Under my house, in Botafogo, I have a peddler. I call it “the tiny shop”. On the sidewalk. Every day at dawn, it appears, slowly, orderly, somehow clean.
You never know what you can find there, from the window I see only the big things. One day a refrigerator, another day a television, then a sofa, an armchair that seems comfortable indeed.
Then I go downstairs and I understand that the shop is not at all random, in its organization. There is everything. A pair of used shoes, there may be a book, sometimes glasses. Ancient dishes. But never dresses.
All arranged according to an order, inscrutable but certainly not accidental. And then late at night, in the dark, the shop slowly disappears, and goes to sleep in the truck parked nearby.
I like the owner. He is a taciturn gentleman, who speaks with gestures, serious but not surly.
The shop has been slowly getting out of the truck for twenty years, settled on the pavement, and in the evening returned to the truck to rest (perhaps with its owner, who knows).
And after about ten years, having earned a “good morning” from the owner, with a greeting of the hand and a whispered “good morning”, makes me feel, at least a little, carioca.
