Friends and Dreamers: Bruno

For my second Under the Hills post, I would like to begin by doing a series of interviews, where I introduce people to my beloved friends.

Bruno is a friend of mine from #Suicide on DAL.net IRC. He is one of the more interesting people that I have met, brooding, temperate, and cuddly—he reminds me a lot of a great, big ghraul. Like a big bear, warm and lumbering, but purposeful like a giant shadow, with a bright smile. I am always happy to find him lurking in the forest of my Internet domain.

When asked where he lives he tells me, “a coastal European town that incidentally happens to be the capital of Portugal,” of course, I know that he’s talking about Lisbon. After a little prodding he continues to explain that its finer points are that it’s gritty, dirty, and has a lot of beautiful architecture. “[There is a] quiet aura of confidence about her, I guess. It's seen allot, including one of recorded history most fierce earthquakes.”

I asked him about what he liked about some of the architecture so he told me of the Torre de Belém, a formidably built ivory-white fortress constructed at the entrance to the River Tagus’ estuary. In spite of its apparent intent at construction it has a fragile, Fabergé eggshell look about it.

Bruno has always struck me as an artist of sorts, and his writing is something impressive. He tells me that he’s on a hiatus of sorts, lingering about and drifting to-and-fro as his moods take him these days. Getting up early, going out for coffee with friends, and watching life promenade through the twisting and dividing streets of Lisbon have become his everyday meat and potatoes. In the evening, he returns home to soothing music and writes; where he ponders what he’ll do with his life when this restful period is over.

When he looks toward the horizon, Bruno finds himself, seven years hence, receiving a PhD in economics, sociology, or psychology. But, really he feels that his true calling is ludology (the study of videogames from an anthropological and sociological discipline.) Except that this isn’t a widely followed—or taught—perspective, so it may be difficult to get a proper degree in it. I smile when he says this, videogames and their communizing effects (MMORPG and otherwise) have always been a wonder close to my heart. Myself following my own roots of anthropology through mythology and ancient cultures wonder often what will become the mythology of the new-fangled, highly technological world.

He’s a special person, Bruno, and I think that he’s probably not going to hear the last of my poking and prodding; especially now that I know that he intends to study the anthropological equivalent of videogame sociology.

More interviews to come. Watch this spot. There are just so many wonderful people out here, in the fringes of the Internet, flickering between the walls.