There is a change a comin’ in bustling Buenos Aires. The days are a little shorter, the air a little crisper, the wind a refreshing coolness on the cheeks. It’s Autumn. And wow, it’s beautiful.
Spanish classes run every weekday from 5.30 to 7.30 PM. It’s a 40 minute walk to class from our flat and I do the entire roundtrip on foot. I trek the equivalent of about 3.5 km each way and I love it. The walk home in the evening has got to be one of my favourite moments of the day.
Tonight, the sun is a blazing pink and orange, the city is mad with traffic. Streets are packed with pedestrians clamoring up from the subways or rushing home from work. Dogs are barking, kids are being rushed between after-school programs and home, restaurants are lighting candles, shop vendors are sweeping sidewalks. There is a warm aroma of food roasting in the air.
At dusk, this city comes to life. 9 million people rushing to the heartbeat of another new evening, another ended day. At dusk, work is swept aside to make way for family, for food, for friends.
It is absolutely breathtaking.
Crazy big cities have always done this to me. New York, Cairo, London, Shanghai. I’ve come to love the chaos, the sheer volume of people, the colours and the sounds. Somehow amidst the anarchy, I find peace. I feel small, insignificant, humbled. I feel a rhythm outside myself, a heartbeat, a drum. There is so much life!
A young beggar, a suited business-man, a fruit vendor on the corner. No matter who they are and what they do, we are all a part of this crazy, jumbled mess of a metropolitan.
Stepping back to watch the movement, to feel the rush of bodies and somehow float above the chaos and hear silence – it is an amazing feeling. Everything somehow becomes one. The colours blur. The sirens, the honking, the barking of dogs. The traffic, the breeze and the gorgeous blazing sunset that no one seems to notice. Everything becomes a rhythmic mess. So beautiful.
Presence.
