If I'd known it was so cool I would've moved a long time ago. Too bad about my wasted youth. There was nothing to complain about, in the grocery s wine cellar I was living my life at its fullest. Cheese, biscuits and so many delicious things to be eaten. But the day I came out on TV, I became an outcast. And when they closed down the store, everything went downhill from there. Good thing a friend of mine gave me a piece of advice. I wandered through the alleys until I reached the entrance to the castle. It's amazing. Just with what's falling from the tables I can easily live for a whole year.
(Translated by Alma Teodora Miron / University of Bucharest, Faculty of Foreign Languages and Literatures, MTTLC, year II / Corrected by Silvia Petrescu, coordinator of the translations)
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Had I known it was so cool, I would have moved in a long time ago. Too bad I've wasted my youth. I can't complain, I was living the life of a big shot in the grocery's storage room. Cheese and crackers galore, loads of goodies to nibble. It's just that since the day I was on TV, I became a pariah. And when they closed the store down, everything went downhill. Luckily a pal of mine gave me a tip. I groped in the dark through the canals until I finally reached the entrance to the castle. The place rocks. I can live for a year with leftovers and crumbs on the floor only.
(Alternative translation by Gilda Pârvan (Ogheorghe))Real Fiction is a collective project started in 2013 by Florin Piersic Jr. The concept of Real Fiction continued to exist as a Facebook group, after a volume of stories was published at Humanitas Publishing House. (In October 2021, the group has 7.275 members.) The authors write ultra-short stories, with the texts limited to 500 characters (in Romanian, so the length of the English translation might be a little different) - a flash-fiction exercise on a topic that changes every few days. The group's coordinators are Florin Piersic Jr., Gabriel Molnar, Răzvan Penescu, and Luchian Abel. (Drawing by Adrian T. Roman)
Versiunea în română a acestui text se poate citi aici, în rubrica Ficțiuni Reale.
