Look Who's Back by Timur Vermes Read Free Book Online

terraces of houses and streets, checking, considering, cogitating, chancing. My preliminary survey was rather positive: the country, or the city at least, seemed free of rubble and in good order; overall one might certify it satisfactorily pre-war. The new Volkswagens seemed to be performing reliably; they were quieter these days, albeit an acquired taste aesthetically. What stood out to my keen eye were the mystifying slogans covering every wall. Yes, I was familiar with this technique; in Weimar, especially, the communist accomplices used to daub their Bolshevist claptrap all over the place. And I myself had learned from this. But at least back then you could read the words painted by either side. Now, I noted, a large number of the messages – their authors evidently regarded them as sufficiently important to deface the houses of honest citizens with them – were simply impossible to decipher. I could only hope that this was the brainchild of illiterate leftwing vermin, but as I kept going I observed that the legibility of the slogans did not change from house to house, and therefore had to assume that important messages such as “Germany, awake” or “Sieg Heil” were possibly hiding amongst them too. Confronted with such ubiquitous dilettantism, I felt my blood boil. It was plain for all to see that what was missing here was firm leadership, tight organisation. What made this particularly irksome was the fact that many of these writings had been produced with substantial colour and apparent effort. Or had the world in my absence developed a specific style of writing for political slogans? Determined to get to the bottom of thematter, I approached a lady who was holding a child by the hand.
    “Please excuse me for bothering you, madam,” I said. Pointing to one of the inscriptions, I asked, “Could you tell me what that says?”
    “How should I know?” the lady said, giving me an odd look.
    “So you find this writing rather strange, too?” I enquired further.
    “Not just the writing,” the lady said hesitantly. “Are you alright?”
    “Worry not,” I said. “I’m on my way to the dry cleaner’s.”
    “You’d be better off going to the barber’s!” the woman said.
    I turned my head to the side, bent to the window of a new-fangled automobile and took a good look at myself. Although not impeccable, my parting appeared fine, and although my moustache would need a trim in a few days’ time, for the moment a visit to the barber’s was not essential. I took the opportunity to calculate that the following evening would be the most strategically advantageous for a more thorough body wash. Setting off again, I passed more of the same propaganda slogans, which might as well have been written in Chinese. The other thing that struck me was how many people seemed to be equipped with wireless receivers – an admirable number. Radar dishes were attached to windows everywhere, for receiving radio transmissions, no doubt. Were I to have the opportunity to speak over the radio waves, then winning over a new horde of staunch comrades amongst the Volk would be as easy as marching into Denmark. I had, after all, listened fruitlessly to a broadcast on the wireless, which sounded as if drunken musicianswere playing, and announcers were babbling the very words that were smeared so illegibly on these walls. All I had to do was speak comprehensible German, surely that would suffice? – child’s play. Full of confidence and with a spring in my step, I strode on. Then, a short distance away, I saw the sign for YILMAZ BLITZ CLEANER’S.
    This came as something of a surprise.
    Yes, all those newspapers had implied that there must be a large Turkish readership in the city, even if the circumstances of their arrival remained something of a mystery. And during my stroll I had also noticed the occasional passer-by whose Aryan ancestry was questionable, to put it mildly, and not only four or five generations back, but right up