Just Trying to Get From Point A to Point B

My grandparents and aunt called to wish me a happy birthday, and at some point someone asked me to tell them something crazy that had happened: “Hm… well yesterday a truckdriver who drove us down held a machete to his throat and said he was going to commit suicide because I wouldn’t return his love, he was joking….I swear…” Yikes! Okay, one of those times things sound way more intense then how it was in the moment and the second the words left my mouth I wished I could suck them back up, put a stopper on any anxiety that I could cause. (Why couldn’t I just tell a normal story about going to get meio frango at that little new stand near my friend’s house and the cute lady at the counter who served us). It is just so easy to spill out about the nuts, the bad, and the worse, but without the context of the good and the great it doesn’t make sense.

Transportation. I think probably everyone in PC Moz (if not all of PC) blogs about transportation at some point, how could you not? And I feel like if someone asks for a “crazy adventure story” they will get a story about transportation.

Public transportation: chapas: little white vans that are designed to fit 11 people but usually carry 20-30 people, no joke: 4 people per bench plus a couple of babies, a large plaid zip suitcase, and a some of chickens, maybe a caged pigeon (the worst was when there was a live sheep shoved under my seat, and it gave off the strong odor of rotting cheese and fear). Chapas are usually rusty, thick-exhaust producing, roped together death traps… sometimes you get lucky and the plastic on the seats isn’t tearing and scratchy, the paint is flawless, and the speakers are actually good enough to figure out what song is being played. At Inchope, the major crossing for me to catch rides, there is a charred chapa skeleton, victim of an engine fire or explosion, a little reminder about the lack of the enforceable-safety laws to motivate you on your way. Really I have nothing positive to say about chapas themselves, but I have this weird liking for chapa drivers and workers (I am also semi-obsessed with public trans drivers for trimet back home, you know they have good stories to tell at the end of the day… so this chapa driver intrigue might not be an opinion shared by all volunteers). They are usually helpful, honest Businessmen (except sometimes they say they are leaving RIGHT NOW when they are really going to be sitting for another hour) who point you in the right direction when you look totally lost, and up for a little chatting if you are sitting in the front. So far the only incidents: a few popped tires in the middle of nowhere, once the hood started smoking and the driver poured water, which was carried to the vehicle by an ancient women from her hut next to the road, all over the …engine?… and we were on our way.

Up north most of the transport is open-back flat bed trucks. Once two women got in a fist fight, which was physically limited by the 25 people standing and sitting around them. Open-backs mean big sky wind and sunburn, and for whatever reason I see more male passengers drinking in the open backs then the regular chapas.

Buses are my least favorite. The rows have fold down seats so that there is no aisle, the last row sits 5 across rather than 4 like the other aisles… I’m not sure, guess the bus is slightly wider in the back? Once coming home I was stuck in the back seat, and this adorably cute fat baby was sitting next to me with his mom (so we were 6 across technically). I dozed and woke up because my leg was damp, okay more than damp, it was wet. Juices from the baby’s cloth diaper had leaked on me. A man up front started complaining about the smell and the mom started changing her babe. It was a difficult process to coordinate because we were all packed so tightly on the bench that I would say we were more like snuggle-buddies than strangers on a ride home together. I pressed my fontside up against the bus wall, stuck my nose out the window and took big calming breaths hoping that the yellow baby sludge wouldn’t get on my backpack. Poor mama!

So, public transport is an experience but I’ll take a private car anyday. I don’t have to worry about a private car falling apart halfway into a trip. Hitching is, in my opinion, a safer option and my preferred mode of travel. I meet businessmen, workers, tourists, ex-pats and I awkwardly try to make engaging conversation, not that small talk has ever been a strong skill of mine. But it usually works, somehow, the chitchat goes between two complete strangers.

When public transport is not coming and private cars aren’t passing, you can pay to ride in a semi. Semis are slow. I avoid them but sometimes you just have to keep moving. In terms of what happened the other day, what I mentioned to my grandparents on my birthday: I ended up in a semi with two friends I was traveling down south with. They snoozed on the trucker’s mattress, and the driver turned up the stereo and started to serenade me with passada songs: “Listen to these lyrics, they are for you, listen carefully.” He passed his cellphone to me: “Your friends will never know, look they are deep asleep, they don’t have to know, just give me your number.” He talked about how if he had a white American woman traveling around with him in his truck nobody would question him, nobody would challenge him, everybody would just be in awe, and everybody would know he had unique prowess intelligence and success. I told him my husband (um … yeah that one who is teaching English down in Vil) would be soo angry with me, I just could not give him my phone number, and so on. The driver persisted: teasing joking complimenting. He started fiddling under his seat and pulled out a machete. And I thought: Oh no! Machete, again! He held it to his throat, he was going to commit suicide if I didn’t give him my number, he was heartbroken, he could not live without my love…he said everything with a little smile but tried to keep the theatrics serious … and, machete still out, he started singing passada songs to me, again.