thats a good preface to this story.
So i leave asuncion terminal at 2. The bus crashes into a pickup about 40 k out. We bajarnos and wait for another bus. Buses come and go and I finally get on another at around 4. Tranquilo. But, lightning struck a second time in a town called Juan Mallorquin, known in guarani as ka'arendy (yerba burning. one of the funny things about paraguay is that a lot of the towns have sweet names in guarani but were changed to lame spanish names). So we get into mallorquin and the bus just crawls to a stop and dies, oil leak. So at this point, around 7:30, I know that I can't make the 7 o'clock last bus to encarnacion from ciudad del este. SO naturally I went to the terminal and got a box of uvita and a leg of chicken (uvita is a cheap argentinian wine, of such high quality that it gets exported to the former soviet bloc as evidenced by the cyrhillic alphabet on one side of the packaging). The stem was for immediate gratification, and the uvita was my reward for when i presumably would arrive back in my site. So finally another bus comes at around 9 -por alli- and i hop on. Home free. Only have to catch the 11:30 encarn bus at kilometer thirty (beautiful, beautiful kilometer thirty). But nahaniri. The bus driver's wouldn't let me off because they said it was too dangerous and they would leave me at the toll booth, about 5 k further down the ruta. So i get off at a deserted toll booth and with my motile options limited to a moto taxi, which would get me thrown out of the peace corps, hitching with the police (but that was out because they were in the process of making a bust on a brazil bound smuggler), and hoping an asuncion bus would roll through and bring me back to 30. Fortunately, por suerte, a bus came. I tried to explain my plight and asked to not pay. Doikoi. Not only did they make me pay 10 thousand guaranis to go 4 kilometers, but as we were rolling by the police (paraguayan bus drivers are the worst rubberneckers in the world) he just goes "why is your bag so heavy? all the marijuana?" and i was just like thanks dick, right in front of the police mid bust you're going to make them think that i'm trafficking drugs? Anywho, arrive in 30 tranquilamente and head to the hotel that i stayed at almost exactly a year ago when going to my site for the first time and getting similarly stranded. I can't describe the seediness (the only billboard in 30 is a wild west wanted billboard of 4 guys with warrants for their arrests in brazil and paraguay, and of course their aliae? if thats the plural. Caballito (little horse) is wanted for traffickingdrugs into brazil, good to know, comforting. So I head to the motel. Doorbell, nobody's home. I wait and wait and finally there's some movement and out comes a dude in his tighty whiteys who starts dancing on his little balcony. Next his girlfriend walks out topless. I'm just like "is there space for the night?" . Don't know, I'm not the owner. I go in and do the paraguayan doorbell, clapping your hands really loudly, but nobody stirs. So I feel defeated, time for the uvita. I take some bricks from a construction site, three to sit on and wait for the bus and a fourth for self defense should necessity require as such, and rip that uvita box open like its all going to the ukraine. Dude comes over: "que tal?", ha che "mba'e la porte?" He leaves and sits with his buddies and I'm just like shit, they're drawing straws for who gets to mug gringo. But finally they yell over to me "ejumi" (thats the polite command in guarani to come over). So I go over, clink my box-o-wine with their cerveza ha roguapy. And we chat. Pablo the mechanic, his friend, another mechanic, and the guard with the sawed off. They were some of the most calidad dudes I've hung out with. They're sitting there like the potato eaters but instead of gnarled hands illuminated by a warm hearth, its grease covered paws and the omnipresent fluorescent lighting of paraguay. And pablo goes "anders, do you know who the happiest man in the world is?" who? "el pobre" the poor man. Why pablo?, "because he knows exactly what he has, nothing". Anete che ra. Now, thats not the most profound statement in the world. But sitting around drinking with friendly people in a shite corner of the world, it was fun. But he goes on "Andres, do you know who has it the worst in the world?" no pablo, who? mavapa? "El pobre...cuando lo rice esta corriendo, esta tomando ejercicio, cuando el pobre corre, esta robando. Cuando el rico tiene vino, esta tomando un poco, disfrutando la vida; cuando el pobre quiere tomar, es un borracho." Thank you pablo. When the rich man runs, hes exercising, when the poor man runs, he's stealing. When the rich man is drinking he's enjoying, when the poor man drinks, he's a drunk. The some deep (albeit contradictory; is the poor man happy or sad, or both?) stuff to hear from third world mechanics. Finally, 1 o'clock rolls around. I'm like amigos, this bus isn't coming, what am I going to do? "Andres, vamos arrelar la situacion" jaha. They went into the junkyard and grabbed a tarp and some insulating foam and made me a nice little bed. I didn't have my sleeping bag, but the fates smiled on me that night and it was a balmy paraguayan winter night. I shook their hands and thanked them, and the guard with the sawed off ambles over to his post and says to me, "anders, don't worry, voy a protegirte"
Although I only slept 3 hours until 4 when the mechanic opened for business and had to get back to my site for pay day at the yerba factory. I swear to los dios, that it was the most beautiful dawn I've seen in paraguay. I knew red clouds signify rain, sailor take warning, but I didn't care, I laid on my foam and watched that sun rise como la kuarahy nosemo'ai ko'ero. I told them before they left that night that I was going to come back to drink terere with them, and although I haven't yet had the opportunity, I will make it back. Tranquilo.
No comments:
Post a Comment