Pedro On The Road

– Hello my friend – I read on my computer screen that afternoon in September. I was in a coffee shop in Ulan Bator, sipping a black tea, my mouth slightly open as my eyes understood how gorgeous Mongolian women were – I need your help... I need 100 dollars…

«I will be your friend» were the first words he told me a few months earlier, in Laos. The small room we were in had two windows and a door, all of which blocked with wood, a broken toilet in the corner and nothing other than 21 people inside, me being the only foreigner. The room we were in was a prison cell, where I had been dragged to after being hunted by greedy policemen the previous night.

Li had time for me in what was the worst experience of my LIFE. He gave me hope when I was desperate, he gave me his only spare swim shorts when I woke up soaked in the urine that flooded my corner. Most of all he gave me his smile and told me everything would be alright. It was alright – I got out after two nights and he stayed in for another two weeks.

It´s a crazy technological century we live in. People in jail improvise pens, and they write their e-mail address on cigarette packs, which you hide when you are released. And then you stay in touch. And then your friend asks for 100 dollars because his father died in Thailand and he doesn´t have the money to pay for the body to be shipped back.

After so much time on the road, after thousands of kilometers hitchhiking, after being hosted by locals over 100 times, I knew this was it – this was my opportunity to give back. My cynicism didn´t allow me to do it blindly, though. I contacted another Laotian friend who met Li and made sure his story was true. This friend, himself kind enough to trust me, gave him the money on my behalf.

And so, if on the one hand my heart sunk for the tragedy that had touched Li, my soul sadly smiled at my own self, knowing that when the time came, I was of importance to someone I might never see again.