Where Am I?

    “In The Village.”
    “The Village?”
    “Yes you know, this is The Village!”

    “No I don’t know. Look I don’t know where I am, how I got here.”
    “So where do you want to go?”
    “Go?”
    “Well you're sitting in my taxi, I’m a taxi driver, and I take people places.”

    “Well take me to the nearest town.”
    “Look  this is a local service, I do local calls only.”
    “Well take me to the railway station.”
    “The what?”
    “You don’t know what a railway station is?”
    “Oh you mean the railroad station.”
    “Railway, railroad to the station with all haste.”
    “They closed it down. Now everyone uses the bus.”
    “Ah, well take me to the bus station.”
    “Well now you’re talking!”

    It was just a short drive across The Village to the bus station where  people were climbing into red and cream coloured buses . I decided to join the people getting onto the first bus.

    Once all the passengers were aboard ,the bus pulled out of the bus station and drove slowly through the streets of The Village. Then Drove out  along a road out into the featureless desert. We seemed to have travelled for miles and miles. I wondered when we would come to an oasis, or perhaps to meet travelling nomads. But all there was, was sand for miles and miles in every direction.

   Then I saw them out of the window, two twin towers that gleamed in the sun. I asked a woman sat in the seat in front of me if we could go there.

    “Go where?”
    “To the twin towers.”
    “No-one ever goes there. Least ways I’ve never heard of anyone going there.”
   I got up out of my seat and went to the front of the bus to speak with the driver.

   “Can we go to the twin towers?” I asked.

   “It’s not on my route” said the driver.

    “Not on your route? You’re only driving through the desert. You could drive in any direction, what difference would it make?”
    “Well I did try driving to those towers once.”
    “Try?”
    “Well I never got anywhere near those towers. I think they’re a mirage or something. Never heard of anyone making it to those towers.”

   I returned to my seat, and sat watching the desert go by with my fellow passengers. We drove on for what seemed like hours without seeing any other sign of life, but that which inhabited the bus. We could have been driving around in circles for all I knew. Then suddenly as we passed by a large sand dune, there it was, civilisation at last! Palm trees everywhere. Buildings, traffic, people. The bus pulled up at a bus stop and the passengers began to get off the bus. I got out of my seat and slowly made my way along the bus.

   “Where are we?” I asked the driver.

   “The Village” came the reply.

   “But I got on the bus in The Village.

   “This is The Village, you’ve arrived here.”
    “It can’t be! I’m getting off the bus where I got on it!”
    “Who are these people anyway?”
    “You should know, being a newcomer to The Village yourself!”
    “Newcomer?”
    “Well you’ve just arrived haven’t you!”
    “But I got on the bus in The Village!”
    “Yes, and this is where you get off!”
    I got off the bus and joined the rest of the newcomers in The Village!

It is, as it is, as it should be.

Be seeing you