The Fifty

Of course, this set the wheels spinning. It does not take much, admittedly, but spinning they were set nevertheless.

He was referring to the Great Blic List of 50 Most Powerful Foreigners – published today – from which my humble foreignness was inconspicuously absent. In reality, the lists that I could hope to be on would be more like

List of 50 Bald People

List of 50 Big-Mouthed Complainers

List of 50 Inconsistent Bloggists

List of 50 Foreign Curmudgeons

List of 50 People who Really Do Not Belong on a List of 50 People Published in the Press

Ah! This is my niche! And is “bloggists” a word?

But the wheels which were spinning have nothing to do with my own listability of lack thereof, but rather I began to wonder what could be the process of wheel-spinning within the mind and pen of the Blic lister. The first thing that heartens one is knowing that there are indeed MORE than 50 foreigners here, such that we may institute a caste system among ourselves and move the top 50 Brahmin to the head of the class, while we Untouchables sit at our lowly desks and write Unreadable blogs.

To any of us in the foreign population of Serbia, my demographic, the fifty are no strangers. We all know them or know of them or have stood in the cheese line at Mercator behind one or another of them. They are misquoted and wrongly translated in the papers. They move their mouths in front of the TV cameras while an interpreter says whatever he wants in the voice-over. They are, in short, both Powerful and Well Known. We sit around tribal campfires and tell their stories and sing the songs of their exploits.

And what does this singular honor bring the Listed Ones? I spoke to one of them already (whose number will be withheld to protect his civil liberties) who told me that the Listing only means that there are a “certain number” of “bigger twats” ahead of him. False modesty aside, they have all secretly clipped the Blic article and will frame it or send it to family, CEOs back in their home countries, or their PR agencies with a short note of complaint about their rank.

In future, I believe that we should all honor the Listed Ones, the Powerful Ones, by addressing them by their Number. When we write a letter to Telenor, we can make reference to a quote by Number 1. When we need a loan, we can ask Number 17 directly – except for the fact that he is no longer in the country….

My unworthy congratulations, however, go to Numbers 1 through 50 (and also to the Secret Number 3 who was edited out since this morning). And to numbers 2 though 50 – and rest of the innumerable – better luck next year.

CBF (bez broj)