Exeter 21 October 2006

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We go shopping for the week, and the game starts as we are travelling towards Topsham. CLOUDYSUNNY is very happy about my shrimps, which, as usual, get shared out. While I reflect about the game with a shopkeeper, HASSAN makes an appearance. He has had a long shift and is thinking of stepping out for a walk.

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My daughter is desperate to get some flowers, and I, at last, have HASSAN’s attention, so I ask if I can join him. Following an uncanny (folding) circular motion, which, again, reminds me of Waiting for Godot, we head for Kath’s Café where my game started and we first met. I suggest CLOUDYSUNNY joins too.

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I arrive at Kath’s Café. CLOUDYSUNNY has already arrived. ALBERT and PASTAMECK are also here. I try to engage CLOUDYSUNNY in talking about the show they saw in Berlin, but all they say is ‘the end is nigh’. This is the last I hear from this player. I then ask HASSAN how he feels now that everything is finishing – he replies, as usual, diplomatically, but with a touch of irony which makes me smile. It's quiet, more than usual. Then, without warning, everything starts fading. Silence sets in. Even though I know the game is ending today I feel cought out. I get my last message. The day is over for my figurine.

There is, of course, no game tomorrow, except that its pervasiveness, I am sure, has left a lasting trace. Although players may lose the sense that they were immersed in this mysterious decaying city, they won’t lose the sense of their play. The actual game, its code, will always contain all our games, ready to be re-enacted, played back, re-staged. As document, Day of the Figurines, is always already (a)live again.