It's a car city, our host tells us of Nashville. You're nothing without a car. When they'd first arrived in America, they tried to do without a car, he says. They walked and rode the bus everywhere. The buses are great here, he says. You can have great conversations. Everyone talks, he says. But it takes hours to get anywhere.
They took up cycling. Everyone thinks you're crazy if you cycle here, he says. People yell at you. People yell, why are you cycling? But he cycles to work nonetheless, he says.
But they've bought a car now. They had to. How else could they get to La Hacienda, their favourite restaurant? The only thing for them is to become Mexican, they decided. To learn Spanish. To learn to Salsa.
And how else would they get to their favourite Vietnamese restaurant? The only thing for them is become Vietnamese, they decided. To learn Vietnamese. To make ramens.
The size of the carpark outside the Vietnamese restaurant amazes us, when our hosts take us there. Madly, our host drives us round and round in circles. I can't get over the amount of space here!, he says. It's madness!
Over dinner, he tells us of his project to photograph the old parts of Nashville before they're demolished. There's virtually nothing of it left, he says. It keeps him sane, he says, cycling round the old ruins and finding a way to break in and take pictures of what he finds. When we get home that evening, he shows us a slide show of photographs on his laptop and trembles with melancholy. Where did it all go wrong?
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