Route 11: Vidya Rajan
Image by Connor O’Brien
Route 11: The Historical Simulation Museum Park Experience by Vidya Rajan
It’s the year 2300 and you’re participating in a museum simulation audio tour. Listen as the guide teaches you about 'life in the past' and you glimpse at what’s to come. Playfully surreal with grounded references to inequity, the ride is a moving, hilarious offer to connect our present to the future.
The optimum place to listen to it is on the route 11 tram, starting around stop D17, Collins Landing, and ending around stop 7, 101 Collins Street, but it can be listened to on any tram at any time.
Credits
Written by Vidya Rajan
Commissioned by David Ryding
Edited by Elizabeth Flux
Recorded at the State Library of Victoria
Produced by Beth Atkinson-Quinton
With music by Steve Hearne
Tramlines is a podcast created by Broadwave in partnership with the Melbourne UNESCO City of Literature Office.
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The Historical Simulation Museum Park Experience - Route 11 by Vidya Rajan
[SFX A tram travels towards the listener. Rumbles along the tracks. People board.]
Intro (various voices): Tramlines, Tramlines, Tramlines (laughs), Tramlines, Tramlines, Tramlines, um T-R-A-M-L-I-N-E-S, Tramlines.
[SFX Tram doors open]
Beth Atkinson-Quinton VO: This is Tramlines: part audiobook, part spoken word and part locative literature. These are stories written to be listened to on a tram.
[SFX Tram dings and journeys on. Theme music fades out. Episode theme opens]
Beth Atkinson-Quinton VO: Today’s journey is a new fiction work by Vidya Rajan: The Historical Simulation Museum Park Experience. The optimum place to listen to it is on the route 11 tram, starting around stop D17, Collins Landing, and ending around stop 7, 101 Collins Street, but it can be listened to on any tram at any time.
Press play when you have boarded Stop 17.
Stop 17 – Stop 15: approximately
A sound of muzak – 2 -3 bars.
Followed by three soft beeps.
Vidya Rajan VO: (gasps) Okay! Hello! Don’t panic. Do not be alarmed.
How are you feeling? You can’t answer me obviously, that’s okay.
Alright some of you may be feeling weird, that’s normal. That’s normal.
If you can just take a deep breath in, 1, 2, 3. Inhale. And exhale. Did you do that?
Alright, feeling a bit less odd? Some of you will be standing, some of you are sitting. Don’t worry about it either way – it’s just whatever’s comfortable for you.
You may be asking what is this? Where am I? Am I dead? Am I asleep? Have I time-travelled?
The answer is no, to all of those questions. Well, maybe yes to the time-travel in a manner of speaking.
Keep that breathing up. 1,2,3.
Okay it might be coming back to some of you. Just moments ago, we met. And you placed your body into the Simulation Pod, here at the Historical Simulation Museum Park.
And I am your guide today! You just saw me. I was the one who stood next to the person who did the safety demonstration and fitted you in your seat. I’m watching over you now along with the whole team. Though you probably don’t remember us. Short-term memory just before the simulation is usually fuzzy.
But rest assured you’re very safe, and as real as everything feels right now, it’s not.
Though I did try very hard – I’m also the designer of this experience. It’s my first one ever. And the first time we’ve run it.
And um, can I just say – thank you for choosing it. And congratulations on your good taste. For choosing this experience. I personally think it says you’re very refined.
Most people who come to the museum park want to go to a Resource War sim obviously, or to one of the festivals of the First Oligarch – party people, I guess. But I think this is the stuff that’s really interesting. The sort of everyday experience. Of ordinary things. That’s how you really learn about history, right? Well, you know as much history as we could recover after the Great Rebooting. And as much was deemed appropriate to our bandwidth, of course. No cluttering of bad discourse here.
But um, yes, I designed this. Welcome to Melbourne, around the early 2020s. You’re on the Route 11 Tram! Oh tram – I love that word. It’s what you’re on right now. This wheeling contraption, powered by fossil generated electric currents – that’s how far back we’re talking. Basically an early 21st century mode of transport. Transport. Tramsport – maybe that’s where it comes from? I’ll have to get our researchers onto that.
Another reminder to not worry - your body is still very much in the year 2300. But your mind and your sensations hopefully feel like they’re way back then. Whatever your mind experiences in the next little while, rest assured it will have no effect on you in the present.
You’ll be feeling some of those sensations now. Whatever position you’re in, you might feel the real weight of those bodies. They were constantly in contact with full gravity back then. If you look in a reflective surface and see your own face, but slightly distorted, bit sodden and grotesque – you have our patented simtech to thank for that! This is what they looked like!
Also, what else - yes, you may find the air a bit weird – bit stale. Smells everywhere. No concept of purification domes back then either. Nothing was controlled for their benefit. Also, the sounds, you might be finding them overwhelming – I would not advise taking out your ear pod, it might be too much. They didn’t know how to optimise the auditory environment for maximum calm and efficient creation back then. You can tell from the lack of birdsong. It was very infrequent and left to actual birds, imagine that!
Anyway, 1,2,3 breathe if you need to but you should, I hope, be feeling okay now. And we can start to look around! Okay, this will be fun.
Also like I said this is a first test run, very safe, but because of that there may be some glitches in vision – you may see some things I'm discussing a little earlier or later. But all the more reason to keep your eyes peeled wide at all times!
A few beats.
Stop 15 – 14: King David – William(ish).
And as you’re looking around now, out onto the street from the windows, this area would be unrecognisable to you of course, but the name might ring a bell – Fitzroy – a neighbourhood back then, but now – one of the smaller agricultural vaults. Maybe you know someone who works there?
Though, if you’re attending the park, I don’t imagine you do actually. Quite a few tokens for entry, but well worth it of course.
As you look around, some of you are randomly set to night mode, some on day, but you should be able to make out what I can tell you are shops for clothes mainly. Clothing boutiques peppered on the left and on the right. It was a madness back then. Inside the tram too, on your person even maybe, you’ll see evidence of that. So much colour and variety – a real time of needless excess, as we know now. They were unaware how it would clutter the bandwidth, and dispel potentiality and innovation.
Okay – A little game for you for the rest of the ride – I want you to keep your eyes peeled for two things. I’ve inserted them a few times, so you should have plenty of chances. I won’t say if it’s in the tram, or out, but I want you at some point to see if you can spot –
1 – A person wearing a backpack, and that backpack has many symbols on it. Badges or stickers. This was very popular back then, part of the tendency to wasteful expression – it didn’t matter what was being expressed, merely that there was expression, so.
2 – A person with a beard. Probably of male mode appearance. You will notice, and this may be emotional, that they seem a little insecure. Flushed sometimes. Beards were often used to mask unhappiness and a lack of vitality in one’s daily life.
So, keep an eye out for those two features. It’s the details that make it I think.
And as you look, you’ll also see various food and bars and pubs – kinds of drink holes – as they were called. People would spend full nights there – drinking – literally ingesting liquids to alter themselves. Much more safe and neat now for us, pop a pill and you’re on your way. But it was part of the everyday, not just for special occasions as we have it – they had a lot of indolent time. It was normal to go with large groups of friends and could be very messy sometimes. A lot of clean-up, next day health consequences, disruption of all potential efficiencies.
Lots of humour comes out of the time as well – they frequently enjoyed that. Though most of the jokes are incomprehensible, but I like this one. It’s about a horse – of course – those were everywhere at the time, not like now, only horses for the oligarchs as is best, they were everywhere. And one time, a horse went into the bar and it was asked why are you so sad? And it said, oh no it’s because my face is long. You’re mistaken!
(laughing to self) I don’t know if I told that right, I’m not the funny one in my family. I was always better at this sort of thing. But um interestingly we can take a historic lesson from that – that even the horses were sad then, everyone’s bandwidth and happiness levels were low.
Heading to Gertrude/passing Gertrude
Oh – you’re seeing a lot of houses too, terrace houses, and some apartments as well, nothing too tall or innovative-friendly as yet, architecturally speaking – which also speaks to the character of the neighbourhood. It was full of people who did not wish to work, and spent a lot of time studying at local universities specialising in what we would see as ludicrous and wasteful things. Though, I have a bit of sympathy because I mean, you can imagine how my family reacted when I took this job, with my skills I could have worked directly for ministry – but I’ve just been obsessed with pre-rebooting history and making people enjoy things, to optimise their endeavours of course. It’s all part of the balance of the system isn’t it?
Talking about myself again!
Oh I forgot to mention you may have seen a particularly large block of apartments go by on the left – some of you real history buffs would know that’s where some of the early protests took place, to build the better tomorrow we’re in. They probably couldn’t have dreamed of this you know. Uh, we don’t know much about them though, sadly.
Beats.
Heading into Victoria parade/St. Vincent’s Plaza
We’re nearly on the last stretch, I’d encourage you to really look around at everyone. You will be primed to notice their exhaustion and their needless variety – so different to us. But perhaps look past it to wonder which one of your fellow passengers reminds you of someone you know. That’s what I always like to wonder about.
Beat.
And we’re heading into the city now of course – much of this imagery on the eyeline might be a bit more familiar to you – the tall buildings, and such. More reminiscent of our neighbourhoods, but still different. You can close your eyes too now for a bit, actually I’d advise doing so. Please close your eyes as the visual strain from the simulation might be setting in.
Are they closed? I like to close my eyes at this point actually even apart from the strain, and just think of how you feel right now, feel the rhythm of the tram – and I like to think of how they used to make this kind of journey for work so often – coming out of where we were, all the way into these buildings, sitting or standing like this, hearing these sounds every day. No concept of the total work-life integrative balance system, only 24 hours in a day and it was divided into different spaces for home and for productivity – seems so silly now. They had really segmented thinking. Even a museum park like this, you’d have to travel far to get to, or it would be a special visit, not just something you could pop into during your day as part of your rejuvenation tokens. A simpler, slower, neurologically deficient time. None of them there could have dreamt of the algorithmic clarity we are so lucky to experience now.
Though it has its own glow. If you open your eyes now, you may feel a bit of that magic – uh not magic, um, you know, experience. A sudden adjustment to the light, is a nice kind of rush I think.
Beat
Heading past parliament.
Ooh – did you catch that – some of you will be coming up to or just passing I hope – thank you again for testing this – Parliament. There’s a familiar word and site. This kind of architecture is one of the things the Oligarchs thought it was important to keep – um, despite it not being the most efficient building structure – just as a nod to where we’ve come from. They only used to have one in every city and now we have so many, in every zone to house the outposts of the ministry. Some of our brightest innovators in these buildings of course. I interviewed for a job there once, you know, due to my skills, but it wasn’t the best fit, culturally – only got through the first level. Probably shouldn’t have said that even.
Oh also did you see a theatre back there by any chance – that’s an entertainment complex – actual live performances that people would go to all the time. They would choose the most energetic children they could find and make them sing and dance with painted faces. Many of the adults in the shows were also child-like in their expression and needs and wants. It was a culture that celebrated youth - I suppose, something we have in common, though we handle it less clumsily. Anyway these shows were Like our annual festivals, but they happened constantly. Yes, wasteful. But they were very indulgent, hedonistic, confused people.
Heading to 101 and supposedly stopping
Oh gosh, we’re passing Collins Place. The sheen of it all much more familiar and comfortable to everyone I’m sure. This style was known as “high-end corporate” though now it’s merely “homey” – tastes do change! And again, history buffs will have a bell ring for them here – Collins Place is of course where the agreement was signed, to hand over the keys to the First Oligarch. Trust in governments and decision-makers was very low then – unlike (pause) now of course – people had had enough of the mismanagement, the lack of acceleration in work, the purposeless lives. They were crying out for the Oligarchal visions of the future.
Anyway a long time ago now! And that’s nearly it, for us I’m afraid. I know there’s so much more we could have talked of, but what an important note to end on!
Oh wait - did you spot the bearded man or the backpacks? Have a quick look outside and inside the tram if you haven’t - it’s never too late.
Also for some of you – a randomised plus feature I was testing at the last minute – did you spot the tram GUARDS - they’re in vests and just walk up and down trying to talk to you! They existed to regulate whether people were allowed into the tram or not. That was their sole purpose. Imagine, they actually had to put on those special clothes, receive hours of training, and then walk up and down! The physical and human effort – so rudimentary.
Though we have speculated that the reason they kept these guards around for so long was because of resistance to surveillance, they wanted a warm human touch or something infantile like that - we all had that phase in our teens for one summer remember? Well I did oops (laughs) Oh sorry, yes -(clears throat).
Thank you for helping us test this – I will definitely optimise my time more next time and pace it better. Tell your family and workmates to step in any time! Okay, getting the signal – now just take a breath and –
Beep, Beep, Beep (as at the start)
Sound of rustling.
Vidya Rajan VO: Yes, sorry I think I was a little off the metre. But it went smoothly. No one’s rejuvenation slot is over yet.
Beth Atkinson-Quinton VO: Good, we don’t want that.
Vidya Rajan VO: Yeah (sighs).
Beth Atkinson-Quinton VO: What is it?
Vidya Rajan VO: I don’t know. I feel like I didn’t really give them all the interesting facts. And I hadn’t verified all my research yet. We’ve rushed it.
Beth Atkinson-Quinton VO:No one cares. You’re the only one who’s so into this time period anyway.
Vidya Rajan VO: Yeah but also ending before Town Hall feels a bit wrong too.
Beth Atkinson-Quinton VO: Feels a bit wrong? You’ve spent too long reading about these people. What’s next? You’ll vibe a new holiday?
They laugh.
Vidya Rajan VO: It was a significant conflict though. At the hall. The body count and -
Beth Atkinson-Quinton VO: Fuck.
Vidya Rajan VO: What?
Beth Atkinson-Quinton VO: You didn’t cue the – after the –
Fumbling. The muzak comes on for many bars. Then a click to end.
Beth Atkinson-Quinton VO: Tramlines is an initiative of the Melbourne UNESCO City Of Literature Office with the podcast created by Broadwave.
Route 11: The Historical Simulation Museum Park Experience was written and read by Vidya Rajan, commissioned by David Ryding, edited by Elizabeth Flux, recorded at the State Library of Victoria, produced by Beth Atkinson-Quinton, with music by Steve Hearne.