut down for I don’t know which fraud. The trouble is that he just didn’t send the documents.” “Seriously? And what happens now?” “I have sixty days to leave the US.” Polina offered to go through all the legal technicalities try to find a loophole. I gently declined. “How do you feel?” “I honestly don’t feel anything. I guess it will hit me later.” The day after I was still fine. Two days after I felt the obligation of acting angry at my boss. As days went by, I also tried to be sad or disillusioned, but to this day I still don’t regret it. Thinking about it, my experience in the land of opportunity was doomed from the start. I had the first hint about it when my company asked me to open an American bank account to which they could transfer my tiny salary. Not that I had any bureaucratic issue. I drove to the closest mall, walked into a certain Chase bank, and ten minutes later I was already done. The unpleasant déjà vu hit me while I was unwrapping my new credit card. Still on the driveway, reaching on my pocket for the keys, I turned the envelope and there I read it: “Lehman Brothers Holdings Inc.” He cut his credit card in half, tore up his documents, and burned his money. He had terrible adventures in remote places, left profound memories in every person he met, and hitchhiked his way up to Alaska, where he died for food poisoning. His name was Christopher Johnson McCandless, a young Californian of a privileged upbringing, who, only a few days after graduating with full marks from Emory University, got rid of all his possessions, donated his saving to charity, and he started to travel. On the road. The world remembers him because his story became a bestseller book and a movie that captured the young generation’s desire for a big sod off to the modern capitalist world. Looking at my shiny credit card, I wondered what my personal hero would have thought about me. How could I open an account in the same bank responsible for the 2008 financial crisis, which almost bankrupted my country?I put the credit card in my wallet and drove back to the office trying to not think about it. Pennette Vodka and Salmone; some weed on a colorful glass pipe; sex on the sofa – with her two small dogs looking at us – then some pennette again. For a while, the discussion buzzed this way and that, incoherent, confused, like a wasp caught between a double-panned window. Then she suddenly said: “I think you should stop laughing and start taking me seriously”. “What do you mean?” “I am serious, it’s something that I am willing to do.” Monica was a friend of a friend. I only saw her three times in my life, but things moved pretty quickly between us: that night she asked me to marry her. Quite some chutzpah for someone I just met! All I knew about her is that she was a thirty-something psychologist from Hungary, who moved to America to study and temporarily married a friend to get a Visa. I guessed she liked me, but her offer to marry me, and to give me the same opportunity that she enjoyed, had more to do with her past than with me. Funny how psychologists can never solve their psychosis. “Well, thanks for the offer,” I finally said, feeling like a fish out of water, “but I don’t know if I want to stay.” A pause of dramatic silence. “I don’t care. I did everything I could, I played by the rules, and now I am not so interested anymore.” My relationship with Los Angeles ended that day, stoned on a couch in Sherman Oaks, busy turning down a marriage offer from a friend I hardly knew. I felt like Los Angeles was being quite a bitch with me, like in one of those toxic relationships that don’t want to finish. First, the city dumps me like it didn’t matter, and then it has second thoughts and it presents me with the opportunity to get together again. But it was too late. After thirteen months spent killing myself to fit in that city, I was now feeling liberated. The morning after, on my way back from Monica’s place, I noticed a group of people protesting against the use of public sprinklers. Too few millimeters of water in too many days: this was everyday news in Los Angeles 2014; officials were even advising skipping showers whenever possible. California was drying out, and I didn’t care. Old, rusty and with holes in its roof, my car wasn’t made for rain – I only paid it 800 dollars anyway. True, I never enjoyed driving around on forty-plus degrees without AC, but at least at home, I was fine. The big Eucalyptus in the middle of my backyard further contributed to my alienation from everyone else’s problems. It was a big old tree that stood gorgeous right next to Hollywood Boulevard, the last of its kind in this city. Its big leaves overshadowed the house and kept it cool all year long. A few years back, my landlady Polina considered selling her house. Inspectors came over and gave her a generous offer, but when they told her that they would have had to turn down the three in order to construct a new apartment building, she immediately changed her mind. Polina was a constant source of inspiration for me. She was a beautiful and strong Russian woman who lived in the US for most of her life, but who disliked both the Russians and the Americans. An ex-model, photographer, and film producer, she was now working as an acupuncturist. Next door was living my colleague Jeremy, a forty-something New York Jewish with a past as the guitar player of a rock band, and a difficult present as a constantly broke motion graphic artist. His personality was the unbalanced mix of strong social values, a bright mind, and absolutely no filter. He loved to complain about ‘merica to whoever would listen, but never superficially, always with the passion of a betrayed lover. The first time I walked into the office he said: “Jesus, now they send the interns in the graphics department too?”. Fast forward 3 months and he is ordering a round of Don Julio Tequila after another sixteen-hours working day together. “This is the best around, you know?” He said. “Not really, I don’t like Tequila.” “Of course, because you only buy shitty cheap shots. Do they even pay you at the office?” “Mark gives me one hundred bucks a week off the books”, I said. “Can you bring home the bacon with that?” “Dude, it’s LA, of course I can’t. I have been eating salad and rise for the last five months.” “Motherfuckers!” he cursed downing the shot of tequila with a wince. “But why do you work so much then?” “I don’t really know. I guess I want this job.” “Jesus. Let’s have a second round. Put away that money, kid, I pay.” Jeremy was right, good tequila is a different kettle of fish. I miss talking with him, waiting for him to prepare his morning espresso, and driving to work together. I miss Teddy, my landlady’s giant black dog who sounded like a dragon but behaved like a poppy. My rollerblades, because only in Los Angeles people don’t look at you weirdly when you use them. A ten dollar haircut at Supercuts every two weeks. Rock climbing with my friend Josh. My license plate, all I had left of my beloved Ford Escort 1991 after the car accident. Premiere Pro, the buggy editing software on which I spent most of my days. Nivea Baby Cream to fight California’s ridiculously dry weather. Broccoli, swordfish, and dark chocolate – in this order. Catie’s big blue eyes. I even miss the second time I shaved my hair – also the second time I immediately regretted doing it. I miss the abandoned couches that people leave on Los Angeles’ streets. They look so lonely and amiss, like solitary children who got too old too quickly. But most importantly, I miss cheap Oreos for breakfast. And it was Oreos again, this time for lunch, at a gas station just off Route 101. Then off again on the potholed highway, surrounded by dried shrubs and fat cacti. Hands on the driving wheel in brown leather, windows open, the salty breeze from the ocean. And then the crash, the exhaust system rattling off, and the awful smell of something burning. That Saturday I was coming back from the last shooting for my company after another seventy-hours working week. I was dead tired, I had five cookies for lunch and I was driving in forty-degree weather without AC. I don’t know if I passed out or if I simply fell asleep, all I remember is that I hit the BMW in front of me at sixty miles per hour. That woke me up. I crumbled out of my car with a big bruise on my chest. The guy in front of me was fine but wanted to call an ambulance for me. I refused because my insurance did not cover the 500-dollar bill. We exchanged the details, he drove away, and I called a friend to pick me up. That’s when I noticed that the radio in my car was still on. My favorite song. “I was scared of dentists and the dark/ I was scared of pretty girls and starting conversations.” While the proudly emptiest song ever written hypnotized the world with the uncompromising superficiality of its invented world - gangam - and the perverted ex-Disney alumni Miley Cyrus swung naked on a wrecking ball, I came up with a theory. By applying the Pareto principle to the world, I reached the conclusion that eighty percent of the people were stupid. I know, quite optimistic. No thanks, only a ukulele for me. Vance Joy’s Riptide was all I needed. A stream of consciousness that accumulates mysterious details, a series of small, personal facts a million times more complex than Beyoncé’s best makeup. To be sure, I was crazy too, but in a different way. After that car accident I had trouble breathing for more than two months, but that did not stop me from saving the 500 bucks on the ambulance to produce my own movie. As soon as I recovered from the accident I went to Malibu beach, my favorite spot in California, for a last day at the ocean. Two miles are a long way, if you are running on the beach; all those little muscles in the palms of your feet work overtime in the sand. That’s why I learned to leave my old Ford Escort not farther than one mile from Point Mugu, Hollywood B-movies most photographed cliff that marks the western end of the Malibu Coast. Accustomed as I was to go jogging next to the fetid waters of Milan’s canals, I never regretted moving to Los Angeles when I was at the beach. That day I felt very well and I didn’t want to go back to my car after only one mile of running. So, once I reached Point Mugu, where the coast simply ends on a bunch of insurmountable rocks, I dug a hole next to one of the only trees in the beech, I buried my keys and phone, then started to swim. In my mind the plan was easy, I would have swum around the rocks and kept running on the other side. It didn't even occur to me that the other end of the cliff could be more than one hundred meters away. Worse yet, once you start swimming you can’t go back, or the big waves of the ocean will surely smash you against the sharp rocks of the cliff. So there I was, dead tired off the coast of Malibu, trying to stay afloat while desperately looking for a solution. Then all of a sudden something slimy touched my foot. It was obviously some seaweed, but in my mind I had no doubt: there was a shark. All my fatigue disappeared and I swam like crazy until I reached the other side of the cliff. Face on the sand, breathing heavily with my eyes closed, it took me a while to realize what a terrible smell there was. Disgusted, I opened my eyes and I saw one of the most surprising spectacles. Hundreds of seals laid in front of me, sleeping on the sun or fighting for the best spot on a cliff. Clearly, very few people had been stupid enough to reach that side of the coast, making it a perfect spot for those beautiful and stinky animals. Staring at that uncontaminated spot of land with my nose pinched, I thought this was a good summary of my experience in California. A catch 22. A hard journey that brought me to something dangerous and smelly, but also unexpected and beautiful. It was time to go back. Back to where it all started, thirteen months before, when I was stuck at my desk with my red luggage next to me. Outside is windy, my dad waits for me in the car, ready to drive me to the airport where I will take a thirteen-hour flight to Los Angeles. But I just can’t move. I keep looking at that picture of a sunny day with my friends in Riccione. I know this is the last chance I have to change my mind, to say that I don’t want to go, that I want to stay here with my friends and my family. Then I click on the picture, and I realize that it’s actually a video. Someone must have pressed the wrong button so that instead of auto timing the camera to take a picture after ten seconds, it took a ten seconds video of us getting ready for a shot that never happened. And it was beautiful. Trapped in those seconds that were never supposed to be remembered, you could have a glance at what we truly were, with our real smiles and our real expressions. I played those seconds on repeat until they lodged in my head like the most pleasant earworm. Secured in my memory, those moments would have never vanished. We would have always been there, in that beach, together, redoing the same things over and over. A place of no choices to take, no challenges to face, no dreams to follow. I closed my laptop and head over to the car.