Alfredo

He sells every herb. And coca. The sacred leaf of the Aymara and the Quechua people. The illegal substance that numbs or runs the angry and empty people. Alfredo has been in Buenos Aires for two years and has mastered the Argentinean accent. It’s a matter of survival. Racism kills. Damn. Can he live?

Pigeons in Buenos Aires

Across from the window I work it there is a concrete ledge. Two pigeons chill there. Today, one lay down, putting its feet underneath its belly and its head along the ledge. The other walks over and began to nestle her head into his neck. It seemed she was using her beak to clean him off or give him a little massage. Maybe he needed a couple seconds on the shoulders to chill him out after all that poking his head around so intensely. I wonder why humans don’t feel comfortable to give massages in public? And why do we think we are so much more important that pigeons? And why these pigeons are getting so close to this open window I’m standing in and why it’s freaking me out? I wanna learn to fly.

Besitos

The streets of this hood are mud and clay. People have the dirt on their hands. Workers. Barrio Roberto Carillo is on the outskirts of Buenos Aires. It’s sunny and this hood has me finally feeling at home. We’re walking the streets. Around the corner comes the toughest looking dude we’ve seen so far, all pierced up, tatted out and dressed in black walking toward us with the stare of an executioner. When he is a few feet away he sings out the name of the old neighborhood futbol coach we are walking with and grill turns to grin. They greet with a kiss. Then I go to give him a point and he brings it in for the real thing… Kissed by a thug in the middle of the street. Totally normal here in Argentina. Alright, I’m cool. Keeping it moving...

-TOGETHER IN THE DARK-

Leaving home in the frigid darkness of 5am reminds me of the shelter. I take a moment to picture the breakfast table of brothers in the South Bronx. They are there. Starting from zero, looking for work and for an apartment. Looking to escape the system that steps hard on their chest with every application refused, every program filled up or insufficient, every job that leads to nothing but unstable survival. So many of them have heart problems. Many that Lincoln hospital will never fix. They are there, I think. And I am here.

Parks full of Possibilities

In the park here in Buenos Aires youth speak. They sit and drink mate and talk. Others skateboard, some read and some play futbol. They are together. It’s peaceful. I am overwhelmed with gratitude to be here, to love here… I wander the streets and wonder about the peaks and valley’s of people’s lives in this costal city farther south than I’ve ever been… I listen to the people, watch the humanness of their expression.

This is a Latin American city, even though it has architecture like Paris’ town halls and Italian names like Avenida Alberdi or Villa Crespo, but its Latino for sure. So it already feels like home. Dogs bark, drums play, three friends sitting next to me are laughing. The whole plaza feels like they are dancing in honor of expression itself, celebrating the perseverance of music, giving thanks for the benevolence of the sun. Actually, they’re just chilling like any people in any park anywhere... But it’s my first day far from home and I’m as open to inspiration as the cloudless sky above my head. Why not?

HOMES

Brazilian Airlines scoop me right out of my city and toss me to Rio, then drop me in Buenos Aires at 2am. Adrian drives his old little taxi slowly into the sleeping city, he talks about futbol as my mind travels back to this country’s Dirty War when these doors were kicked in and young activists like us were stolen out their beds, tortured, murdered and disappeared. ‘Every player wants to go to Europe’ Adrian explains. ‘Como no, I’m sure they do, I reply. The country has gone through an economic crisis in recent years but my friend says, ‘things are ok.... not good, not bad.’ We pass Parque Lezama and pull up outside Uspallata 489 where I will be calling home for the next few months. I think I’ve gotten good at making homes. I get out the car, step into the middle of the empty street and call up to the third floor: “Princesa!” She puts her head out the window and smiles. Home. The morning comes, the sun rises on a cold and crowded city where the ghosts of 30,000 people disappeared whisper dreams of revolutions, demands of rebellion and the simple human desire to at least be remembered. I can hear them sing.

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