Being Bad
In the realm of evil, you are surrounded by zillions of little stalls inside a huge shopping-mall. Thai-pop blasts from the speakers. Cafés sell obscenely pink and green drinks.
On the shelves you see covers of software CDs which look nice and new until you get a bit closer. Then the raw grid of quick scan&print-jobs becomes visible.
On the tables before the shelves there are books made of plastic-foil cd-covers. Software, hardware, dvds, video-cds. The covers are empty. Each has a number. On the tables there are also boxes with slips of papers and pens. People browse through the books and note down numbers. Then they go to the counter, hand over some cash and the slip of paper.
The agents of the realm of evil return the change and tell people how long they will have to wait for delivery of their hellish purchase. 15 minutes.
No longer does it take for the sub-agents to go straight to the heart of evil and return: with your fully licensed copy of FrameMaker 7.0, InDesign 2.0, Norton Ghost 2002, Encyclopedia Britannica, compilation-CDs of all sorts of software lumped together, e-books, games, operating systems, the latest anatomy atlas, a CD-ROM about how to groom roses or one containing all you ever wanted to know about the prostate – or whatever else it was you ordered. Whatever else. Really.
For 150 Thai Baht per CD.
Due to unforgivable negligence on my part, the batteries of my camera were not properly charged, hence no photos from the realm of evil. But I guess I'll be back there in about ten days. Please be patient, oh Extremely Esteemed One, and mail whatever desires you may have from the realm of evil or otherwise. Nearly instant wish-fulfilment guaranteed.