ENGLISH VERSION
Virus Sapiens
For over a month, he’s been taking afternoon walks at about the same time of the day. This routine kept him somewhat sane in a time when all the days felt like Sunday afternoons. “Funny,” he thought, “I spend more time outside now than I ever did before.”

His beloved native Maribor was never known for pulsing at a hundred and eighty beats per minute; it preferred rather to bubble beneath the surface while keeping a straight face for the outside world, but during the past month, its usual calm grew even greater.
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He decided to head into town. The Turk over the shut doors of the corner store directed his expressionless gaze towards the empty square and kept his thoughts to himself as he was wont to do.

A few steps farther, a dandelion that had sprung from the wall and climbed atop the stone arc of the bridge was flashing its lavish yellow hues as if to say “Look at me, you’ve got all the time in the world now to spot me.”

​It seemed to him that even the usually lazy-flowing Drava River had come to a complete halt. No, it wasn't just that; when an easterly wind picked up over its surface, he got the feeling the river was flowing backwards.

Constructions machinery at the Main Square had already fallen silent. The few remaining workers wandered aimlessly about the site and were slowly getting ready to head home. Slowly but surely, the square was being draped with shiny new attire, one that was sure to stand out. See, Maribor had always had a few dents here and there and was always a bit rough around the edges. Even the plague monument, erected centuries ago to mark a different epidemic, was given a sprucing up and cleaned, and the column rising from the scaffolding made Mary look like she was placed in quarantine too.

Gosposka Street was empty, aside from a few pigeons, and he could hear the sound of his footsteps while walking. He liked the peace and quiet, liked how he could hear the birds and even his own breath, but there was more. Grass had begun to grow from all the nooks and crannies between cobblestones. While in some places it made its first shy attempts, there were parts where it had firmly established its position and was becoming greener and greener without the usual horde of trampling feet.
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Slovenska Street was nearly as empty; he encountered only two, maybe three people. They passed one another at a great distance, with their faces turned away as if a mere look could be contagious. A few people stood in front of the store at Grajski Square. Forming a neat line, disciplined and masked, they were in full regard of distancing rules. Pigeons were walking among them as if they were smirking at people. He headed towards the park, passing the statue of the moustached general frozen in time, with his grim gaze facing west and his sabre ready to be drawn.

The park was nearly in full green and was pulsing with life. Another dandelion stood proud on the unkempt lawn, surrounded by flocks of white daisies. Magnolias had already shed their blossoms and the fallen petals were strewn about the promenade, with no one around to pile them up with a noisy leaf blower and put them away.

He had the feeling that the few passers-by shared his thoughts that life did not stop but it was rather us who have stopped, whereas life went on, following its own path and returning to where it belonged. If only there wasn’t that ominous red-and-white plastic tape wrapped around the playground that forbade children from playing. Still, signs that children were playing here remained, outlined in chalk on the ground.

Heading back home it occurred to him that he shouldn’t worry about what will happen to the city. If it survived sieges by Hungarians and Turks, the plague and fires, two world wars and bombing raids, countless countries and regimes, economic collapses and recessions, revolts and uprisings, it will live through being frozen in time for a while. But ever so silently, a quote from the Matrix crept into his mind that made him think:

"I'd like to share a revelation that I've had during my time here. It came to me when I tried to classify your species and I realized that you're not actually mammals. Every mammal on this planet instinctively develops a natural equilibrium with the surrounding environment but you humans do not. You move to an area and you multiply and multiply until every natural resource is consumed and the only way you can survive is to spread to another area. There is another organism on this planet that follows the same pattern. Do you know what it is? A virus.”

And it dawned on him that he did not wish for things to turn back to normal any time soon, that he no longer wished for a world that had seemed normal just a few months ago. A world in which we rocked and raved, trying to overtake time any way we could, a world in which the real virus was us. Virus Sapiens.
ORIGINAL TEXT

Virus Sapiens

​Že dober mesec se je vsak popoldan približno ob istem času odpravil na sprehod. Rutina, ki ga je v časih, ko so vsi dnevi podobni nedeljskim popoldnevom, ohranjala pri koliko toliko zdravi pameti. »Hecno,« je pomislil »zdaj sem več zunaj, kot sem bil prej.

Njemu tako ljub rodni Maribor je le poredkoma utripal s stoosemdesetimi udarci na minuto, bolj je brbotal pod površino, navzven pa je kazal svoj umirjeni obraz, a zadnjih mesec dni se je tudi ta njegova običajna umirjenost umirila še bolj.

Odločil se je, da krene v mesto. Turek nad zaprtimi vrati trafike je nemo zrl na prazen trg in si kot ponavadi mislil svoje, nekoliko dlje pa se je nad kamnitim obokom mostu iz zidu razbohotil regrat in se kazal v vsem svojem razkošnem rumenilu, češ: »Glejte me, zdaj imate čas, da me opazite.«

Tudi sicer lenobna Drava se mu je zdela, kot da se je ustavila; še več, ko je zapihal čez gladino veter z vzhodne strani, je dobil občutek, da teče nazaj.

Na Glavnem trgu so gradbeni stroji že utihnili, le nekaj delavcev je še tavalo po gradbišču in se počasi odpravljalo domov. Trg počasi dobiva novo bleščavo podobo in bo kar nekoliko izstopal, Maribor je bil namreč zmeraj nekoliko obtolčen in okrušen po robovih. Tudi kužno znamenje sredi trga, postavljeno pred stoletji v spomin na neko drugo epidemijo, lišpajo in čistijo in steber obdan z gradbenim odrom izgleda, kot da je tudi Marija v karanteni.

Na Gosposki ulici, z izjemo nekaj golobov, ni srečal nikogar in med hojo je lahko slišal svoje korake. Všeč mu je bila ta tišina, v kateri je bilo slišati ptice in je lahko prisluhnil celo svojemu dihanju, opazil
pa je še nekaj. Iz vseh razpok in razmakov med tlakovci je pričela poganjati trava. Mestoma še sramežljivo, ponekod pa si je že kar dodobra izborila prostor in zelenela, saj ni bilo neštetih nog, ki bi jo pomendrali.

Podobno prazna je bila tudi Slovenska ulica, srečal je le dva ali tri sprehajalce. V velikem loku so se ognili drug drugemu in umikali poglede, kot da so tudi ti nalezljivi. Pred trgovino na Grajskem trgu je stalo nekaj ljudi. Lepo v vrsti, disciplinirani, zamaskirani in po predpisih distancirani. Kot v posmeh so se med njimi sprehajali golobi. Krenil je proti parku, mimo v času zamrznjenega kipa brkatega generala, z mrkim pogledom proti zahodu, tik pred tem, da izvleče sabljo.

Že dodobra zeleneli park je utripal od življenja. Tudi tukaj se je na nepokošeni travi bohotil regrat, ki so se mu pridružile zaplate belih marjetic. Odpadli listi odcvetele magnolije so se vrtinčili po
promenadi, saj ni bilo nikogar, ki bi jih s hrupnim pihalnikom zgnal na kup in pospravil.

Zdelo se mu je, da sicer redki sprehajalci čutijo podobno kot on, da se življenje ni ustavilo, ampak da smo se končno ustavili mi, življenje pa je šlo svojo pot in se vrnilo tja, kamor sodi. Če le ne bi bilo tistega zloveščega rdeče-belega plastičnega traku, ki je ovit okoli igral prepovedoval otroško igro. A so otroci vendarle povsod puščali sledi svoje igre, če ne drugače, s kredo po asfaltu.

Ko se je vračal proti domu, je ugotovil, da ga ni strah za mesto. Če je preživelo madžarska in turška obleganja, kugo in požare, dve svetovni vojni in bombne napade, države in režime, gospodarske zlome in padce, upore in vstaje, bo tudi to "zamrznitev" v času. Se mu je pa od nekod tiho prikradel citat iz Matrice, ki mu je dal misliti:

»V času svojega bivanja med vami sem prišel do spoznanja, da pravzaprav niste sesalci. Vsak sesalec na tem planetu namreč nagonsko razvije naravno ravnovesje s svojim okoljem, vi ljudje pa ne. Premaknete se na območje in se množite in množite, dokler ne porabite vseh naravnih virov in edini način, da preživite je, da se razširite na drugo območje. Na tem planetu obstaja še en organizem, ki sledi istemu vzorcu. Veste, kaj je to? Virus.«

In prešinilo ga je, da si ne želi, da bi bilo kmalu vse po starem, da si ne želi več sveta, ki se mu je še pred nekaj meseci zdel normalen. Sveta, v katerem smo (z)noreli in po levi in desni prehitevali čas, sveta, v katerem smo virus pravzaprav mi. Virus Sapiens.

Vid Kmetič

These few lines are much too short to list everything that Vid Kmetič has worked on and produced so far, but anything he did was never far removed from culture. Over the last few years Vid found his voice in the written word, using his native Maribor as the leitmotif of his texts. Be it newspaper articles, social media posts or books, Vid always takes great pleasure in more or less (un)known
stories from the city’s past. On top of that, he never shies away from poking his quill into more recent Mariborian adventures. In short: Vid truly cares about Maribor.

Slovenian-English translations made by Rok Kodrič
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