Cytara

  “Do you have a Valentine's Day story for us, grandma?' Sarah decorates the flowers on the large table made of raw wood with some artful inlaid work which is showing objects and landscapes. A table without technology is a rare object in grandmother Naomi's home.  It’s the 14th February 2079.  The tableware, fine porcelain with spring-flower decoration, is already placed for the family dinner. "Valentine's day had changed in the beginning of the pandemic such as many other traditions like dancing through the night in elegant ballrooms that weren’t practiced due to new behavior schemes caused by necessary distance rules or mask regulations. It wasn't the same like before 2020. Valentine's Day was associated rather with romantic situations like those of two people who meet for fine dining in the hope to start a new relationship than with tokens of love between married couples. But Grandfather started the 14th February deflorestation of my garden already befor...

  Almost one year has passed since Naomi invited her daughter Joyce and granddaughter Sarah to her home and farm, where she plants innovative new garden fruits at the high-tech glasshouse. The architecture of the Grand Palais-like building cites late 19th, early 20th century Viennese Modernism and the style of Otto Wagner. Three generations of women who are living in the time now as contemporaries but witness the presence from different life angles due experiences collected under politically and socially constantly changing circumstances.  The Christmas surprise of one of the last meetings, the snowball AI had become already part of Joyce's life journey before the mid-40 years old even knew that there exists an especially for her from the friends of her mother developed artificial intelligence program.  The AI - called after its first appearance 'Snowball' - was enabled by Joyce for Sarah and Naomi as a practical family communication tool which takes part of the convers...

  "Easter Rest, Easter Silence or Easter Peace?" Part 7 of the series "After The Pandemic. A Fictional Story" by Karin Sawetz The Cytara-series ‘After The Pandemic. A Fictional Story’ goes on. The last story played during Christmas holidays. Now we are back in the house of grandmother Naomi who invited the family to an Easter brunch. Grandmother’s stories about the revolution after the pandemic are legendary and are lessons for her daughter Joyce and granddaughter Sarah how to observe the political system for implementing a ‘change’ like it became a popular practice among citizens in the years already before the pandemic. The wish for the reconstruction of political and economic systems had grown out from many seeds which were set over decades. Whether it’s racism respectively the inequality in society which became at last through the transparency of digital administration for everyone visual and was diagnosed as an old structural problem on it’s way to the future,...

"Peace Is a Fragile Thing" Part 6 of the series "After The Pandemic. A Fictional Story" by Karin Sawetz The Christmas tree stands half decorated in the side hall of the three parted glass and steel building of the winter garden. "History tells us that revolutions are a constant and necessary for the development of society. Revolutionary movements are like bells who signal war in societies where the legislation stands against the changes new technologies, migration waves, climate for example bring. After years of struggling with new challenges such as digitization which reformed people's life- and work worlds, the pandemic topped the list of problems in 2020. And in 2021, we experienced how fragile peace can be.”  Grandmother Naomi takes another box for storing the glass balls after the festivities. The Christmas tree decorations contain figures, houses,  trees, animals. When turned upside down, snowflakes begin to trickle over the small sized stage-like dis...

"A New Beginning" Part 5 of the series "After The Pandemic. A Fictional Story" by Karin Sawetz “I'm not better than corrupt systems. Yes, Sarah the stories you've heard are true. But the first step wasn't set by me," corrects grandmother Naomi with a wink in her eyes the story, "I was polite and responded appropriately.”  "You had no choice. The situation was provocative not only in your case,” explains Joyce the story of Naomi to her daughter Sarah. “There were millions of people thrown into circumstances which heated up the civil war arenas on streets worldwide and in the cyber world. The outbreak of a revolution was how it's said in German 'aufgelegt' or with other words: People saw it coming. The real fire starters were the corrupt justice and police systems. The most peaceful people were pissed off at the naughtiness of the state administration,” Joyce stands up and goes to the kitchen. "Can I open the b...

“Life Is Not A Rehearsal” Part 4 of the series "After The Pandemic. A Fictional Story" by Karin Sawetz "The Hofrat…  it took a bad end. He lived in the believe to be the one who decides what counts. We all have to live with the consequences of our actions of the past. The Hofrat is a good example for bad decisions based on evil intentions. It was another time and such guys like the Hofrat haven’t calculated the new circumstances.The anger of the population turned the life of the ones who tried to profit or benefit from the misery of others into a nightmare." The reflections of the sunset appear as a flickering fire in grandma Naomi's eyes. "Life is not a rehearsal, never forget that. There is no second chance."   In this moment the German shepherd of Sarah's mother runs into the winter garden. "Come on Sweetie, you wild beast." Sarah takes the head of the dog with both hands into a stranglehold such as starting a fight.  ...

“The Wheat & The Chaff” Part 3 of the series "After The Pandemic. A Fictional Story" by Karin Sawetz “Can you remember what the Hofrat said: Now the wheat will be separated from the chaff. My god was this an ass!” Martin doesn’t wait to start his first anecdote with one of his personal highlights from the beginning of the revolt. “There were these guys who provoked the population. Very consciously  - with quasi criminal intent to benefit from the misery of people. He is a very good example what happened at that time. The Hofrat...” Sarah interrupts Martin’s story in the middle of the sentence: “What’s a ‘Hofrat’?” “‘Hofrat’ was the title of a civil servant; everybody could become a Hofrat when the person was long enough in the position of a civil servant and had political contacts. And such a guy was the Hofrat; he and many others had delusions of grandeur. He tried to compromise your grandmother already before the outbreak of the pandemic. We all knew a...

“Patience” Part 2 of the series "After The Pandemic. A Fictional Story" by Karin Sawetz “Who lost the patience?” asked Sarah looking from the kitchen at the garden door such as she can’t await that the guests for the afternoon tea on this Easter weekend arrive. The grandmother arranges the plates with the cookies around the palm willow bouquet decorated with old-fashioned Easter eggs at an oval table of the rattan seating group in the glass house of the winter garden with a natural privacy protection by an old tree’s branches which reach to the ground. Granny continues the conversation from the enclosed glass veranda about the causes of the revolt after the outbreak of the pandemic. “Only few lost the patience and drifted into criminality. Most of the people used the possibilities of the new time. They had for the first time the means in their hands to be connected and to practice solidarity with enough transparency without harming privacy to secure a ...

"Kitchen talk" Part 1 of the series "After The Pandemic. A Fictional Story" by Karin Sawetz “There will come the day we have forgotten to remember how the revolt started and the names of the ones who had to carry the weight of others' guilt. Many will say nobody was guilty and that it was the coronavirus which ruined first the life of the weak middle class and worsened the suffering of the poor, before the revolt was started almost as a natural reflex to the greed of the ones who ruled discreetly from a shadowy network over power and money. The mass of people was breathless from the disease, the grief of the high amount of deaths made them hopeless, and the downfall couldn't be stopped early enough. The people’s situation turned with new working conditions into a degraded status of mainly short-time employees with diminished rights and such a low income that the living costs couldn't be covered. When it was hard to afford living before the p...