The Gentle Giant is a professional bodybuilder and fairly famous in Poland, he is often featured in bodybuilding magazines. He trains at a local gym and works as a bouncer in the local boozer, which I suppose in English terms would be classed as a nightclub. Big Eggs, liking his blokes big, goes weak at the knees at the sight of him. I watched The Gentle Giant the other night as he ejected two men from the club who'd had too much to drink and were reluctant to leave and marvelled at his size... not tall but a couple of yards wide.
Most nights he sits on his own concentrated on his mobile phone, his giant fingers methodically pressing out messages on the tiny keypad, or reading. He frequently looks bored and tired, the club goes on til at least 3am during the week and 6am at the weekends. The rules are that the staff must wait until the bar has cleared before they can close, meaning that they sometimes must sit patiently while a hard core group of alkies sit at the bar talking rubbish. I remember being in London and being physically hoarded out of pubs at a few minutes past 11pm, is that still the way it is? The tourists must have been shocked at the archaic licensing laws in one of the world's great capitals.
Now and then The Gentle Giant has a melancholy air about him. He has been training for maybe 20 years and working at this club for the last ten, he's now in his late 30's. He once remarked that his life is the same day in day out....work, training, work, training, his nights spent in the smoke filled club, his days in the gym. He has no wife or children and like most people in Poland he lives in a small flat in a block. He keeps himself to himself and is actually quite shy. He is one of the nicest people I have met in this city. I got to know him quite well after he approached me one night and asked me if I would give him some English lessons...
Word of the week: Kulturyst meaning bodybuilder.
