Travel log - Europe - Day 21

Day 21 Salzburg

So, another day would start in Salzburg and I had many places to go. The night had been full of dreams, I remembered them vividly and wrote some parts. Maybe I was affected by the visit to the Freud Museum and I wanted to interpret the elements and know the answers to life mysteries. Well, at least my own mysterious ways. As I got ready for the day, the family was already gathered around the table having breakfast. It was a delicious breakfast and they asked me about what I would do during the day. I told them I was going to some places. They lent me a map and gave some suggestions. I could take the bus or just walk along the river to get downtown. They told me it would be something like 5 kilometers away. A bit discouraging, we could think, but, I had time and maybe walking would give me ideas to understand those dreams of mine. I would be in movement, going along a beautiful river. As I finished breakfast, Ansuela asked for my help to improve a snow tower she was building on the balcony. It was a one-meter tower made of snow with some holes in it. I am not very good at this and we had made no snow-man in Belgium, but I was eager to learn. We got one bucket and a small cup and I should fill the bucket with ice and put the cup with its border touching the side of the bucket and after I should put some water. It made the snow melt a bit and soon turn to ice . We would then remove it from the bucket and remove the cup, leaving a hole on one of the sides. I had no idea why the holes existed, but we doubled the size of the tower. So, I took the trail through the woods and got to river, turned right and there we go.

The peace and quiet of the walk made me feel lonely and at the same time, it soothed my spirit. I could almost hear the sound of silence (in the city I should be listening to the sound of music). There were some people going by, vagrant like me or exercising. I followed my shadow and I could see from a distance the fortress which would be my first stop.

As I arrived at the center, I was welcomed by very beautiful short buildings. The avenues were large and there was some morning buzz of cars going by. The day was sunny but most of the roofs had snow. I was afraid of walking on the sidewalks because I had heard somewhere (maybe Prague) that when an amount of snow got loose and fell from the edges of roofs, people could get killed. I visited a square and a church, which was closed. I tried following my direction instincts, although I no longer trusted them after the failure in Vienna (and in the previous day at the station). But the fortress was on top of the hill, then I had to find a way to go up, so all the steep streets were very likely to lead me there. Finally, I found a place where I could take a funicular (I didn’t remember that was the name). But I thought it was expensive to do it so I tried the other alternative which was the beautiful set of stairs you can see below:

There were few tourists there when I arrived. Officially, the place is called Hohensalzburg Castle and it was not expensive to enter (maybe 7 euros).
The place was very nice. As it was a bit early, few people were visiting and it was getting more crowded as I was leaving. It was a fortress/castle where the religious leaders who had controlled the city lived and protected themselves. There were museums inside and some balconies where one could have a wonderful view of the city, the surrounding mountains and the beautiful sky.

I spent some hours there and after the visit I headed for the center of the city. I was getting hungry so I started to look for a place to eat. As it would be my first lunch in Salzburg, I should try some traditional Austrian food, something I hadn’t eaten in Vienna. However, I ended up going to a restaurant which had an Indian name and an elephant on the sign.
This experience was not as cool as one may think. As soon as I entered the place I realized the restaurant was a small room, with about 6 or 7 tables. There were almost all taken by couples and some friends having lunch. There was no one to serve, and I even felt like I had entered someone’s house and should leave as soon as possible. After some minutes thinking, I sat at the empty table, I guess it was the only one available, and waited. Suddenly, by the same door I had entered, a guy entered and I realized he was the waiter just because he was carrying the tray. No apron, no special uniform. I stayed there sitting and looking around, and the guys from the nearby table kept staring at me. I felt awkward and wanted to leave so badly. And although I was there, feeling naked, the waiter guy did not approach me. He did some other things and then he seemed to have paid attention to me. At that point, I had managed to calm myself down and started observing people near there, talking and all. He handed me a menu and I chose the food I wanted. Then he left again, by the door and didn’t come back for about minutes. Imagine if someone would leave, because they could have. Anyway, he came back and started serving me and, at the same time, he was cleaning some of the tables. Some of the people, specially the staring neighbors left and by the time I was finishing my meal, there were only a couple and I left. I had some rice and chicken, plus some naan bread as entrée.
After that, I resumed my walk around the narrow , now alley-like streets. The city was not so crowded although it was one day before a holiday. The 06 of January is a very important day, as the children were dressed in the 3 wise men clothes and they go from house to house asking for donations to a certain world cause. I had thought it strange that some houses had some numbers and symbols on their doors, written with chalk and afterwards Ansuela told me what that meant: the children would write that that house had already contributed. I could witness this cultural event that same night while were were having dinner, but I’ll get to this later.
I saw some interesting stores, and one that really called my attention was a movie theater called Kino, where one could watch cult movies and all. The building was very interesting and I felt like watching a movie, but I still had some parts of the city to see.
My next stop was Schloss Mirabel or Mirabell Gardens.
I don’t know if I have already told you that there is a museum of Mozart in Salzburg because he was born there. Although he spent most of his life in Vienna and we visited his museum there, he is a kind of attraction to Salzburg. All the gift shops you go you have something related to his music and his photos. One of the most striking symbols of Salzburg are the Mirabell chocolates, which have Mozart pictures and are called “Mozart’s balls” (pun intended, I guess). I brought some to my friends and almost lost them, but this story should also come in the future.
The gardens were beautiful, but there was a kind of sense it would be way better in the summer. Most parts were locked and under snow. But the statues served as an example of the kind of spectacle we could have had, provided it was summer.
**
After the gardens, I decided to go home. It was a bit after four and soon the sun would be setting. I headed home but I was freezing already, I knew I would have to walk about 7 or something kilometers and I started, already freezing and willing to go to the toilet. As I walked I started not feeling my hands anymore, and instead of entering any place in order to get warmer, I felt it would be wiser to keep going, to arrive soon. I got there with half my arms purple from the cold. Ansuela saw it and prepared me some hot tea and we talked about what I had done that day. She informed me a friend of hers wanted us to go to a dinner at her house. So we did.
The house was not very far. It was about a 5 minute walk. Her husband went by bicycle and we went walking. The dinner was very nice and I had the opportunity to witness one of the kids dressed as the wise men, coming and asking for some donations, and he wrote the numbers with chalk on their door. After they told me everything about that tradition. The dinner with Cristina was very nice and after drinking a bit of wine and getting some chocolate as gift, we decided to go home. Again, Herman went first with his bike and we stayed behind, but that was so nice, us walking home remembering songs and singing, our way, forgetting parts of the lyrics and just inventing some.
As we got home, I calculated I had walked about 20 km that day. One thing I was sure: I could eat junk food and all, but I was definitely doing quite a lot of exercise. I wrote the postcards I had bought that day and the following day I had to post them. There was a post box in front of the hostel in Berlin and I had just kept the postcards to hand in to my friends, I didn’t want to do that again with the other cities. And to bed I went, that nice and comfy bed. And the night came, enveloping me in its stillness.

Travel log - Europe - Day 20

Day 20 - Salzburg

A new step of the trip starts. Leaving Joy and Lorenzo to their dreams, a city like Vienna behind, I went to the station trying to calculate if I would make it on time. I could not afford missing another train. The subway was fast and as I had seen the day before, I had to carry my luggage stairs up. I got to the platform 5 minutes before the departing time and I felt so proud I was early and not late.
The train was a bit different from the others I had taken till then. It was not so expensive but it seemed fancier. In all wagons you had a screen, showing you where you were in the map, the speed of the train, and some other details. I followed it as much as I could but as soon as the train started moving, the cradling movement lulled me into a dozing state. After all, I had slept 4 hours or something. I had planned a train trip so that I could cross Austria and see the fields, see whatever I could. So I did that every 5 seconds I could keep my eyes open. I had impressions like the following ones, but for sure I was partly unconscious when I took them.

Finally, the morning was advancing, the day was cold and the snow was abundant again. Vienna had been a kind of break since it didn’t snow so much and there was no snow on the streets like all the other places I had already been to. I arrived at Salzburg central station and I felt a bit daunted. I bought a ticket to go to the South Station where I was supposed to get off to go to my Couchsurfing base in the area. Buying the ticket was not difficult. But I asked for direction to where I should take the train and the attendant didn’t give me very precise information. I headed for the platforms, but there was no number of platform in the ticket and there was no escalators, only regular stairs and one had to go down a staircase and up another one to arrive at the platforms. Accessibility zero. There was no voice announcing the trains, not even in German. The trains came and they had no indication that it was the one I should take. There was nobody on the platform for me to ask for information. I tried a couple and they barely spoke English.
I went back to the ticket counter in order to understand better how I should proceed. It took 15 minutes dragging my suitcase to go and come back and I learned I could take any of the red trains (but why she had not told me that before I don’t know). I have to admit part of this confusion at the station was because it was under repair, but anyway, I was a bit sleepy and the loneliness (I had just made so special friends who I had to leave behind again), so I could not have a good first impression of the city.
I was also a bit anxious because the direction to get to my hosts’ house were not so clear. And because, differently from all my other CS experiences I would not be at a young person’s house. I would be staying with a family, two daughters and the parents. As I had it in my mind, the girls would be couchsurfers and the parents kind of accepted this lifestyle and had agreed to host people.
But I will come back to that later. I got off at the right station and looked around. No street names in signs, I had to look for a public phone. Finally I could reach them home and told I had arrived. As she was explaining to me which way to take, my one euro expired and I had to call again. Guess what? I couldn’t make the call. The phone had just decided not to work anymore. Probably it went on strike. So I made up my mind to walk towards the direction my sense was telling me (after the fiasco in Vienna I still insisted in relying on my inner GPS - silly me) to go. I walked and walked past some bus stops, no taxis around. Suddenly, from another direction a girl comes. There was nobody around for me to ask for direction so I stopped and to my surprise she asked: “are you Elton?”. She was Olivia, one of the daughters, one angel who had come to save me at the station. She told me we should walk the opposite way and so we did, across the meadows, which was a kind of shortcut.
The house was near a forest and the river. It was a two storey house, very well decorated and full of windows. The mother, Ansuela, was waiting for me. She took me to a room where I would be staying, and commented how big my suitcase was. All of them thought so, just like Joy and Lorenzo had already made fun of me because of its size. Well, never go to a backpack trip, like an adventure, with a big suitcase. (To defend myself: it was winter, I had never experience such cold so I had no idea how many things of each to take).
***
They took me for a tour in the house and asked questions about my trip till then. Of course I told them with details the sad story of Carol and we had lunch.
After lunch, one friend of the family actually came to catch us, plus some equipment - that is, some sledges - and headed towards one of the nearby mountains. She parked the car and we started going uphill. It took us more than half an hour to get to a good point. We had to stop at the middle to catch some breath, I remember looking at all that snow and freezing at the same time I was sweating from the exercise.
When we got to a certain point, no at the top, but high enough, Ansuela and her friend took their wood sledges and Olivia and I got the plastic ones. It would be the first time I would go tobogganing down the hill. This were some of the views we had going up.

I had to say it was quite an experience. It took some time for me to realize I had to control my body swing because I would go to the opposite side I had put my weight, so I had to swing left if I wanted to go right. Also, there was no space for the feet, so I had to keep them up and be careful not to let them change the delicate balance. So I would zigzag down the mountain, and once I even thought I would fall outside the path, because I could not stop. It would be very funny (and tragic) to see me rolling down the very steep hill. Adventure, you might say. Close to the bottom of the mountain, Olivia took a shortcut through one steeper hill beside the path, and this was a time I was afraid, for you had to be careful with the rocks not to get hurt or damage the sledge. It was my luck the way up took so long, because I was not so sure I would have liked to go up and down (like a drunk person). But I can’t deny it was a lot of fun.
We were a bit wet from the snow, so we headed home to warm up. As we got there, I met Herman, the father and we had a substantial five o’clock tea. The table was set at a part of the house full of windows in all sides so you could eat while observing the sunset and the mountains around.
After that, Ansuela invited me to go to the river bank and then we would be able to better watch the sunset. We had to get to the river by the middle of some trees, the woods. Not so distant, she told me, and it was less than 100 meters. As we got there the sun had already hidden behind the houses on the other side of the river.

There was a walkway along the river, and some people were passing by on their sweatsuits. There were some benches and I can’t remember if we sat there or if we just stood, but we started talking about life and about what we had in common. It was so nice, we discovered we loved singing. I told her about the story on the karaoke in Vienna and the time I sang on the karaoke going to Estonia, on the ship. Then, we got to Abba and we just started trying to remember the most we could of the lyrics. No song was completely sung, since we would always forget a line or two, so humming we went back home and she promised to show me some things on youtbube.
She introduced me to a couple who plays the acoustic guitar as percursion along with its string functions and she showed me a video of a singer who would from then on be part of my life: Katie Melua.
***
After that I took a shower and Ansuela told me they were waiting for a guy from Syria to come. he was from Couchsurfing and I was not sure whether he was going to sleep over as well or not. In the end, it turned out he was already living in the city, so he just wanted to make some new friends. He was a little slow in getting things and although he was not a strictly religious person, he had some behaviors very foreign to me. But we got some music sheets, he got an acoustic guitar, we found some other instruments and we sat at the table, Ansuela, Olivia, me and the guy, whose name I don’t remember, to have a good time singing and playing. I took a picture of the guy’s performance.
After having some fun, we had dinner. It was a delicious pumpkin soup or cream with some pumpkin oil. We talked a bit more and I ate heartily.
After dinner the guy left. I had wondered if he was going to stay there, but he lived downtown and was only getting to know some people from the city, other couchsurfers. Then, after taking everything to the kitchen, Ansuela suggested we should have some game time. She and I engaged in many activities: there was a board game with animals, which I loved called Hive. There was another, with some dark and light beads and we should create a sequence, preventing our opponent from creating one first. Finally, we had some billiard and table tennis in the basement. I felt so happy as it had been ages I hadn’t play anything. She had so much energy, she was overflowing with it and it was kind of contagious. She had told me she suffered from Parkinson disease. So she could not fully be what she had always loved being, an artisan, an artist. Even the guitar she could no longer play without some pain. Nevertheless, she was so active, she had so many nice ideas of what we could do to spend our time that all you had to do was to go with the flow, it was laughter and fun guaranteed. So, after playing and talking about life and all, we headed to bed. I knew I would be able to cover most of the tourist attractions in the two days I would be there, but I planned to wake up early.

Travel log - Europe - Day 19

Vienna farewell

So, it was our last day in Vienna. I wanted to take advantage of every minute I still had there and I decided we should wake up early in order to see more places. We left the house, went to the bakery to buy some cookies and some milk with chocolate that we had while we walked towards the center.
Joy wanted to see the famous watch. I had already seen one in Prague, so I was happy about watches. As I knew it was not a Big Ben, I just went for it because she had been so nice to go to the places I had suggested the day before. We got a little lost and ended up walking by an avenue with a lot of fancy stores. We asked for some information and managed to get to the cathedral. The clock, however, was never there. We did follow the directions but never reached it. We decided to walk to a museum, and Joy saw on a guide we were close to the Mozart House. On our way, we saw a stall and as I was a bit hungry, we stopped to have a snack. Lorenzo had mentioned the day before that there were some sausages with cheese inside and they were a kind of food symbol of Vienna. So, I had to eat one before leaving.

We got to the Mozart House. We were not allowed to take pictures inside, but the audioguide was included in the ticket. After so many museums, it was the first time I was going to use one. Let me tell you it was very nice to go from picture to picture with that cellphone and listening to the stories of people who were part of Mozart’s life and how the decor of that house had been reconstituted. The funny thing is, with the guide, you spend much more time than you would in the museum, and you interact much less than you should, talking about the works and the details. When we left there, it was more than one o’clock, all the morning had gone by and we had visited only the cathedral and one museum. Another thing which had been decided was that at night we were going to watch a concert or an opera. I had had the chance to go to classical music concerts in Prague and in Vienna but I had not felt so interested (maybe it was because I hadn’t felt like going on my own).

So we headed for the place to buy some tickets for the opera at night. I told her there was a station called Volkstheater and that this should be the place where we could buy the tickets. So we went there and it was a beautiful building near the center of the city. Nevertheless, as soon as we tried to buy some tickets for the opera, we learned from the attendant that we should go to Volksopera, on the other side of town, because we wanted to watch an OPERA. It made some sense and I had seen in small print there was an Opera House near a subway station. So we got the subway again and there we went to the opera house.
With the tickets in hand, we decided we should split and Joy would meet a guy from Couchsurfing who would give her a ride from Vienna to Budapest, her next destination. I had no plans or places to go, so I decided I would try to visit Katrin, the girl who would have been my host there and could not receive me. I took the subway and went to a neighborhood I had not been, Pilgramgrasse. I walked around and tried to call her. Again, problems with public phones. Would I leave Europe without being able to use a public phone properly? No way I could talk to her. Having her address, I decided to do something very impolite and unlike me: I would just drop by and say hello. I went to her building, rang the bell and nothing. Again, nothing. So I gave up. (Afterwards I wrote her an email telling her of my visit and she would tell me she was there, having a nap and it would be lovely to have me visiting) She lost the gift I had taken her and I lost the chance of meeting a nice person (she had helped me with the preparations of the trip).
With no other place to go, the cold afternoon made me want to go home and I went to Lorenzo’s and it would be a guess, for he could be there or not, I was not sure. With my luck of the afternoon, I took the subway and I tried. He was out. Again, nowhere to go and I would still have 2 hours before the meeting time for us to watch the opera. So I decided to go to the train station, just to see where it was and simulate what I would have to do the next morning, very very early.
Before going there, I decided to take the subway, get off in any strange station and walk around. I entered streets, shops, walked without a destination. A flâneur. It was interesting. I had a lot to think about and then that was the chance to look back on what had been happening in this crazy trip of mine. Far from friends, from home, from everything I cared about. Except from myself. When I could not handle it anymore, I went to the station. It was no secret getting there. However, I noticed the escalators were not working as they were making some repairs there and I would have to calculate some minutes more to carry the heavy suitcase all the way up. I bought some postcards and magnets in a shop. They were cheaper than at the stalls downtown.
***
It was already dark as we met at the station. Joy was pissed because the guy she had gone to meet was a dork. He had tried to hit on her and even open minded people like us felt a bit embarrassed by what he had said. I told her about how my afternoon had been boring and we went for the show. By the way, when we had got there in order to buy the tickets, the woman had informed us we would have different pricing according to where we chose to sit. There were some seats for 50 euros and there was a ticket, I guess it was about 2 euros and the person would have to keep standing behind the seat rows. We bought this one because Joy was one of my kind: let’s grab all the discounts we can. At the end, we stood there till 5 minutes before the show started and the lady who was organizing the seats told us we could sit on the chairs of the last row, as they would remain empty. If we had paid 19 euros, instead of 2, for the seats in the last row I would have been very angry. But thanks to our wit we paid almost nothing and we had all the comfort. The opera was in German, but the story was known, Hansel and Gretel.
We had a nice time, there was a break and we could check out the people in the audience. It was fun.

As we left the opera, we went straight to Lorenzo’s because we were cold and tired. Guess what? He was not there. But Joy sent him a text message and he told us he would arive home, in what, 40 minutes or so? It was time to go to Magistrat again and have some more food and drinks while we waited for him. I guess then we were already considered part of the club as we had been there the day before. The mafia atmosphere had disappeared or we had already got used to it. As we were finishing our snacks Lorenzo arrived and we went upstairs for the warmth of his place and to some deserved rest. I would be leaving pretty early in the morning, as my train was to depart at 7h30 or something. Joy would leave after lunch and she was taking the train as the ride with the freak was no longer an option. So we sat on the bed I was sleeping on and Lorenzo asked us about what we would take of Vienna, as impressions and all. We kept talking and although we had not drunk anything, I remember only some fragments of what we talked about. I remember we talked about so many things like threesomes, and gayness and I gave them a gift I had brought from Brazil. The sad thing is that when we bought the gifts before going, we had no idea who we were meeting. Joy for example was a total surprise and one of the best ones of the trip. We talked for hours, until about 2 am. We had some fun at the computer, as Lorenzo showed us a funny website called Chatroullette. It consists of a webcam chat in which the site connects you to random users in the world. Mostly there are people (men) in few clothes and low lights, but I remember we three laughed out loud as we tried to have a chat and people would disconnect on us and then we had to start again (or we would do that).
It was a bit before 3am when we turned off the lights and I knew very soon the alarm would go off and Vienna would be gone, but the memories... oh sweet memories would linger

Interlude 2 - the trip project

Again there was an interruption on posting about my trip. A long one, as there was no posts in October.

Soon, it will be exactly a year after we were leaving Brazil to go to the big and cold Europe. I had promised myself I would finish reporting the adventures I had on the trip, from preparation to return, no matter how long it would take me to. I had hoped things would flow, but this year was kind of crazy and I depended on some people to help me out with the revision of the text.

Anyway, I am closer to the end now than to the beginning and I made a deal with myself I shoudl be able to finish the whole story before the one year anniversary on December 16.

So far, I told you about the arrival in Europe, the week Carol and I spent in Belgium, followed by our experiences in Berlin and the terrible accident Carol suffered on Christmas Eve. Then, I reported what happened after she went back to Brazil and I kept on follwing the plans and headed to Prague. After the lovely days in Prague, I arrived in Vienna, where I spent the New Year. Many things happened in Vienna and my story here ended one day before leaving Vienna. Thus, soon I will be posting the continuation: the last day in Vienna, the trip to Salzburg, Finland and Paris, the final destination. All these posts can be found if you click on the tag TRIPS , to the right.

I hope you enjoy the rest of the posts. Happy journey with me in my memories.

Elton "John" sings...

To my friend Sinead

“Blue jean baby, L.A. lady, seamstress for the band
Pretty eyed, pirate smile, you'll marry a music man”

Then I remember the way you were nice as I told you I sucked in snooker. We were a team and you tried to save us from being humiliated by our opponents. Your smile had something about it. Something mysterious and at the same time, transparent.

“Ballerina, you must have seen her dancing in the sand
And now she's in me, always with me, tiny dancer in my hand”

I guess a picture speaks more than a thousand words.

"Jesus freaks out in the street
Handing tickets out for God
Turning back she just laughs
The boulevard is not that bad"

And there you are, telling me about Lybia and Dublin, and the States, and all around the world where you had been. And it was then you told me you liked talking to me in English, because it reminded you of home.

"Piano man he makes his stand
In the auditorium"

You life was like an opera, then a rock concert, fire flying, fireworks, you were moving faster than a ray of light, you were alive like I had seen only few people being. You were authentic and you were free.

“Looking on she sings the songs
The words she knows the tune she hums“

You sing the world in your eyes, in your jests and in your way to look at the world as a warrior princess, as a girl who has seen so much and still gets amazed by what people can do or say. An eternal child yet as wise as a sphinx. Will you let me guess, or will you devour me?

“But oh how it feels so real
Lying here with no one near”

And sometimes, you who cast a fighter shadow, you are all alone, again trying to figure out why he was not the one. Blaming yourself for having misread the signs. Watching the traps and laughing at their faces, but a bit afraid, one can see by the way you walk.

“Only you and you can hear me
When I say softly slowly”

We had so much fun together, walking and exploring and talking till our eyes could not remain open and our tongues had been softened by sleep. We connected in a way we had met only two months ago and it seemed like we had always been friends. You rocked my world then and the distance now makes little difference in the brightness of the remembrance of days past, and of our good times.

“Hold me closer tiny dancer
Count the headlights on the highway
Lay me down in sheets of linen
you had a busy day today”

I have no idea what the future holds for both of us. We have a big big wild world ahead of us, and we want to fly, we want to break the boundaries, and some rules, but never the bonds that links us in this web of dreams, hopes and fears. You are far, yet you are close, you left but you remain in my heart, a hidden precious treasure that I am sure will come up when I least expect.

Espera

A menina olha pras mãozinhas geladas, pousadas sobre seu colo e fica assim meio sem jeito.

Ela se envergonha das mãozinhas, e tenta escondê-las sob o tecido.

Uma a uma, ela vai tentando cobrir a sua vergonha tremulante, ela vai tentando se esquivar dos sintomas e dos sinais de sua fraqueza.

Ela tenta forçar um choro, quer ouvir seus soluços entremeando o silêncio do seu quarto.

A mala meio pronta, aberta, esperando, faminta de qualquer coisa que possa fazê-la completa.

A menina quer levantar e fechar a mala e falar pronto, mas a mala teima em ficar ali, boquiaberta, exalando um hálito com cheiro de orgulho.

A menina se sente meio jetlag. Ela sente que está no hemisfério errado, no lugar errado, pois que neste momento mesmo deveria se estar em outro lugar, com outros pensamentos, mas ela é só a menina mesmo e ela pode voar milhas e milhas por minuto, será que o barulho ali fora é o mesmo que o barulho aqui dentro?

A menina vai buscando encontrar alguma paz e tenta encontrar alguma energia para sair correndo, para dançar a noite toda, mas sua pele se enflacidece, seus membros se tornam um tanto quanto pesados, ela procura as palavras para falar, mas ela só consegue dizer escuridão e o barulho ali fora e a vontade morrendo como uma planta que murcha na velocidade da luz.

Mas amanhã ela não vai mais estar aqui. O gozo era hoje, mas mandaram dizer que adiou. Coito interrompido, pobrezinha. Ela que viva mais um pouco, rindo ou chorando, se escondendo ou fazendo seu show. Amanhã ela vai sacudir os tamancos, ela vai se deslumbrar com outras paragens, ela vai perceber que o mundo é um pouco maior e mais sensível e mais cru... el a inda não sabe como vai voltar, mas sabe, que agora ela... só precisa esperar.

Espiral

O menino anda pelas ruas vazias e silenciosas da cidade do morango em uma manhã qualquer. Ele segue seu caminho, subindo avenidas e ouvindo seus pensamentos, alto e claro. Uma gota segue a outra e avisa o menino que ele terá problema. E uma a uma cada gota vai caindo e vai destruindo a beleza do seu caminhar, que se apressa, temendo molhar mais que seu corpo e seus pertences. Novamente a chuva inesperada, sem aviso, sem anúncio.

A chuva vai molhando os cabelos recém-cortados do menino, e vão colando sua roupa ao seu corpo, um tremor o faz quase parar de caminhar, mas ele não sabe se é do vento frio que sopra do norte ou se é de dentro.

O menino sente vontade de matar. Sente vontade de gritar e destruir o silêncio que só é quebrado pelo som dos cachorros, sinfonia canina e cândida. Mas ele se acalma e pensa, ah seu eu fosse um catchorro.

Ele caminha e tenta não tropeçar nas próprias metáforas. Planeja e arquiteta acordos, movimentos, alianças. Ele se vê confuso, de tal forma que nem mesmo a conversa que tem com a anciã, aquela que sabe tudo, ou quase tudo, ele sai de lá do mesmo jeito que entrou, mas mais ímpio.

O menino decide coisas, que ele sabe que vai desdecidir depois. Ele vive e percebe que a vida é corda bamba. Tão fácil perder a concentração e balançar. Tão fácil errar o pé e se ver sem chão, ou cordão. Tão fácil fingir e tingir tudo com as cores da França – vide a trilogia do Kieslowski. Se a liberdade é azul e a igualdade é branca, de que cor é o amor?

O menino mastiga mentiras e tenta transformá-las em verdade e isso faz um bolo no estômago dele, ele pensa em vomitar, mas tem medo de encarar o que virá das entranhas. Antigamente, ele se lembra, algumas oraculentes liam a sorte e o futuro nas vísceras de animais. Mas como ele mesmo dizia àquele que Já Passou, o futuro é incerto. Ele sorri e, pluc, liga a chavinha do... ah, foda-se.