used to such high temperatures for this time of year, and we found it difficult to find water fountains to drink.
And those we found we were not sure they had water that was safe to drink, even though people drank from them without any concern. We, out of prudence, preferred only to refresh our hands and head, for a fountain that had been operating for so many hundreds of years could not be as clean as we wanted.
Perhaps it was the contrast, but those people seemed quite unassuming to us, away from the big cities filled with the smoke of nearby factories, to which we were used by now. On the other hand, probably they thought the same about us, when they realized we were amazed at things they saw on a daily basis.
We liked so much what we saw, that some of my classmates started to draw what they saw in their notebooks, so as not to forget anything, sketching silhouettes, more or less well rendered, of the most significant and important buildings. On the other hand, others seemed to be more at ease writing, and they stopped on every street attempting to describe in a few paragraphs the wonders we were seeing. Only of a few of our colleagues were taking pictures with their cameras.
Incidentally, I do not know how they could pass the cameras through customs. Before leaving, we received very detailed instructions to take no technology out the country. Probably when they dropped the name of their parents, that weighed more than any written rule.
So, occasionally they asked us to stop to take pictures of the whole group with one of those buildings in the back.
Maybe as far as travelling I was not as expert as others, because I had only brought my notebook, where I intended to collect every day what was most remarkable, without trying to capture in those few lines the admiration that the city produced on me at every turn.
One of the aspects I found most curious, in contrast with what I knew, was the way women dressed. Older ones used a black scarf or handkerchief on their heads and they dressed in black. Younger ones dressed with discreet colors but sported scarves of striking colors.
I was used to see women in my country with make-up, large flight skirts, and short sleeves showing their arms, and only some of them wearing a scarf as a decorative detail.
It also seemed to me there was a clear difference between the sexes as to what they could or could not do. That way the men strutted down the streets with clothes that looked were their best galas, except those at work that wore a simple shirt because of the prevailing heat. Now, in an attitude somewhat funny for us, men seemed to be the ones in charge, whereas women, in a modest and shy way, seemed to try to be totally unnoticed, as if they had nothing to prove or to contribute.
That seemed quite surprising to me, it was as if everyone had become stuck in time. The way they dressed, I mean, because I do not think there was a religious reason, as it happens with the Quakers, a community that had isolated themselves from the rest of the world, keeping their culture and not wanting to progress, showing this in the way they dressed, not very different from what we were seeing now.
Well, those were my impressions at the time. Later on I would be able to understand that culture. It was all the result of my inexperience, since as my classmates that had traveled in Europe told me, on each country there were totally different traditions and dressing codes.
Even the way men and women treated each other was quite different depending on the country where one went. They told me about the liveliness of French women, who exhibited their charm without much modesty, so they did not wait the man to go after them, but they chose the one they found most gracious.
Even in places with a common culture and language as ours, they still seemed to keep rather peculiar traditions. That way, unlike what it happened in our country for some time, women there had not managed to have enough level of economic and political independence. This even happened in England, where the first movements to obtain voting rights for women started. That is, that women could vote to choose their representatives and thereby had a recognized series of rights equal to men. Apart from the political considerations, however, many women still did not work, except in minor areas or at home.
Those comparisons kept astonishing me, perhaps this part of the world was evolving more slowly than I thought.
At least in my country there was an important effort to share its culture with the rest, and we had integrated in our society those migrants who had recently come from all countries of Europe, political refugees, immigrants, or just relatives, which that way were reunited.
Quite a few had come fleeing political systems they did not accept, others looking for better living conditions and job opportunities. All of them had been welcomed, regardless of sex, race or religion.
Before long, they embraced the culture of the country without losing their own, so it was difficult to differentiate them at schools or at their jobs.
Perhaps what was most noticeable was the color of their skin or some of their features, but since there were already so many who had been in the country for generations, this was no sign of any special condition.
What they did keep as a sign of their identity were their practices and ceremonies, like when they were getting married or when they said goodbye to loved ones who had passed away. I had gone to their funerals more than once, first out of curiosity, and later out of friendship.
CHAPTER 2. THE FIRST SURPRISE
We walked through those ancient streets, many of them cobbled, for what it was supposed to be a short visit, but there were endless and countless tourist sights, at least that is how they looked to the rest of the group, who got excited every time we turned a corner and discovered an outstanding old building.
To me, so many visits to historic buildings seemed endless, so I was a little exhausted and tired, perhaps because I had been walking all morning from one place to another. Maybe it was due to the heat and the change of hour, because it was still night in my country and here it was close to noon, or maybe because I had not had enough sleep because of our failed exploration of the city’s nightlife. Maybe it was a combination of both.
Besides, everything we saw had been here for hundreds of years, and for sure it would remain like that for many more.
That is why I did not understand the need of the rest of the group to go to every single place that seemed remarkable to them, documenting it with photographs or in their notebooks, as if they were the first discoverers of some ancient ruins.
I sat by a stone fountain, in the middle of a square, waiting for my classmates to leave a church they were in. I was absent-minded, looking at the bottom of a pond formed by the water falling from the fountain, when a little girl approached me.
By how tall she was, I do not think she was more than six or seven. She had a white dress and a yellow scarf on her head, and with a broad smile she offered me a flower of great white petals.
After receiving that precious and delicate object in my hands, and not knowing the reason for that gift, I wanted to pay her, taking some coins out of my wallet and showing them to her so she would receive them. However, she shook her head, told me something that I did not understand, and raising her right hand as a goodbye gesture, turned and ran away.
I did not know what to do with that little wonder, and I put it on my lapel. In other occasions I would not have done it, since I knew flowers as a decoration were only used at weddings or other social events, and that they were more an ornament for women.
When I looked up after placing the flower, I saw the girl walking away through one of the many alleys that led to this square. Sincerely I was somewhat disoriented with this rather chaotic urban distribution. I was used to big cities, where from the main streets, of larger size, parted the rest of the smaller secondary streets. However, here the size of the road was not an indication of anything, since from any of them could emerge another and later another one of different size, and of these other new avenues and roads.
In addition to that, the few indications that had the names of the places where we went were written in that strange language, which despite sharing a similar alphabet was quite enigmatic to me.
Perhaps if I had paid a little more attention to the classes of ancient languages, during which my teacher wasted so much effort trying