"Those who crusade, not for God in themselves, but against
the devil in others, never succeed in making the world better,
but leave it either as it was, or sometimes perceptibly worse
than what it was, before the crusade began. By thinking
primarily of evil we tend, however excellent our intentions,
to create occasions for evil to manifest itself."
-- Aldous Huxley
"The only war that matters is the war against the imagination.
All others are subsumed by it."
-- Diane DiPrima, "Rant", from Pieces of a Song.
"It is difficult
to get the news from poems
yet men die miserably every day
for lack
of what is found there"
-- William Carlos Williams, "Asphodel, That Greeny Flower"
You are so right, I never really noticed that until now! And it is always around doors, right? So you have to walk through toxic fumes to get anywhere. It is a disgusting habit.
Thanks for your comment Oxygen Girl and I completely agree. Often I find myself holding in my breath as I go through doors in anticipation of the toxic haze …I think the sign subliminally reminds them about smoking, so they light up and have one before they enter. And the build-up of thrown stubs are another disgusting result.
i am currently in Germany and it is interesting to see the quite different attitude to smoking here than in Australia. Smoking is way more common here and as far as i can tell also seems to be less of a division of smokers/non-smokers along socio-economic lines here. Not to mention cigarette ad billboards, i don’t remember seeing one of them in Oz for a long time… But i am getting off the original topic, just wanted to add an observation of my own (and i should be fair and note that smoking is just one small part of a plethora of cultural differences between Australia and Europe).
Hi Michael and thanks for coming by. I’ve heard the same and look forward to perhaps hearing about more of the differences both between Oz and Germany/ Austria as well as between different parts of Germany. I hear the Bavarians are really eccentric (maybe I should go stay there, I’d be right at home ;) )
well i can only comment on my own observations but to generalise wildly i’d say the further south you go in Germany (ie down into Bavaria) the more real people start to resemble awful cliched stereotypes