A few days ago I had to go to the other side of the city in search of medicine. This was a sunny afternoon and even quiet… well, if it were not for the constant problems of transport or problems in the country, I would have said it was a beautiful afternoon. I searched the medicine, which I received as a donation or humanitarian aid, and immediately thought of returning home. It was not late, we are talking about almost 3:00 p.m. and I was already thinking of going to lock up me in the house; In fact I leave my home when it is absolutely necessary because looking for cash to pay the bus is another martyrdom.
I went to the bus stop and started my wait a little before 3:30 p.m.; I got uneasy when it was 4:30 p.m. and I was still in the same place (no transport had passed in more than an hour). I walked a few blocks trying to find other options that could serve to get closer to my house, but I had no luck because the pair of buses that passed were full. I walked a little more, but the picture did not improve for me. I arrived at a stop where several people were crowded and pursued the same goal: to go home. I asked myself: “How long have these people here?” Although the possible answer anguished me, I still asked myself: it could be a few minutes? More than one hour? Could I get on a transport? Would I have to walk to my house? Walking to the house… being there on the other side of the city is almost unthinkable, but in today’s Venezuela where even the unimaginable is possible, to walk to my house was a possibility, a possibility I feared.
I leaned against a concrete wall that was behind the stop, I do not know how many people were waiting for transportation there but they were not few. I noticed the presence of a lady, I would be between 76 and 78 years old, I do not know; Her hair was loose, it was long up to shoulder height, and its color was a reddish but very clear. She tried unsuccessfully for a bus to stop where she was, you could tell she was in a hurry to leave. Of course, I was also in a hurry because at that point it was more than 5:00 p.m., but I was apparently calm.
I was still waiting while some people decided to keep walking a few blocks to find other options. I also evaluated the possibilities, but walking a little further west did not make much sense, walking to the south did not know where it would take me, I came walking from the north and the east was not an option … conclusion: I had to stay where I was or at least to take a transport to get close to the center of the city because maybe, and just maybe, my transportation possibilities could increase and thus reach my home.
I had to go home, only that I thought. I needed this to happen before night fell. I looked at the floor, looked up at the top of the trees, looked at the buildings, then looked back at the passing cars. At that time I thought how good it would be to have a car, but then I thought about the cost of changing the oil, of the tires and stop counting… it is very difficult to maintain a car in this country.
Oh this country… a country where you can not mobilize because there is no public transport, where you see that it has become common to turn to trucks that make urban transport in the main cities of the country. The perfect picture of how you can treat people as animals and having their consent, but is that the situation has pushed citizens to resort to all possible options to get to their jobs or homes. Of course, all this sketches a very sad picture that we should never have reached, but we reached it…
I began to ask myself why I left home, and I remembered that I went to look for a medicine that can not be obtained or that the seller asks for millions for it, and that incidentally it has been expired months ago. Of course this is not a problem because it became habitual to take expired medicines, or medicines that are made for animals. That’s why I left home, I left the shelter where I feel calm, I left because it was also a donation and you have to be a little grateful, right?
I look in the distance and a bus approaches, it would not take me to the house but it would bring me closer to where I am going. I walk to the edge of the sidewalk and other people do the same. The bus stops and I realize that it is full, a couple of people did climb up to the door (this is absolutely dangerous, but when you need to go home you climb up and hold on tight to keep from falling off the bus).
I could not climb and I knew it, but in front of me was that old woman who had called me so much attention a few minutes before, she was struggling to climb while the bus driver’s assistant told her that she would not fit, that she could not climb. That’s when she started screaming to be allowed to go up:
– FOR THE LOVE OF GOD!
The bus driver’s assistant tells her to try the back door, she runs but they do not allow her to climb either. She shouts again:
– FOR THE LOVE OF GOD! FOR THE LOVE OF GOD!
And she started hitting the bus while she kept yelling. I was absolutely scared because the bus started to move. I said to myself:
– For God’s sake, she’s going to fall down and the bus roll the back wheels over her!
Yes, I thought the worst. It did not happen, the bus left at that moment but she kept saying between sobs:
– For the love of God… Oh oh!
My God, I did not know what to do. In automatic I started to walk back to the stop, I was in shock, and the old woman was crying inconsolably while clinging to a tree.
– Oh oh! Oh oh! For the love of God…
The old woman with difficulty walked back to the stop, cried inconsolably, took out a handkerchief and wiped her tears with it. All her sorrows, all her frustrations and all her problems exploded at that moment. I understood it, it was not just about losing the bus, it was the accumulation of all the bad things you see every day. People asked her what she had, she between sobs and with difficulty said that she had so many problems, problems in her house, transportation problems, even money problems because she did not even have to pay for the bus.
My God, everything turned inside me. In my pocket I barely have cash to pay for my own passage, what could I do? And as this is the country of the unimaginable, the ATM exist but do not have money. You can have money in your bank account, but in your hands you will not have cash and you need it to be able to mobilize in the city… where you look there is a problem: there is no transportation, there is no cash, everything is expensive or extremely expensive, there are no medicines or are extremely expensive …
I wanted to start crying, I had a lump in my throat, I did not know where to look to focus on something else and stop thinking. The country falls apart while an old woman and the rest shout: “For the love of God!” A scream that drowns and is lost among so many problems, among so many different realities, because there will always be someone in worse condition than one.
I still wanted to cry, I took a deep breath. I looked back to where the old lady was and some people helped her, they gave her money to pay for her passage. I thought:
– There are so many good people who are helping in silence, like those people, and you never realize it. Is that the bad always makes more noise …
I looked and there was a bus that could take me downtown, I went up and the last thing I knew was that the old woman was sitting at the stop. I hope she were able to get home quickly. I got to my home just before dusk and I thanked God for that.
That day I could not do anything for that old woman, not always one can help, but I will continue to do my bit when I can because there are many people out there suffering and having a hard time. It is not that one does not suffer, but out there there are people in worse condition than one. If one can do something that relieves another’s burden, even a little, it must be done… it is worth doing.
Fedora