Barrio Gotico

School trips are never as nice as you expect them to be. You’re sent to bed hours before you want to sleep and are woken up indescribably early the next morning. Museum after museum and tour after tour, the day’s journey seems endless. It’s hot and you’re tired and you just want to find a pool or an ocean to dive into or suntan by.

Only an hour for lunch!?! How are you supposed to eat, shop and take pictures in that space of time? It already takes a good fifteen minutes before you and your friends can agree on a little Spanish café at the edge of the Barrio Gotico. Stupidly, a bunch of you order pizza, which takes an eternity to get to the table, during which you have already downed two lukewarm, overpriced Cokes apiece. The café is just as beastly warm as it is outside. One small fan rattles in the corner, attempting to cool the room and unsurprisingly failing to do so (mainly because the very large barman is standing right in front of it, giving you strange looks).

The food finally arrives and you realise the friend you made fun of for ordering a cold salad probably made the right decision. Hot wafts of steam wash over your face and hands as you stare down at the square pizza in front of you; but with the rising heat, the scent of pizza spices reaches your nose, reminding you just how hungry you are.

Twenty minutes later, you and your friends leave the café and head back to the prearranged meeting place to continue the afternoon’s activities. Your stomach no longer growling and your thirst is satisfied with the large bottle of water purchased at a local supermarket for a fourth of the price of the Cokes you’d had at lunch. However, the sun still beats down on you mercilessly and your feet are starting to hurt again from all the walking.

The tour starts up again and squinting your eyes in the bright sunlight, you don your sunglasses and begrudgingly follow the sound of your teacher’s voice. The group walks a few meters further into the Barrio Gotico and you’re already beginning to feel the heat. The once cold water in your bottle is beginning to grow warm and there’s only so much the cheap fan you bought in the tourist shop can do to cool you down. You’re dying for a shower, or even some air conditioning would do.

“I’m boiling!” you mutter to your best friend.

“I’m tired,” she replies, “and my feet hurt!”

“I’m bored! Why can’t we go do something interesting?” adds someone else, thinking of the beach promised for later in the afternoon.

“Por favor?”

Another voice reaches your ears and you turn to look at its owner. An older woman stands off to the side of your group with her hand extended. A small baby is wrapped up and hanging in a makeshift harness on her hip. The woman has no water and her clothes are little more than rags. You can see the pleading in her eyes, but the group’s momentum pushes you forward and you walk on.

Further into the Barrio Gotico you find yourself walking down a street lined with people. Men and women are seated on mats and blankets along the brick walls with cups or hats placed in front of them. You’ve never seen such destitution in your life. Some, like the old woman who spoke to you, are asking for money. Others lean silently against the wall, eyes closed against the harsh June sun. Some are missing arms, others legs. One is lying asleep beside his cup. You push your sunglasses back up the bridge of your nose and fidget in your trendy shoes, feeling suddenly selfish.

The man at the end of the street is the one who will always remain in your mind. He is old and thin and clad in a scruffy pair of trousers and worn shoes. His right hand is missing, his arm ending in uneven bumps. Burn scars cover the majority of his torso and the side of his face which isn’t sunburnt. You reach for your purse to give this man some money and one of your teachers steps between you and the man.

“They’re all fakes, don’t give him any money,” your teacher says in a voice which says she knows best.

“How do you know?” asks one of your friends. You were just about to ask the same question.

“Oh, I just know,” your teacher replies, taking a drink from her large water bottle and marching off back towards the front of the group.

You and your friends look at each other as you pull a few coins out of your purse and drop them into the man’s cup. He says something to you in Spanish which you don’t quite understand, but the look in his eyes is thanks enough. Taking one last look at the line of beggars as your group turns the corner, you know won’t be complaining about anything for a good while.