There’s a private message from a friend I rarely see called Cara. She asks how I am. She’s messaged me to say she’s annoyed I missed our Skype dinner. She knows I was online because I was live-tweeting a rant about chutneys and my Skype was on but set to ‘busy’. Cara lives 45 minutes away by tube but doesn’t meet up unless it’s on Skype. She does this thing called Skype Dinners, where you cook some food and eat together online. It’s supposed to be like a dinner party. I didn’t do it because I feel weird about knowing someone has a full screen of me chewing. Cara’s developing a site, like ChatRoulette, but for the dinner party aficionado. You create a profile, listing things you like to talk about, what you’re looking for – a date or a conversation or to meet interesting people – whether you want politics, or humour, or life-affirming and then you’re matched with someone you have dinner with. It’s still in beta test because she can’t attract funders.
I click ‘hide request’ on the other Kitab’s add friend notification.
I have a job interview with an American internet company. It’s for a community manager position. I would work from home and get to travel to Portland once a year for a global team meet-up. I’ve been asked to look at their website and be brutally honest about it, because part of what I will be doing will be working with developers to create a better user experience. After we’ve done our pleasantries and I’ve tried to impress the American interviewer, Lou-Anne, with my English accent, she asks me to tell her a bit about the website and my thoughts. I’m nervous. I don’t know how to talk intelligently, sell myself, make me seem like a viable candidate. At the same time, I need the job, so I have to. I try to be as enthusiastic as a Skype call can allow me.
‘Well,’ I say. ‘I like the way the interface allows for a granular approach to the user experience.’
‘Mmmm,’ Lou-Anne says. She wants me to keep talking. I don’t know what to say.
‘The thing is, with the landing page, there’s a real need for authenticity. Authenticity is important online. People feel like they trust you more if you’re authentic. And this feels authentic.’
‘What’s authentic about it for you? Tell us what we’re doing right and maybe tell us what we could be doing better.’
‘Well,’ I say. ‘The whole thing feels like … like, I logged into this website when I was having a look and the first thing I see is an empty shell. That empty shell is a reminder that we’re alone online unless we make connections ourselves. We have an innate desire to create our own immersive journeys. But to do that, we need a proactive approach to content aggregation.’ I’m saying words at this point. I applied for this job because I can use Twitter. I don’t know what I’m saying.
‘Right,’ Lou-Anne says. In a clipped way. ‘That’s interesting. Great to hear your thoughts,’ she says with an inflection that makes me think she doesn’t care for my thoughts. There’s a silence. And then:
‘What else? What about the filter mechanism – is it aspirational enough?’ I look around the screen for a filter mechanism. All I see is the empty shell of an account I signed up for 20 minutes before the interview.
‘Well,’ I say, nervously. ‘The greys are very slick.’
‘Kitab, I’m going to stop you there, and let you know: we just spent a quarter of a million dollars redeveloping our site … for a chewier click-through matrix full of snackable content. In terms of the ideation and its agility in the marketplace, I suppose, yes, that is a nifty grey …’ She stops talking. I smile into the calendar and stare at the picture of me, my dad, Aziz and Mum on my noticeboard till it blurs. Lou-Anne waits for me to respond.
I spend an afternoon tweeting in-jokes with other writers. Mostly with Hayley.
We’re trying to write out the plot of Midnight’s Children using only gifs. So far, we’re only on chapter 2.
I trawl Facebook for what’s happening with my supposed ‘real friends’. They have been out to places and taken photos of what they had to eat and drink. Who knows if they really did, or perhaps these are stock photos. I ‘like’ a random selection, just to keep a presence.
I check Dad’s account. He’s recently added 6 new females and has been tagged in a photo by his brother, in which he’s falling over in the garden, drunk. I post a comment on it, saying ‘Ahhh, my role model’, and my uncle replies. We go back and forth about my dad’s antics – dating and drinking – until it turns nasty and I’m accused of being judgmental. My uncle comments: ‘Your father has worked hard in his life. Why can he not relax without his son getting high and mighty? We are all on a journey, Kitab-beta.’
I look at the fridge and know there’s nothing in there I want. Beer. Cheese. And the chutneys. Those fucking chutneys. Aziz eats all his meals out. He doesn’t have anything I can steal.
I notice that Rach has decided to join Facebook. And add me, I might add. I look through her feed. There are a few photos and I’m in attendance at all the events they were taken at; they were when we were together. We look happy. We’re smiling, laughing, dancing, cuddling, in one we’re kissing, but this captured intimacy doesn’t feel like something I’ve experienced. I stare at the photo of me kissing her and it doesn’t look like me. For one, this Kitab looks happy. I remember that night. It was my birthday 3 years ago and we had ended up at our flat, shoes off, dancing to reggae. There was a limbo competition. I won. I’m surprisingly good at the limbo. I think about tweeting ‘I’m surprisingly good at limbo’, but I don’t.
There’s a few comments from people welcoming her: ‘finally?!?!>>!’. That’s it. She has made no declaration of her reasons for joining or what she likes or dislikes. She is simply there. Lurking. Watching. It’s weird that she’s on here. One of our main arguments was her ‘Black Ops’ aversion to technology, meaning she didn’t have a mobile phone. She couldn’t understand why we couldn’t make a plan and stick to it; she wasn’t signed up to any social networking site. She didn’t have email or Facebook. ‘Why can’t we just phone each other on a landline and make an arrangement and keep to it?’ she would say. She worked in a job that didn’t require constant email access. You had to be present with her. And bloody hell, that was hard.
I go into my Documents folder, into Admin, and then into CV. In CV there’s another folder called D323. It’s got all my camera phone nude photos of Rach that I promised I’d deleted. I look at the one of her with her bra hanging off her knee, her foot up on the bed. It’s a sideways shot. She covers her right breast and down bits with this angle. I zoom in until the pixels blur into flesh-coloured squares.
I get a Facebook event invite from Rach reminding me about her birthday then a private message from her apologising for including me in it. She asks me ‘How are you?’, and even written down I can hear the emphasis on the are. I don’t reply because fuck her for not understanding how social media works. She was constantly irritated that I spent my time self-promoting on the internet and living off my inheritance instead of giving her any attention.
She once told me, ‘I hate how you’re never in the room with me. Even when you’re in the room. You’re just on that bloody phone making lazy self-obsessed quips about nothing.’
‘It’s just fun, this big online conversation.’
‘What about our conversation? I’m in the room.’
‘I just think it’s amazing, having this global audience to interact with.’
‘What? And tell them all the stupid things I say?’
‘You are funny.’
I used to mock her on Twitter. I thought she didn’t mind. People found it funny.
Example tweet: ‘My girlfriend pronounces the B in subtle but calls submarine sumarines.’
I had changed the focus of the tweet slightly to make her look stupid. At the time we had been walking through a village in Devon, making fun of words with silent letters, saying them to each other slowly, like ‘E-NOO-GUH-HUH’ and ‘GA-HOST’. We were falling about laughing, and it kept up for another hour till during lunch, when, while Rach slowly finished her sand
wich – she was such a slow eater, it was almost cute – I tweeted.
My dad replies to my text asking if he’s okay, saying: ‘Of course Im ok. seeing you tonight. Please shave. I would like to see my son’s face.’
Aziz, sensing my inert hangover, emails me a motivational message to get me writing. ‘If you are the Captain of a sinking ship, the best example you can set is to get off that ship as soon as you can. Really, you should be the first off.’
I shave. As my stubble comes off, I remember why I’ve kept it thick in recent months: it’s to disguise the bloating of beer and pizza in my cheeks. I look at myself in the mirror. Apart from the bags under my eyes and the beer gut, I’m doing okay, I think. I compose an email to Rach. I don’t send it.
Eventually, I’ve wasted enough time to justify opening a beer. As I close the fridge, I see another chutney that I’ve never opened before. It has Rach’s handwriting on it. It says mango, lime and cumin chutney. I close the fridge on it.
aZiZWILLKILLYOU episode 2 Aziz vs Tattoos
[posted 8 September, 11:02]
People, there are 3 rules that apply to all tattoos …
If you get the name of a loved one tattooed on your body, you will break up with each other.
If you design the tattoo yourself, chances are it’s not good enough to go on your body.
If you think your tattoo is unique, it definitely isn’t. If your tattoo is unique, it’s most likely shit.
AMIRIGHT?
Take it from Aziz. This shit is gospel. Matthew, Mark, Luke, John and AZIZWILLKILLYOU gospel.
So guys, something weird happened last night. I was talking to my brother, Kit, about getting a tattoo. I want one. I’ve never had one before. I’m definitely the kind of crazy motherfucker who needs a crazy motherfucker tattoo to make him look like a crazy motherfucker. But those 3 rules I listed, they always stopped me. And, why mess with perfection? Innit? My bro Kit’s already declared he’s going to get an ironic ‘job description’ tattooed on his forearm, the sensitive artist. But anyway, we were chatting.
I was saying I should get a random word like ‘sparrow’ or ‘erudite’ tattooed on my bicep as a talking point. Conversational lull? Wanna mystify some beanie in the pub with something vague but talking-pointy? Flex your biceps and wait for the enquiries to pour in.
Because, then people’ll be like … why does it say that word? And I’ll have this amazing story prepared for them. So, Kit and I are discussing words.
‘Sparrow,’ I was like, yeah, weird word.
And he was like, ‘Why?’
And I was like, ‘It doesn’t matter. That’s not the point. It’s a talking point.’
‘Yeah, but neither of us know what to say about it.’
‘True. Erudite?’
Then Kit was like, ‘And what?’
‘And what what?’
‘No … and what?’
‘What do you mean?’
‘I mean … and what?’
‘What the words … “and what?”?’
‘Yeah …’
‘That’s pretty cool. What about an ampersand and a question mark?’
‘Pretty cool.’
‘Not cool enough.’
And then, it hit me. When he came back from the fridge, I was like, ‘I have the answer.’
‘Hit me,’ Kit said.
‘I’ll get my favourite t-shirt. On my chest. That way I’ll never lose it, shrink it, or ruin it. Think about it, I’ll always be dressed. In my favourite t-shirt.’
Kit laughed.
‘Imagine,’ I said. ‘People who confine their tattoos to where they can’t be seen when you’re wearing a suit – what if they got a tattoo that smartened them up?’
‘Like workwear tatts?’
‘Exactly. You gotta be smart for work, right?’
Kit said, ‘I wonder if you could get a tattoo of a tie? That way you’re always smartly dressed.’
‘Nah, man. That would be annoying over your belly. Especially if you put on weight. It’d look stupid,’ I said back.
‘No, mate. A bow tie. Imagine a bow tie tattoo. You would be so dapper, mate. Do you think anyone has ever had a bow tie tattoo on their neck?’
We Googled it. Why not? We’re modern men. And what is the smartphone if not the thing that means conversations never have to descend into bullshit? We have every answer at our fingers. I’m only too happy to look up bow tie tattoos, because if there is one out there, that person is my new hero. All my heroes are either stupid or brave. I typed ‘bow tie tattoo’ into my phone’s search engine and tapped ‘GO’.
I hit the image search and there, courtesy of the internet, were photos of a surprisingly diverse selection of people with bow tie tattoos. Some with bow ties on their breasts, some with bow ties on their forearms but only one where an actual bow tie would be.
‘That’s me,’ I said.
I handed the phone to Kit. Fourth picture into the image list there was a thumbnail of a man who looked remarkably like Aziz. This guy was wearing sunglasses I might wear (aviators in a new rave hue), a black wife-beater, a wicked shit-eating smile, Chico Dusty chocolate skin and the same spiky hair that’s been poking up between girls legs round my way for the last 15 years. The same nose. The same wide-eared ‘YESSSS BLUUUUUD’ grin. And a red bow tie. Tattooed under his neck. Where a real red bow tie would be. I clicked on the thumbnail and it took us to a larger photo. Kit moved to sit next to me. We stared at the screen, dumbfounded looks on our faces.
‘Are you thinking what I’m thinking?’
‘No,’ Kit said.
‘I’m doing it. That’s me. I have to do it. I owe it to this me.’ I pointed at the phone. I pointed at the scar on my neck. ‘It’s time to cover this malarkey up.’
‘That’s not you,’ Kit said.
‘It could be me. From the future. Apparently they can do that now with the internets.’
We examined the contours of the bow tie tattoo man’s face. The closer you look, you realise it isn’t me.
‘It’s bloody odd how similar we are,’ I said.
‘That’s the power of the internet,’ Kit said.
‘What do you mean?’
‘The more we’re allowed to Google search stuff, the more we realise we’re not special.’
‘Oh, shut up. There’s no one like Aziz. And I’m getting a bow tie tattoo.’
What do you think?
There are 8 comments for this blog:
Muderation: DO IT
Philo Savvy: Yes, cossssssign. DO IT.
MichaelMcArthur: Seriously? WTF> You cray, Aziz.
Decarp: Someone just tweeted this blog and it’s nuts. Wait – you’re gonna get a bow tie tattoo cos someone else who looks like you has one? Yes.
Philo Savvy: Pics or STFU.
AZIZWILLKILLYOU: I’ve been thinking, this is definitely happening people. Not only am I getting that tattoo, but I’m hunting that fuckface down.
KITABWILLDESTROYYOU: Go to bed. Stop stalking people online.
Decarp: Go Aziz!
History:
Tattoo disasters – Google
Spying on people’s Facebooks – Google
Best Asian author – Google
Jhumpa Lahiri hot – Google
It’s Friday night (my dad’s usual slot for me – Friday for the children and friends, Saturday for the ladies) and I’m sitting in our favourite Indian restaurant waiting for him to arrive. When Dad shows up, he is dressed in a silk pink shirt, a leather jacket that goes past his waist, and black trousers. The only thing missing is some crocodile shoes. Instead my dad is wearing the omnipresent black Nike Air knock-offs he’s been wearing for the last 20 years, which keep his now-mangled feet breezy and comfortable. I once bought him some proper Nike Airs but they’re boxfresh, unused – ‘unused to my feet’, Dad said. His feet are now moulded to the shape of the inside of these cheap versions. He is holding on to the remnants of his sparse, thin, silky silver hair by growing around the bald crown a
fine mane as long as possible.
‘What’s new, kiddo?’
‘Rachel wants to be my friend on the Facebook.’
‘She wants to be back together? Good, I like that.’
‘No, just friends on Facebook.’
‘Why would she do that? Unless she wants to be back together?’
I don’t reply. We both snap poppadoms.
Dad spoons onion onto his shard and I stare at the bubbles on mine, before dipping it in the raita and crunching down, grimacing at the sugary yoghurt.
‘Thank you for shaving. You know? Your face looks fat. Why is your face so fat? I need to work on this beer belly so I can get more dates, eh kiddo?’
When my mum died, when I was young, he went through a decade of wearing a fleece jumper and tracksuit bottoms, going to work in the same warehouse and coming home and eating the same food watching the same DVDs of the same Bollywood songs he and my mum listened to. It was a decade of mourning. Then he retired, and quickly realised how much of a social animal he is. He goes out 4 nights a week, wakes up in the early afternoons hung-over and watches old films till it’s time to go out again. He is basically me in my early 20s. Wednesday and Thursday nights, he props up the bar in his local Indian pub, watching cricket and counting masala peanuts (finely-chopped onions and chillies mixed in with dry roasted peanuts, drizzled in lemon juice and chilli powder) as dinner. Fridays and Saturdays are date-nights for him. He only ever has dinner with me or with a lady. And because he’s the type of guy who stands on old-fashioned ceremony, he will never let his child or a lady pay for dinner. We eat for free.
Meatspace Page 2
