While I was away.

The rain was a constant in this city, rainy season or not. The only difference was that in the dry season it was a light rain that you walked about in not even knowing you were getting wet, and I only noticed when I felt the legs of my jeans wet against my heels as I picked my way through disarray of stones of what would soon be a renovated city park. I saw they were tearing down the old men’s bar as I passed. It didn’t fit in with the renovations I guessed. Last night had seemed no different as I made my way to the plaza passing through this old park; the old men were playing chess, checkers, dominoes, and cards as they smoked and drank. Probably fitting in some way; going out without a fuss, as they had passed all their evenings there.

In the church on the plaza there was singing. I bought a beer from a man with a Styrofoam cooler, and sat down on a cement bench listening to them, such sincerity… out of key. I asked a security guard, and he told me the ticket office wouldn’t open until 4, so I had 3 hours. Down the street and around the corner a ways I knew this Portuguese restaurant where the food was cheap and good, and I could waste the remaining hours sitting outside drinking beer watching the people walk past sticking close to the toldos de lona (I’ve been here so long I’ve forgotten the English word) trying not to get too wet. The owner had immigrated to Brazil when he was 19 and had been here for 51 years. His was a small town not too far from Porto about 20 km from a place I had been. The bacalhal pasteis were the best I’d had mixing Brazilian and Portuguese recipes. As I was pouring a beer I saw a motorcycle run into a car. His break lever made a long dent in the rear door of the car. After checking for damage the lady driving pulled off to the side of the street already cramped with cars. I was interested to see how it worked out because I had never seen an accident up close in Brazil. I knew you didn’t have to carry insurance, but they said you better have cash on hand to pay if you did get into an accident. I was quite disappointed, I saw no money exchange hands, she only took his information down, and didn’t ask to see his identity card to verify anything. “Plane boring,” I thought as I waited for my entree.
Paying my bill I walked down the side streets that would take me to the opera house fastest, and passing one of those stores that is only a guy hanging out a window with frigdes in the room behind him, I bought a specialty beer, and I was glad I had when I saw the line. 5 past 4 and already the line went down the steps in front of the opera house. An industrious ice cream vendor had set up his cart by the line doing good business, though if he’d had beer I would’ve bought another one. The man in front of me went to talk to the boy hanging out the window giving information about the show, and I don’t think he liked what he heard because he took off. I bought 2 of the remaining decent seats and called her up. We agreed to meet at 6 since the boxes were assigned but not the seats.
Walking back to my hotel I saw an old man selling avocadoes the size of softballs out of a wheel barrow. He said 2 for 5, but I only wanted 1. I waited until he bagged it up then I offered him 2. He said the price was fixed, but it never was. I took out 2 and offered it to him, and reluctantly he took it saying what they all say in that confiding voice, “I do this only for you.” Passing through the park again a vendor had set up tables with books, and I bought a pocket dictionary for 5. It seemed like a good deal until I found a typo while looking up a word.
I took the avocado up to the roof of my hotel eating it with a beer cutting thick slices of it as I watched the tourists disembark from a nondescript cruise ship without even a pool to be seen on it. The tourists flooded this area for a day as the cruise ship waited 10 hours until their return. The tourists always took cruise ships while only the locals took the river boats from town to town. There were 50 or so stacked up next to each other like so many parked cars waiting for their next destination. Passages of 50 if you brought a hammock, 100 if you wanted a room the size of a closet, 200 if you wanted a suit to take you to whatever part of Amazonas you wanted to go.

The café where all the tourists ate was where I waited for her. They had all sorts of import beers at a price, but they also had a decent Brazilian beer for cheap, plus it was the closest to the opera house, so I would see her before she saw me.
The line was around the corner by the time we got there, and I asked if she wanted any popcorn from the lady selling. She said no, but when I bought some for me, she helped me finish it. It wasn’t long until they let us in, and we were making our way up the 4 flights to the top of South America’s oldest functioning opera house. Luckily we were first to the box taking the only 2 seats with a view where we leaned our elbows on the velvet covered rail like kids at the kitchen counter. The couple behind us was not so lucky, as they had to stand to see at all.
She noticed how the mural on the ceiling wasn’t painted on but papered on like it looked from the tours of the place they gave when there wasn’t a show, and I tried to pick out all the names of famous authors, musicians, and philosophers painted on the wooden shields around the first row of seats: Racine, Shakespeare, Beethoven, Mozart, Goethe, and others I couldn’t see from the top, but that I had seen when I went on a tour of the place before. It reminded me of a theatre out of one of Balzac’s or Zola’s stories, which didn’t strike me when I was taking a tour, but to be seeing a play here would have taken me back in time, if it hadn’t been for the people and their flashing cell phones when the lights dimmed for the show.
It started with drumming in the dark, and then a yellow light shone on the drummers and dancers as they danced in. We both leaned out, our heads on our elbows in an almost comfortable position, so we could see. That it was a Brazilian play you could tell from how it resembled their soap operas. The acting was exaggerated to be funny, and the main theme was relations between men and women, and of course there was nudity with more male nudity than female, and all the women cheered when he first appeared naked on a bed. I laughed too, it was funny. I don’t think I’ve ever seen a tragedy in Brazil, outside of life. They’re not very fond of them.
She leaned in close and put her arm around me, though I didn’t make much of it as she was over affectionate. She called me love several times, which from any other girl would have disconcerted me, but coming from an actress, it was just a little sign of affection, half affected. Both of us were slightly uncomfortable, and I kept looking at my watch waiting for the play to end so I could put my neck back into a normal position. What didn’t help was the mosquito, who seemed to be just biting me, though I wondered why he had singled me out of all those other people.
Arm-in-arm we made our way down the steps out into the plaza that was already dark. She couldn’t think of anything close so I picked a place I knew had Italian food and wine. When we got there she told me it was where her father always went to when he was in town. I picked a table by the street because that was where I always sat so I could watch the people pass, and she picked the seat facing the TV so she could watch it. Of course I had to comment of this because they have TVs in all except the nicest restaurants. I asked her if people ever talked in restaurants, but she didn’t hear me, watching TV. Alright she said, “I’ll only watch you,” staring straight into my eyes like she would find something there, though I don’t think either of us knew what.
The waiter came over and I ordered a bottle of Alandra and we split a lasagna. I could tell he was nervous as he opened the bottle, probably the first time he had done it. It was almost painful for me, but I didn’t try to help him. Over his shoulder was the owner instructing him, which I’m sure didn’t help. He made to pour hers first, but the owner corrected him saying he should pour me a taste since I had ordered it. Dutifully I swirled it, tasted, and told him he could keep pouring. He was so nervous he left the corkscrew at the table, and I had to laugh.
With trembling hands he served our lasagna out of a metal pan using a fork and a knife, and she tried to make him laugh by telling him he could take away the corkscrew now. It didn’t help, so I didn’t pay attention to what he was doing, as if everything were going perfectly smooth, though I had to laugh when he left sorry to have made him so nervous, but she had wanted wine, and I hadn’t known any other place. So few people drink wine in the north, and they always try to serve you red wine cold, but I was in luck, they didn’t serve much wine, so I hadn’t been pre-chilled.
We walked back to the plaza finding most places closed or closing, so we walked over to the pizza place where I had a beer and she had a coke. She asked me about cameras, apple computers, and ipods, things that cost too much here. I had all except the apple, and she thought it was funny that my camera, ipod, and laptop combined were worth more than my truck, though even my truck would be worth 5 times its value here. “If I was to give her a present,” she said, “I should give her an ipod or a semi-professional camera.” I didn’t have that much money I said, but her look said she didn’t believe me. “I don’t want any jewelry, just a few electronics,” she said. She knew how much I had spent on jewelry for my last girlfriend, and I had told her I wasn’t going to spend that much money on a girl again, though here she didn’t quite believe me either. She wasn’t my girlfriend, and we weren’t dating. We never would, just strange friends who pretended they were dating, but never took it seriously. I liked having a beautiful girl on my arm, and I think that was about as much as she got out of me showing me affection, though when I returned any she brushed it off.
After they had taken up all the outdoor furniture but ours, we decided maybe they were trying to get us to leave, so we walked arm-in-arm down to the bus station where the taxis would be lined up, and she suggested we both take a taxi that could drop me off at my hotel then drop her off. I told her I’d rather walk than pay for a taxi, but that I would pay for hers. She said that the way back to my hotel was dangerous to walk down, but I countered that it was safer for a man to walk that way than a woman. She agreed, and I put her in a cab while I turned off by the park noting that only a few posts were left standing of the old men’s bar, and I bought a beer from a man who was wheeling his Styrofoam cooler home.