It is a sad evening of the night in Barcelona, the day is already ending and it can not be more melancholic, and with that few drops of rain it could be that it really was a very sad night. I'm thinking about the streets of Barcelona, while I listen to my songs also sadder than the night but they are my style and suddenly my phone rings: it's my favorite cousin, what happiness! We talked for a while and we needed to go and look for a coffee, eat at the end and get up to speed: to let off steam, talk, talk about life, the country, etc.
I am driving through the city and observing the surroundings and its appearance in the happy streets, shops, businesses are mostly closed and people are hurried walking to catch the bus to return to their homes; Night is coming and with it its dangers. I arrived at a family house and decided to go to a dairy cafe that we love a lot. We arrived and when I'm about to park I'm not in the dark, in the dark: there's no electricity. My cousin exclaims with an ironic tone: What a novelty! I look outside and look at her and sigh.
I turn the street to leave and we decided to go to another place in which she used to work and prepare rich cappuccinos. It's late at night but thank God and I stop raining, in a short time the streets were lonely and desolate. There are no people that walk, only that they circulate by an engine and some congestion due to a cause of the traffic lights do not work. There is no lighting through which I fall into camouflaged traps without being able to avoid it, I ask lost in my poor spark "parapateado"
We arrived at the café in a dairy area, near hay restaurants, ice cream parlors, this yogurland. These sites used to be crowded and pleasant places, since they have tables outside. However, currently the scene is really depressing: some closed places, to be Thursday night, there is no one on the street and waiters are seen, faces to others.
We sit at one of the tables inside the place, since it is really dangerous outside. When we are about to order the coffees, the light is gone, among the murmurs they heard: Ha! How strange, others sighed like me and the owners said "this can not be worse".
We go out again to drive in search of a coffee, while we observe several employees sitting checking their cell phones with sleep, waiting for the light to return, or for the hours to return home; I think that's how all Venezuelans are, seeing each other's faces disoriented, seeing how life is happening around us, or hoping that something really comes to us urgently.
We stop at an ice cream parlor three blocks down from the cafe where the light went unforeseen "really in Venezuela is not like that". The specialty here is not coffee but Gelatos, however, and after so many laps I do not care. When we entered and if there was light the cashier looked at us and apologizing he told us they did not have coffee and it was like this for two weeks. I begin to despair and to lose the little patience that is in me. My cousin exclaims "God, I just want to have a coffee and smoke a cigarette. Is it too much to ask?" I looked directly at her and told her that in Venezuela yes.
We went to one last place in perhaps the most decent places, there was electricity and coffee there, but there were no tables and the line to pay was obscenely long. I ask my cousin to apologize and she tells me to calm down, it's not my fault. Already at this point I am very mentally exhausted and I think about leaving her at home. It's almost 9 o'clock at night and the dangers await in a Barcelona that was once a very warm and beautiful city.
We ended up taking the so-and-so coffee at a bakery that I do not like very much, but worse is nothing. There is almost no one and there are improvised handmade signs that say: THERE IS NO BREAD.
I rarely drink coffee. I am one of those who usually take it but this time I asked for it strong, very black and a lot of sugar. My cousin was smoked in less than half an hour 4 cigarettes for anxiety. We talked about life, problems, and about the country: at least we were able to vent and forget everything at least for a while and felt a country that she longs for nostalgia and which I never knew: I was only 6 years old when "The Revolution" came to power.
We said goodbye after a while, we hugged and left at home. The "evening" ended and while driving back to my house I think and reflect on what happened tonight, the odyssey to have a coffee. Later more finding a place than the time you savor it and enjoy it.
That same night, electric rationing takes place in my house at 12:00 a.m. at 04:00 a.m. but I forgot. When I arrive, I check Instagram and twitter to catch up and everything I read is bad news. I decide to forget about that and put myself on my laptop to watch a movie and halfway through it the most interesting is the light. Immediately heat and mosquitoes are present. I sigh again tired of all this and I say softly to myself: this is not life ... At 20 minutes I fall asleep in the shadows.
