Trafika Europe 6 - Arabesque

the foreign daughter

my purse and found my train ticket. Then drama in the middle of the street, a fainting fit, demanding explanations, begging me not to leave. However, none of any of that happened. I went on as far as the Plaça Major and crossed over to Verdaguer. I gave the sand- free esplanade a cursory glance and briefly recalled how I used to wander between the market stalls every Saturday there was. Every Saturday in term-time, every Tuesday and Saturday if it was the holidays. The strident cries of the stall- holders, the changing colours of the garments they sell, the general chaos. That was why I was so intent on carving an orderly path through the market, zig-zagging down the alleyways, so keen not to miss a thing. But now I’m past Jacint

Verdaguer and can’t avoid feeling the resentment of the poor as I walk by the houses of the rich, or the people who seem to be so when compared to our limited economic means. Resentment and fascination for the different lives of my secondary school companions, the ones who wear designer jeans and sport hairstyles that keep pace with fashion, who go skiing in winter, have foreign holidays in summer, whose parents pay for their weekend outings, driving licences and who only have to do one thing: study. Why are you so surprised? That’s normal life, yours is the one which doesn’t fit, you are the intruder. You are the one whose mother cleans their houses, and is lucky to do that, because someone allows her into her house with that parting in the middle of her

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