The most amazing thing just happened. No, really, amazing - but before I can tell you about you need to know a few things:
1) I take a taxi to and from school everyday. It’s not exactly cheap – maybe three dollars [MXN$32] each way – but there isn’t any public transportation that goes directly from my neighborhood to EGADE or even remotely close, so I generally just ignore my skinflint tendencies and go for it. It helps that Monterrey, as a city of some 3.5 million people, has more than enough taxis to go around.* So common are they that in all the time I’ve been in Monterrey I have never had to call a taxi; no matter where I am, given five minutes or so I can almost undoubtedly grab one off the street. The unfortunately downside of this process is that even if I like a driver [not just their driving; I try to talk to all of them to improve my Spanish] I don’t expect to ever see him again.
2) Last week I lost my glasses case. That means I lost both my emergency pair and my clip-on sunglasses for the main pair. (I have had this case for almost two years and have only misplaced it once before because I am deathly afraid of the US$200+ replacement cost.) For three days I searched frantically, scouring both my apartment and EGADE from floor to ceiling to no avail. Eventually the sad truth became all too obvious: I must have left it in a taxi. It was the remaining possibility but a practically impossible one: even if I could figure out the right day I couldn’t for the life of me remember the name of the driver. So, flummoxed, I kind of gave up.
Until last night that is. On a whim I stayed late at EGADE; I didn’t have anything in particular to do but I wanted to head over to a party closer to campus than my house. Around nine I left campus and flagged down a taxi, as per usual. The driver and I didn’t talk very much until we’re about half-way to my friend’s place when suddenly he asks [in Spanish]:
“Hey, did you lose your glasses the other day?”**
I replied, incredulously, “yeah - how did you know?”
With a grin he said, "because I have them in my house.”
“No way!”
“It's true – they’re in a grey case, right?”
Well, to make a short story long, he was right and we exchanged numbers and names (his was Pacho, hence the title) and I agreed to call him the next day to make arrangements. So I did and, lo and behold, only a few short minutes ago I got my glasses back! Just when I thought I was getting lost in this faceless metropolis I discovered a brand new face – and a nice, smiling one at that!
* I’m not the only person ill-served by public transportation it would seem, and capitalism has worked to fill the void.
** Okay, in the interest of full disclosure it took me about two full minutes to realize that is what he asked, but I got there eventually. [Estoy un poco tonto.]
[Coda: Pacho, too, finds it incredible that we ran into each other again so quickly - I hailed him from two different spots at two different times on two different days – and is almost as incredulous as me.]
No comments:
Post a Comment