+++
title = "Party Buses"
+++

*Conversation heard in a place unknown. Retold in Rijeka, 2023.*

- I’ve been working inside the system all my life and I’m barely surviving that. I play dumb and that’s how I survive. I am employed in the local government in █████.

- What is it like to work in the system?

- Well, hard. Because there is no system. The first thing you learn when you get into local government is: that’s not my job. And if you want to take initiative… then there is a lot of pushback. The environment resists changes no matter what the changes are. If you have any ambition to change something...first they will clamp down ██ ███. ███ █████ ████ █████ █████. You work eight hours, but half the time you pretend to work, and that’s just how the system works. And after some years, you learn to ███ ████ ███, ██ ████ █ ██████. ███ ██████ ████ ███ █████, ███████ █ █████ ██████ ███ ██ ██████████████ ██████…████████ is omnipresent. And that’s a common thing, it’s nothing new. Embezzlement is ██████████, ████ ██ █████ █████... ███████ ███ ████ ██ ███ █████ ████. You have all these kids showing up with their master’s degrees, ████ ███████ ████████, ███ ███ █████████ ██ ████ ███, ███ ██ ██████, ███████ ██ ███ █████. The buses to the rallies of the governing party are packed with them and there are only two of us left in the entire municipal administration. Out of about fifty people, two or three of us remain...that’s right...and that’s it. Some make fun of it, some participate in all that and make fun of themselves and the entire thing, and some are really into it. Many people don’t want to go, they roll their eyes and shrug their shoulders.