the trip

the name of rio's train station, central do brasil, is rather grander than reality. sure, it is not small, but neither is it big. and if you think it connects rio to the rest of the giant hinterland... well, no. a small network of 5 commuter lines feathers out from here, the longest stretch being 30 kilometers at the most.
still, there is a lot of movement in and around the station. on the side of it there is a busy street market. stalls with cheap plastic toys, second hand cell phones, fruit. each stall plays a different tune on full blast. well, they have to; after all, the stall next door is also playing music on full blast.
the station is in the rather dilapidated center of rio. from here you can see christ in profile.
it is 11.30 and i am here to catch the 11.45 to belford roxo.
i am going to meet the boyfriend at his work.

as the train leaves the station the crumbling houses and buildings of downtown quickly make way for the first of a long succession of favela's. improvised 2 story houses build out of unplastered brick, often with seemingly random add ons. probably build as some more money became available. dogs digging in the dirt, kids flying their kites.
christ quickly turns his back on this part of the city.
and as the brick houses are replaced by wooden sheds, and the kids by crack smoking adults, christ has long disappeared out of view. this is then how a large part of the inhabitants of rio live.

i had postponed this trip for weeks. always something came up. and when no good reason stopped me, there was always laziness to prevent me from going out here.
but now, i must go. for i only have one more week left in brazil before moving back to amsterdam.
oh yes, it is over between me and the boyfriend. and so staying on in rio makes no sense to me.

the carriage is neither full nor empty. opposite me there is a couple - he is quite good looking, she clearly takes care of herself but is not particularly pretty. a somewhat strange couple as she is quite a bit older than he is. hm - on second thought, perhaps they are not a couple at all but a young mother with a mature looking son. could be.
there is a lady constantly on the phone. a pink phone. she is wearing pink too.
at the next stop a young woman gets on board wearing diminutive shorts. her belly shows underneath her faded purple shirt. when she sits down next to me her shorts disappear completely under her belly and it looks as if she is naked from the top down. her fleshy legs shake softly like bread dough when the train continues it rattling journey out to belford roxo.

we pass 2 giant deserted industrial buildings. people seem to have set up home in the buildings, like a family of mice building their houses in a mammoth carcass. around it stand rusting cranes on guard.

as i look at the people around me on board i realize there is a lot of work in the world for the boyfriend. he is a dentist you see and this group of men and women here alone could provide the boyfriend with months of work. pulling the mother's/girlfriend's gray rotten teeth - all of them. making an implant there in the gap that guy has instead of a front tooth. instructing the guy next to me to polish his teeth at least every now and then. oh, heaps of work.

the boyfriend... where did we go wrong i wonder.
i stare out at the never ending maze of the favela's. i imagine us running round in them, me and the boyfriend, our conversations as complex and unmapped as these streets. i am chasing him, calling after him 'wait! i want to tell you something'. but he runs away. we catch a glimpse of each other every now and then, at the end of an alley, in the reflection of a window. there he is, up on the roof. and if ever it looks from above as if he is running after me, look again: that is when he is trying to chase me away.
'stop following me', he says.
'only if you stop running away from me', i answer.
he is speaking to me, something about freedom and independence. about other guys. about secrets and privacy. i only half hear the words. i am too busy catching my breath and at the same time calling things back at him. about respect and oh, the usual crap. i don't even understand it myself. i mutter 'yes,but i moved to rio for you'. yes, i did. so what?

we get tired and pause leaning against each other.
'why are we doing this?'
some friendly words. we laugh. we cuddle a bit. and just when i want to hug him he runs away again.

the course we have run is just as untraceable and twisted as the electricity wires above our heads in this unfriendly neighborhood.
every time we try to untangle our arguments each of us pulls at their loose end and we end up making the knot ever tighter.

the lady with no pants wakes me out of my daydream. she offers me a sticky sweet. 'obrigado.'i could do with something sweet now.
she herself pops the last sweet into her mouth, puts the wrapper back into the plastic sweety bag, now full of empty wrappers. only then does she throw the whole bag on the floor of the train. oh well, it is a start.

we must be getting near to the final destination, to belford roxo. and even though the improvised houses now make way for regular, 'real' houses, there is hardly any improvement. rubbish everywhere. poverty. somehow it does not feel as if we are 'getting' anywhere.
but here we are. final stop.

what a strange trip this has been - just now, but also the past few months. enjoyable, though not always beautiful. friendly people all around me, but sometimes rather harsh. an interesting view, always, even if sometimes painful. it has been one hell of a ride.
i took it alone though, i think. never was i in the same train as the boyfriend. he didn't want to come on board of my train and did not let me on board of his.
does he not realize you can travel on the same train and still have your own journey? look at different things, even sit apart sometimes?

so i have come all this way to this strange place that does not feel like a destination. but as a friend once told me: the journey is the destination!

i find the clinic easily. the boyfriend greets me with a smile. not a kiss.
'lets go for lunch', he says.

we walk in silence.
the boyfriend is no longer 'the boyfriend'. he is that guy that used to love me. my ex. that friendly dentist with perfect teeth. that crazy idiot that held out with me and my nagging for so long. he is andre.

we walk back past the station.
there is a whole row of minibuses next to the station, waiting to take people even further away. on to the next destination: parque são joão, OMCB (whatever that may be), b. vermelha, locaretti. exotic.
i too must catch a minibus or a train or walk - to the next destination.
i will go there alone.
even though i still hope andre will (somehow) be able to join me.