are you a flâneur?

You're very right about the nice warm rain tonight, it really made me happy.

Yes, I am a lazy git. But no more so than most people I know. And some of those people have far better jobs than I do. What am I doing wrong?

And besides its round the corner from my flat and if the italian shops are closed it can be a toss up between KFC and Flaneur.

Suzy and i got taken to eat their once and it is gorgeous.

Actually, I have just tried to insert paragraphs in my head but it's still really hard to read.

the best is when you find a new road that wasn't there some months ago. sometimes they haven't even really laid out the subdivision, just the roads. then you can go zooming about all aimlessly in these not-yet-neighborhoods, or along the main artery for a business park that isn't there yet.

if i was in a city, though, i'd probably just park myself on some steps and watch.

Monday, Stockholm. Me and a Japanese girl took the first bus and ended up at the docks. Wandered around some sky walks, a big business hotel, looked at a closed art centre called Magazin 6, skirted an Indian warehouse. Vast liners at the quay, pine trees, gritty ice underfoot, a grey sky. The blasted rock of the 'tunnel train' tunnels, the Valhalla feel of the subway stations. The department store where Anna Lindt was murdered. Snapping photos of escalators and elevators to post to ILX. Elevator in Swedish is 'hiss'. Up is 'hit' and down is 'ned'. So elevators say 'HISS HIT NED' and escalators say HIT and NED.

!!!

Clearly I didn't appreciate Abba enough as a child and now the country wants me mocked eternally. :-(

Ned is found in Stockholm.

not quite the idealised flaneur perhaps,but enjoyable nonetheless...

among the discoveries
-a road within 200 metres of my house that i've never been up before,with all these really weird completely cubic houses with really tiny windows around the side and none on the front wall

-an internet cafe in what i would have presumed was a house which was completely full of chinese people at 3 in the morning on christmas day (didn't see anyone else at all for about an hour)

-an entire area i didn't know existed between two roads i use regularly

-a near euphoric early morning down by the pier near my house,while listening to selected ambient works two by aphex twin...the light gave the world that weird clarity it tends to have the morning after taking acid,which rarely occurs naturally (the only other time i remember it was one time in venice on holidays with my parents,just as i was thinking about the similarity to the morning after acid my dad commented on how the day had a strange clarity he hadn't seen in years,which was kind of weird)

amsterdam is an incredible city to wander around,as is venice...
was only in london once but id like to go back and buzz around,also the only time i was in new york i walked around most of manhattan's areas one day,which i really enjoyed,and am going back to do again for a week in the next few months...

I revive this thread in my capacity as captain of joie-de-vivre, bon vivant extraordinaire, and shamer at large of the l'homme moyenne sensuel. Besides, I like it.

I was thinking today how I used to be a flaneur and how I miss it, and that it's probably all because of the damn internet. Hanging around cafes is probably healthier than what I'm doing right now.

Yes.

I am one (presently retired).

The essence of flâneurism, in my view, is randomness and consequent surprise. Hence the secret key to prolonged and effective flâneuring is extensive, inexpensive public transport. Without it:
i) the early stages of a day's flâneuring become unfulfilling as one's immediate surroundings inevitably become familiar and mundane;
ii) later stages become goal-orientated i.e. one's path is determined by the direction of home; and
iii) the middle parts labour under the constant dilemma of whether to strike further from home or not, and the choices cease to be random.

The capacity to maintain novelty from start-point to arbitrary end-point not only makes the flâneuring fulfilling at beginning to end, it liberates all choices in between from any import. Choices between random elements, all of which (from the temporal perspective of the chooser) are of unknown and hence equal value, cease to be weighty choices at all, liberating the flâneur to think 'woah, check that crazy house with the flags all over it! I wonder who lives there?!'

Hmmm, If I'm in the right state of mind, properly sensitized, immediate surroundings become a microcosm and I don't have to move on, though I usually do. But walking is not too slow. Also, there are places with such a density of stimulation that you never want for a new tangent. Say, NYC. If your rambles have dull sections you might consider a bicycle. Proper public transport helps, to be sure, but I don't think it has to be necessary.

This is such a lovely thread.

I took a different walk home today, got off the tram many stops early and wandered down the local streets of my suburb... I was suprised to notice all these awesome homes I'd never really seen or paid attention to passing by on busses and such.

Whenever I walk around the local area - especially in the evening as the sun is setting - I love the atmosphere of warmly-lit homes, cooking and comfort. I always think of the line "Past smells of different dinners" from the Larkin poem "Ambulances" (even if that poem itself doesn't exactly have an air of casual flaneur about it, heh).

Its very much a voyueuristic thing, wondering what other peoples lives are like tucked away in their homes. I get great comfort from it.

walked semi-aimlessly around my city in the early-spring sun this weekend. "semi" because I had slight goals - to reach the Fraser river yesterday, to cross a certain bridge on Saturday etc. - the wee pedometer app on my phone says I walked 47km. I'm a big walker generally and hoping to hike a decent amount this year so this was good conditioning but it was also just extremely pleasant and very good for my mental health

Good job Jim! What happened on your walk?

nothing exceptionally interesting but some very pleasant vistas and places that weren't too far from where I live that I had never seen before.

can't beat a bit of a flâne

https://mgl.skyrock.net/big.113434530.jpg?50955236

A Quebec staple. Such a thing would be unthinkable in the land of Baudelaire, obv.

i am a couch flaneur
― mark s (mark s), Tuesday, 15 April 2003 23:14 (sixteen years ago) bookmarkflaglink

^^^^remains true

You’re really doing flaneuring wrong if you walk 47km. Tip o’ the hat to you though!