" I WOULD NEVER LIVE IN THAT VILLAGE. NEVER! "
		by SAMM BENNETT
	Austria is one of those European countries I've visited many times over the years. It's a small nation, but within its borders there are surprising numbers of cities, towns and even villages with live music venues and local audiences eager to listen. I was there on one occasion, several years back , with my band Chunk. We were in a rural area: cows in the fields, stacks of hay, the odd farm house here and there. It was the morning after a concert, and we were getting a ride to the next town. The grassy mountain slopes were covered with dew, glistening under the morning sunlight. These sleepy, serene little corners of the world were a welcome change of scene for me: the antithesis of the gritty neighborhood I lived in, across the Atlantic, in faraway Brooklyn, USA. So, we were just setting out from the village we'd stayed in the night before. It was situated on the side of a mountain, and consisited of some houses, shops, a church, a hotel, and not much else. We drove out of town, which took about 14 seconds or so. I was sitting in the passenger seat up front, next to our driver. Not so far away, just across the valley and halfway up another big hill, I spied another litttle village. I'd actually noticed it earlier that morning, visible as it was from my hotel room window. At a glance, one would surmise that it was virtually identical to the village we'd just departed: the homes, the buildings that probably housed the usual baker, butcher, tobacco and drug store, and of course, a church steeple. I was aware that our driver lived in the area, so I wondered if he was from either of these villages. I asked, do you live in that village over there, across the valley? Well, those two villages might've looked identical, but there were apparently big differences. BIG differences. He turned to me and answered with a quiet but very deliberate air: "No, I live here. I would never live in that village. Never!" There was no doubt as to the rock solid certainty behind this rock solid statement. Now, given that you could practically throw a stone from one village to the other, and given the near-identical physical appearance of the two little burgs, his answer was, well, a source of some amusement to me. It struck me as funny, and I had to chuckle. Our driver didn't share in the joke, however, and there followed an awkward moment of silence, at which point one of the guys in the band said something, and the conversation moved elsewhere. I never learned the reason why living in that village, within whistling distance from his own, was so unthinkable. Perhaps there was a perfectly good and rational reason: maybe the property tax rate is twice as high, with only half the services, or maybe there's a crazed axe murderer living in the church cellar, and no one gets out of there alive. But for the purposes of our essay here, the actual reason, whatever it may have been, is of no importance. I prefer to interpret this little remembrance as a simple illustration of humanity's curious bias, territoriality and mistrust, right there in a nutshell. Wrapped up pretty as you please, nestled into the green grassy farmland, on a lovely and peaceful morning, under the benevolent morning sun.
	This article copyright 2005 Samm Bennett all rights reserved