I
had been walking all afternoon, aimlessly, through the streets of Fuenlabrada, a suburb
outside Madrid; feeling rather lonely 4:30
p.m. I was very hungry. As I was expecting, I couldn’t
find an open restaurant. In Spain 4:00
p.m. to prepare and get ready for dinner. They open again at 8:00 p.m.
I was so hungry that I thought I couldn’t
wait that much to eat. Several blocks down the street I saw a sign: Café Andrade.
Surely they must be open, and I should be able to have at least a sandwich, I
thought. I was right. They had ham and cheese sandwich, and coca
cola, in the menu.
The place was dusky, and except for me,
it was empty. When Farida, the lady attending the bar, brought me my sandwich, I
ate ravenously. Since I was so hungry, it tasted like the best sandwich I had
ever had.
I guess to alleviate the monotony, and
perhaps the loneliness, Farida kept me company, and, as I ate, she started to
talk to me. She told me how when she was barely eighteen, she left her hometown
in Morocco, and all by herself, crossed the Strait of Gibraltar, to try and
find a better life in Spain. She said it was very difficult, that she was the
object of many acts of racism, that there were those who tried to abuse her,
and get her initiated in the business of prostitution, and drug dealing. But
she had managed to escape all those traps. Now she was married, with a three
year old daughter. Her husband worked in the construction industry, while she
tended the bar; they were saving money to buy a house.
Farida’s company and
conversation tasted better than the sandwich; and it was her words what gave me the strength to continue with my pilgrimage.
©
William Almonte Jiménez, 2015
