The hundred-year-old man who jumped out the window and made a reader laugh

I work on the third floor of a typical office building. It’s situated in a complex of office buildings, all of which hold letters, instead of names and have a small park between them. You are met on the reception right across from the entrance, Wing 1 is straight ahead, and Wing 2 is on your right. You go up to the third floor, while using a badge every three steps or so, and sit 3 seats away from the window. Right outside this third-floor window you can find a small rooftop garden, which connects the two wings. It is the roof of the canteen, which is placed right between the two wings. There are all sorts of green plants there, as well as a skylight of some sort. How many times have I wished to open the window and just jump out in this rooftop garden, and sit down for a cup of coffee. But the windows are locked, of course.

What I admired in the beginning of this book was a hundred-year-old man, who one day opened the window and jumped out, because director Alice simply wouldn’t allow him to get an occasional drink. And he went into the world, forget all those rules and Alices and norms.

The Hundred-Year-Old Man Who Jumped out the Window and Disappeared was a very refreshing read. I usually spend most of my time reading either what my friends would call depressing literature, or sinking in some magical realism, enjoying every minute and word. This was probably the first humor book I have ever read, and I must admit – it was quite enjoyable! So much that I even bought my next Jonas Jonasson book, just to make sure they don’t run out of copies. And, let’s face it, because I like hoarding books, too.

I’m not used to laughing out loud when I read a book, but this is what happened with this one occasionally. Sometimes people sitting around me would ask me why am I laughing and what have I read. I realized that it’s actually hard to explain it. Not for any other reason, but because while reading this book you get an image of the characters, which build up, evolve, become more and more lovable, and at some point you just smile at everything they do.

This book is absurd. It describes the impossibly possible things a man can do in a hundred years, it describes the impossible probability of you running into people such as Mao Tse-Tung, Churchill, Stalin, Truman and Kim Jong II. And all that if you just blow up your house for a start. It tells a story of surviving a gulag cold-bloodedly, but not being able to keep it together after the death of a house cat. And then there’s meeting all of those awesome people on your way to… wherever it is you’re running to.

This book has been a great means of turning out my mind when I needed it, or just enjoying a nice comedy when I was in the mood. Though comedy has never been a favorite genre of mine, I think I will always look at this book and smile at it, an I’ll always just say “Hey, buddy! I still know you killed those people, but I’ll keep your secret. I had the hell of a laugh.”

The best part of it? That while reading this book I met up with the one and only Inga, and exchanged some experience about our reading adventure in person. Our new year’s not-resolutions are still swimming somewhere there in the river Vilnia, right before it flows into Neris, and might be well on their way to the Baltic sea now. ❤

Next stop – Belgium!

Chapter Thirteen – Sweden

I must admit I really enjoy writing posts about how I found a book, or why was the one I’m reading my choice for a particular country. But unfortunately it looks like I will have some challenges with writing the story of my research for Sweden. To be more precise – there wasn’t really a research there, the book found me.

Some time this summer I went to the cinema with some friends, but unfortunately I already have absolutely no idea what the movie we saw was. I forgot. But anyway – it’s not really relevant to this story. What’s important is I saw a trailer for another movie during the commercials, which seemed kind of fun and interesting, and I thought it might be a good idea to check it out later. It was based on Swedish book – “How lovely!” I thought.

The title stayed somewhere in the back of my mind, but I never actually went back to the cinema to see it, and I’m not sure they even show it anymore, so that train is gone. What I did tell myself, though, was “Ah, well. It’s always better to read the book first, anyway!” and decided to keep this book for this reading project. I didn’t remember the name of the author, only that it sounded very Scandinavian (what a stereotype, right?) so I decided to ask Google for help. I remembered some part of the movie’s title, and tried looking it up.

“The hundred year old man something” was what I kept repeating to myself. That was more than enough to find Jonas Jonasson‘s novel “The hundred year old man, who climbed out of the window and disappeared“, because it was the first suggestion Google had for me. And this is when my research ended, I ordered the book and will now read it happily ever after. I must admit there have been moments when I’ve been thinking about picking something like Niels Holgersson, or some really dark Scandinavian classic (why do I always connect Sweden to great children’s books or sad novels?), but I decided to go with humor for a change. Not much of a story, isn’t it?

But even so, here’s to the quirks of old age and jumping out of windows Swedish style.

P.S: Inga, I’ve had a lot of moments, when I wanted to start a book earlier, too. “She’ll never know… It would be my dirty little secret!”, I told myself, and this one was no exception. But I was strong, too!