TE19 Iberian Adventure

Three Stories Gabi Csutak Translated from Hungarian by Anna Bentley

Beyond the Bridge The school where they were holding the geography competitionwas in the other half of the city, the part I had never been to. We lived in the old part of the city where, apart from the church, the hotel and a few tenement buildings, there were just detached houses with gardens. The only time we saw the rows of blocks of flats on the other side of the river was in summer, when we went down to the riverbank to play. It was by those inaccessible giants that we measured time, though. When we saw the first windows light up there, we knew it was time to go home. The shore on the other side was much wider and there were always crowds of noisy children in the water. They were wild and strong, they didn’t go home for their dinner and they never went to sleep. The night before the competition I could hardly get to sleep either. When I finally dropped off, I dreamt about the birds again. I used to have two zebra finches. But one day I got home later than I had promised I would, and, as a punishment, Dad let themout of the window. Afterwards, I often dreamt that they had come back. They would fly

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