Before I sat down in one of my favorite watering holes in central Zagreb, a woman in her mid-twenties was already sitting at one of the neighboring tables and going through a fashion magazine. She lifted her eyes from it only to reach for her cup of coffee or glass of water resting on the table. She never looked around while I was there, which was about three quarters of an hour. Her head bent down, she barely moved. She spent at least a minute on each and every page, and sometimes much longer. And most of the pages I could see from where I was sitting showed single photographs of single women in their dazzling outfits. Every single item on display mesmerized the young woman: shoes, dresses, scarves, pocketbooks, underpants, earrings, watches, belts, coats, bracelets, cosmetics, jumpers, bras, stockings, jackets, skirts, blouses… And she mesmerized me, I must admit. I could not believe that we were from the same planet, let alone of the same species. If she were from Venus and I from Mars, I would have no problem with her behavior. If she were a doe and I a wolf, I would have no problem, either. But the gap between us was simply beyond my comprehension. It was impossible to cross, too. By the time I got up to leave, she was still going through the very same fashion magazine. As I was walking away, I shook my head over and over again. “Same planet,” it kept ricocheting through my mind. “Same species!”

To Pietro Aretino