Friday, June 26, 2009

The end of an era

I was in the mall today and had that feeling of being isolated from the world, although it had been only a few hours. I didn't have a cell phone with me nor any access to news.

But the pre-teen girls next to me on the bench did have cell-phones (and probably knew how to use them better than I know my own). They had just received some news.

"Do you think she knows?" one of them whispered to the other. They turned to me.

"Michael Jackson died."

"Oh really? Today? What happened?" They didn't know any details.

It felt odd that Michael Jackson's death would merit speaking to a stranger. I felt that strange feeling of wanting to distance myself from the world, yet at the same time wanting to talk about this thing that was of common interest. Or, shall I say, common grief.

7 comments:

  1. привет,лиз! :)
    yeah..even when i was on the market this morning, a finn girl came to me just to ask whether i've heard the news about michael jackson's death. :o
    it's kinda weird since i know most finn wouldn't want to talk to a stranger on the street or market. :o

    ReplyDelete
  2. "Common" for sure....grief? Interest? It is sort of sad when someone's death causes IMMEDIATE joking. Even Ilya - who barely speaks English, and who I would think would know nothing about Michael Jackson...ran through the hall last night and yelled into Zhen's room, "It OK Zhenya! Michael Jackson never touch you again!" I'm sorry; I wanted to laugh. Maybe it was the accent. Maybe the joy it gives me when Ilya displays his quirky sense of humor.

    Feels unfair for Farrah somehow. Eclipsed.

    ReplyDelete
  3. Он действительно был значимым исполнителем в американской культуре?

    ReplyDelete
  4. I heard on the radio today that he died owning $400.000.000 (four hundred million!) to creditors. If I die owning that much to anyone, please, forget that I existed the next day after my death. I am only concerned about his children. The media should leave them alone.

    ReplyDelete
  5. Andrey, mozhet byt' v kontse 80x nachale 90x. A tak, ego muzyku ty zdes' ne uslyshish'

    ReplyDelete
  6. Да, был значимым исполнителем, потом в качестве личности. А в России, что говорят?

    A lot of people felt sorry for Michael Jackson due to his strange lifestyle, but he was still very highly respected as a musician. From what I know, at least. He was about to go on tour. I heard about his enormous debt as well.

    ReplyDelete
  7. В России больше спорят от чего он умер.

    А вообще кто-то из наших актеров, увидев Майкла Джексона еще в советское время сказал: "Чтоб я так пел, как он танцует" :)

    ReplyDelete

Just added word verification to reduce spam. Nothing personal!

You’re welcome to leave a link to your own blog here if it's relevant to this blog.

Please make sure that your comments are 1) relevant and 2) respectful (i.e. no cuss words, attacks on individuals).

Voices

 In the past month, it has been interesting to read the published thoughts of Russian friends as they've gotten their voice back upon es...