Hello friends. My name is Pablo and I live in a small kneepit deep in the jungles of Chiapas. Here you I make the stories happy and sad and some other places inbetween. I hope you like! Welcome here in my kneepit!

Monday, August 27, 2007

Visitor


One night on my journey I was sitting under the stars drinking the last of my food - some nice cold potato soup - when I hear this noises coming from the trees ahead. It was like a lady whispering in my ear some words I could not quite hear. It make the hair on my moustache tickle like when the fairy spiders come for their dance parties - and it make Pablo blow the big noisy nose trumpet so loud the jungle go very quiet.


After this I am hearing some footsteps and in the dark I can see some tall thin old lady wearing big dark dress. She stop just far enough away so I cannot see the face.


So I call to the old lady - ask if she would like to share some soup (even though it is my last). thinking she must be very hungry and tired here in the middle of no place. The lady say thank you and drink the soup - all the time her head turned away from me.


I ask her where she is coming from, and she says she is from the small village called Guanjanito (or something like) and is looking for her granddaughter who got very scared when the bad men came and ran away into the jungle and must have got lost someplace.


So I ask her if she want some help - maybe we can look together?


But no, the lady say that is not needed. She prefer to travel alone. Besides, it is the strangers which scare her away, so if she see another she does not know, she will maybe run even further away.


Now I am feeling bad, and say sorry but I am just passing through, I too am looking for someone I love.


"I know", said the old lady, "that is how I knew I could come and sit with you. Do not worry about the child. She will come back, they all come home in the end".


So I give her some of my gunannybanny juice - saying the child will be needing this more than me - and wish her well. The old lady she take the juice - say thank you - and then she was gone, her green dress disappearing into the jungle like how it came.


Her story make Pablo feel very sad, but Pablo happy at least can be of some help (even if he have no guannybanny juice left now!)


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In the night I have some big strange dream of a green and red bird who come find Pablo in the hot jungle, dying of thirst and who carry me over the mountain and towards the big blue water, towards my mama...


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Some days later I find myself some miles north away, when I meet some kind local farmer who give me some of their water and tacos, and let me sleep with their cow.
I ask them about the village the woman come from. The old one he says "yes, this was just a few miles away south of here."
Then he tell me some spooky story about this village.
"The indians they were very proud people, who lived in these parts for longer than the trees can remember. One year was terrible disaster. They have little food because of the bad storms which wash away their crops. Then the new government ask them for even more money so when they could not pay, they send in the troops to teach them a lesson, to show the other villages they must also pay for protection.
"So there was some fight, more guns came, and then the whole village was burnt to the ground and many peoples they just disappeared - men, women and children. Nobody know if they were killed or if they run away to the cities, like the president he said. All we know is that was many years ago, but also it is like yesterday.
"Where the village was is nothing now but birds, trees and their secrets".




Adios amigos!

3 comments:

ElizT said...

My heart and my last kumera is with Pablo; may his tears turn to diamonds and his toenails to gold leaf.

ElizT said...

He are a good writer as well.

Heartful said...

Pablo, you are one good storyteller. Good luck on your journey!!