It is not a sentence I invented. It came from an encounter with a homeless friend: “Only slaves go on vacation.” In the present simple tense, it speaks of now; it does not describe the past. Later, from a day laborer on the street, I heard the continuation: “Today there are rich and poor slaves.” The poor fight for survival; the rich are bound by consumption and debts.
Language itself reveals the chain, just a bit. In German, Urlaub derives from Erlaubnis—permission to leave. In English, vacation comes from the Latin vacare—to be vacant, to be free.
Embroidered on beach towels and bath sheets, and written on the sand, the sentence leaves the private sphere and confronts leisure in public space. Not a souvenir, but a question: Who dares? Who are the free?
Language itself reveals the chain, just a bit. In German, Urlaub derives from Erlaubnis—permission to leave. In English, vacation comes from the Latin vacare—to be vacant, to be free.
Embroidered on beach towels and bath sheets, and written on the sand, the sentence leaves the private sphere and confronts leisure in public space. Not a souvenir, but a question: Who dares? Who are the free?
Bath Sheet
Beach Towel
Copyright: Milan Mijalkovic, 2020