Rubem Alves, o professor de espantos

Samba da bênção

"A vida é a arte do encontro embora haja tanto desencontro pela vida..."

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Walking through a promenade in a nameless city. In the background, some music made the atmosphere a bit more bearable. It was neither a dream nor an ideal world. It seemed quite real. Different languages were spoken simultaneously. Each citizen, apparently, had their own ‘’tradition’’, something they could be proud of.

Out of the blue, a Brazilian restaurant could be seen. This is a common territory, thought the noble gentleman. What he didn’t know was: it is a big illusion to believe people from the same country would be more understanding. Speaking the same language doesn’t say much.

Olá!, said the gentleman. Wait a second, dear reader. The storyteller needed to pause in order to get a drink…

As the narrator was saying, the gentleman popped into the Brazilian restaurant with some hopes. Could the staff really understand the main character? Could he understand himself…?

Questions bring about conflict, but sometimes it is necessary to bear in mind things aren’t always as they seem to be. Knowing we are becoming - as the years go by - strangers with ourselves, that our auto-biography has become something quite standard as experiences have turned into a meaningless subject, what does it mean to be a genius?

Friendship is something rare. Nowadays, friends are something like saints: either they don’t exist or they are holy. I would rather stick to the latter statement.

What happened in the Brazilian restaurant?, you might be wondering. The guy pretended to be another foreigner, asked for a feijoada and kept his hopes to himself and went silent. At the end of the day, who cares if the sun shines or if it doesn’t?