For Elise - for his life

Sometimes he can't play the high C-B-E-chord. If that happens he plays a G instead of a B - although he knows how to play Beethoven's "For Elise" since his childhood. Sometimes, when his left little finger is very stiff because of the cold outside, something like this can happen. And Nendar's fingers are often very rigid.

"Especially in the winter months, it is really hard because I always think that it all may soon be over," said Nendar about his life on the road - the streets of Las Vegas. A life without a fixed abode, a life with a sleeping bag, a hat - and an accordion. It was a present from his father - he gave Nendar the accordion shortly before he died. At that time, Nendar was a small boy. With a big dream. "I wanted to become a musician and earn a lot of money." He became a musician but the dreams about the money just didn't come true. If it's a good day, he collects about seven dollars in his hat - when it is a bad day, maybe two.

Nendars dark eyes begin to shine when he tells about his favorite food he's able to buy when he gets enough money. "I love meatballs with mustard and fresh bread." Of course not every day, but occasionally he allows himself this "luxury".

When you see Nendar in the streets, sitting in his sleeping bag, which originally must have been green but now is yellow and littered with brown spots, he appears like he's 58. Or 60. Maybe even 65. He has a round face - nearly half of it is covered by a black beard. From his yellowed teeth are only a few left.

Nendar is not ugly. Unkempt, but not ugly. Presumably, it is not his age, but the years on the street which had left the marks on his face. Somewhere along the way he stopped counting the years. "What are years?" he asks me and expects no reply.

He was eleven years old when his parents died. Nendar grew up in a children's home.

"I was young, I had high hopes, everything was possible back then." The other children often annoyed him. They laughed about Nendar's dream of the big stage. Now he laughs. "Well, that's at least a small stage," he smiles.

Sometimes he can't play the high C-B-E-chord.

Today he succeeds. It is a good day.