Noisy neighbours
In Latin, they say "De gustibus non disputandum est.", which means "There is no arguing taste". I usually agree: "There is no arguing my taste". ;-)
All jokes aside, I have reached the conclusion that, in each nation, there is a kind of music you can always associate with the lack of education: music for the unwashed masses. You can usually recognize it by the fact that it's all that's playing on the mainstream radio stations.
I don't really know what that music is for other countries, but here in Romania, the traditional "Romanian folk music", which was sort of melodic, has been displaced by the infamous "manele". I'm not saying that educated people don't listen to them, but they are the exception, not the rule. The opposite is also true: there are certain kinds of music that only educated people listen to. Jazz comes to mind, as an example.
I'm not exactly a jazz-man myself, (although I enjoy it -- I usually go for rock music), but one thing is for sure: I don't like Hungarian folk music. [ That does not mean I have anything against Hungarians; some of my best friends are Hungarian. ] Which brings us to today's story...
I live in a university hostel. So, I was prepared for late-night, noisy student parties. What I didn't expect was this non-student neighbour of the hostel making so much noise as to be more annoying than all the student parties I had to hear, all year round.
He/she saw fit to show me (and all my unsuspecting neighbours, for that matter) his/her entire collection of Hungarian folk music. I'm usually pretty tolerant with these things, but after 12 hours or so of ethnic instruments I've had enough.
"Fight fire with fire", sez me. "I'll show him a taste of my sound system". So I set up my speakers on the window, facing his direction, and played, as loud as my hardware allowed, "Seek and destroy" from Metallica.
"That'll teach him!", I said to myself and went outside to evaluate the "damage" I had done. But, alas!, my speakers were no match for his! It was as though a mouse was trying to strangle an elephant. Disappointed, I was ready to give up, when the unthinkable happened: his music stopped! Victory!!
I stopped my music too, but I've reached the following conclusion: "I need to buy bigger speakers!" ;-)
Ahhh... the silence... gooooood silence... :-)
