On the way home from work last Saturday I tore off contact info for an apartment ad that was pasted on the light post. Even though I knew that Justin signed a six-month lease when he moved into our room in May. Because that's how tend to operate - always on the lookout for something better. We tolerate the blah-bland color and high rent for the great location (he's a ten-minute walk to work, and we're central to wonderful neighborhoods, a couple harbours, Chinatown, and downtown) . . . and, I'm beginning to realize, for our wonderful housemates.
Late that Sunday morning we went to look at the apartment, which was one of hundreds in a renovated, 100-year-old wool storage building, and apart from the modest oven in the kitchen, and the pool I guess, less attractive than our current place. And in the back of my mind I felt a sadness that surprised me at the thought of leaving Carola and Javier.
The others are nice as well. But it's Carola and Javier who've we gotten closest to so far. On my second day in Sydney I woke up to her singing over breakfast, and knew we should be friends. I told her I liked her singing. She said she thinks singing makes her happy, and why not be happy?
Carola and Javier are a couple, and both here on Chilean government scholarships. She's studying social work, he - engineering. They've had to do English supplementing first, and that was a half-year of hell. They grumble about the English hurdle, and we can feel too that they are amazing people. She's sweet and caring and friendly, and passionate about the land and the politics of her home. She has spent hours showing us pictures from Patagonia, and groaning with real pain over the tragedy of the hydroelectric dams soon to be built there.
She comes from the southern part of Chile, and her family is in Argentina, which feels as much like hers as Chile does sometimes, because it's so close geographically. Still, people from skinny Chile envy fat Brazil and Argentina. Envy their economies and their futbol, and maybe their culture too. They and their friends party all the time, but they don't compare to Brazilians, she tells us.
One Friday night we all find ourselves drinking vodka in the kitchen with Carola, Javier, Luciano (another Chilean), and a couple of their classmates (Korean Jessie and Chinese Sharianne). We laugh and laugh, because Javier is clever and witty, but soon I start making rumblings about bed. Then the Chileans teach us a party song that involves thumping on the closest surface (it was cabinets and countertops for us) and singing "don't go, Holly, don't go." Very persuasive when a whole room of your friends is beating a please-stay rhythm with their hands and voices. Unfortunately I work at 6:00 on Saturday mornings, and that's the morning you don't want to show up late or slow . . . so it only pulled an extra half-an-hour or so from me.
One Friday night we all find ourselves drinking vodka in the kitchen with Carola, Javier, Luciano (another Chilean), and a couple of their classmates (Korean Jessie and Chinese Sharianne). We laugh and laugh, because Javier is clever and witty, but soon I start making rumblings about bed. Then the Chileans teach us a party song that involves thumping on the closest surface (it was cabinets and countertops for us) and singing "don't go, Holly, don't go." Very persuasive when a whole room of your friends is beating a please-stay rhythm with their hands and voices. Unfortunately I work at 6:00 on Saturday mornings, and that's the morning you don't want to show up late or slow . . . so it only pulled an extra half-an-hour or so from me.
No comments:
Post a Comment