Road MS 352

The heavy sun of summer was burning in the silvery bodywork. I could breathe the smell of melted wheels. The sharp light was all over around. And if you were in my shoes, you would see the reflections printed in the windows of a bus, and in its polished tin, reflecting in a mixture of white and some capital letters in red, fading out through a frontage’s wall: TERMINAL DO OESTE (West Terminal). And if you turned your head, you would see two street signs, in the same post, which said: Baron of Rio Branco St. and Vasconcellos Fernandes St. This place was the beginning of my journey through the entrance of the Pantanal’s Gate, the city of Campo Grande. And there I was. Standing on the corner, observing the driver and other employees occupied in cleaning the old and rusty and noisy TRANSMEQUI: a tiny can of burned oil. Destination: Ponte do Grego, near to the Aquidauana River. It’s curious that I have come to find out that the river’s name refers to a very common disease from the settlers’ time; a boy, with a straw hat, who came supposedly to shine my shoes, told me that Aquidauna means Here you get fever! After that, he disappeared, as well as 50 reais, a considerable amount of money in Brazilian currency. Well, there I had fever! My father always told me that buses stations are dangerous places. The Terminal do Oeste was an old building, with thick walls covered with stains of dusty fat, soot and cobwebs. It was broad, with an entire gallery of stores immersed in the darkness. Such stores sell a variety of things: shoes, used clothing, equipment for riding, birds, animals, hammocks; and there were the restaurants, and yes, there were the bars, crowded with bearded men, wearing striped shirts, shouting and laughing about everything. I walked all around that place for about an hour; the boyish fear of losing the school bus had made me arrive too early. Then there came the engine’s gurgling. The old TRANSMEQUI was travelling softly on the road. I opened the window and soaked my lungs with the horizon of green fields. The driver stopped in Terenos, a city before Aquidauana. He rose and said aloud: Five minutes! The stopping point consisted in a small bar, with more man and more beard than before. I went to the bathroom, peed, and when I came back, TRANSMEQUI was gone. Damn childish fear, I was late again! I run until the corner and saw it kicking up dust, its wheels in fury, lashing the gravel. So, I looked to the fields, breathed, and made fifty miles on foot.