Hartling-regeringen, momsen, Anva - og en masse sko...

Den her har jeg lige skrevet (på engelsk, desværre) til en af de italienske medlemmer af The OakTable Network som svar på en mail fra ham om, hvorvidt vi mente det ville være en god idé for ham at lave en blog på italiensk. Det gav mig anledning til at fortælle en historie fra min ungdom (jeg har været 12-14 år), og jeg har også lige sendt den videre til Mark Bohé Jørgensen og Jan Villadsen, som var de to andre der var på det noget usædvanlige job:

=========================================================================
I, for one, could contribute a bit on your Italian blog. You see, back in the 70's (from 73 to 75) we had a brilliant liberal government who decided that changing the VAT rate was a fantastic monetary tool, so they did that three times.

It had a huge impact on my personal finances. I had a good friend named Lloyd (an Australian whos mother had moved back to Denmark after her husband died in Australia). His mother got me and two other friends - Mark and Jan - a job in the shoe department of a large department store in Copenhagen that no longer exists. Our job was to re-price all shoes.

Now, the cheap shoes were easy: You calculated the new price and printed three small price labels per shoe box (one per shoe and one for the box) and put them on top of the previous price labels. Easy.

The pricy Italian shoes, however, were different. Here we had to remove the old price labels with the famous tool known as "nails", which was Hell. Anyway, EVERY shoe box with Italian shoes contained a little slip that said (I most probably remember this incorrectly, so please correct me as much as you like):

"In caso de reclamo, retunare il presente taloncino"

At least that's what I keep saying in my head. It's been inside my head since those years. It will be the last words I remember after I have gotten Alzheimer and have forgotten the names of my children and my love goats.

Because I saw that sentence at least five or six thousand times.

So let me know when you open your Italian-language blog and I'll FINALLY have somewhere to put those words inside my head so that maybe they'll leave me alone after almost 35 years. Whatever people will be discussing on that blog I'll be ready - for as long as it takes for the words to leave my head - to post that comment on EVERY debate taking place there.

Thank you!

Mogens
=========================================================================

Jeg har så modtaget to reaktioner: Én fra Jan Villadsen og en fra italieneren:

Fra Jan fik jeg denne:

"Hahahhahah :-) Din hukommelse er forrygende, Mogens! Jeg mener også at kunne huske, at vi i kælderens dunkle lokale mellem prismærkerne i kor sang "You like tomato, I say tomahtoe, you like potato, I like potahtoe, lets call the whole thing off osv osv..... :-)

Stay safe !!

/Jan´"

- og fra italieneren denne:

"Oh, my equivalent sticky frase is, more or less, and without umlauts:

"keine gegenstande aus dem fersten werfen"
(do not lean outside the window)

that is written under *every single* Italian train window,
that I read the first time when I was 6, and I have seen
every single day when I was young and commuting ...

But I still remember as well your one, that it was in fact
popular in the seventies, and I have not noticed since then:
"in caso di reclamo, ritornare il presente talloncino"
(in case of complaint, please return back this ticket)

I might use it instead of "please leave a comment" on the blog ...
... that could be an Hell of an idea :) "
======================================================================

Så jeg huskede det som:

"In caso de reclamo, retunare il presente taloncino" - men det skulle have været:
"in caso di reclamo, ritornare il presente talloncino"

Det kan jeg godt leve med efter så mange år :).