The Symposium complete, we lingered in the school’s courtyard over lunch. I sat with a group of Americans, most physicians, but one the insurance company researcher. Between conversations about health care at the VA and in private industry, he shared stories of his work (the director of a large restaurant chain had called him to ask about older people and stairs and curbs. His answer: they don’t go well together, try ramps) and also suggestions for me as a younger researcher (self-driving vehicles). As the afternoon sun grew hot and the groups thinned, I took the opportunity to explore the grounds.
The north border of the courtyard was a tall stone wall. For days I had been teased by a small door, and I slipped through. There I was met by a stone courtyard (driveway?) and a small chapel. This chapel, I would later learn, had been in this spot in some form since the thirteenth century when an image of Our Lady of Funchal was observed on the site. The current incarnation, a white plaster exterior accented with grey stone (and an oddly placed clock) had been built and dedicated in the aftermath of the 1755 earthquake. The chapel bordered a street, and on the other side was a small park that allowed a view of the canyon and hillside beyond it. And also a gift – a young man, seated at the base of a cross, practicing his Portuguese raps.
Along the school’s southern border was a park. I had become curious about it our first morning while I had watched a woman, small and thin yet strong, with the dignity that many people who survived the Second World War all seem to have, walk her equally small, strong and equally arthritic smokey grey poodle around the fountain just beyond the fence. The two had been there the following days as well, their slow, short, proud steps a steady presence that provided a glimpse at life in and the rhythms of the neighborhood. Upon my return from the church, the symposium crowd had thinned considerably, and so I said my good-byes. On my way to the Metro station I took a detour through the park to take a look.
The park was a normal park, one you would find in any city. It was small-ish, one block wide and several blocks long, with a structured form of sidewalks (laid out with the symmetry of a formal garden), hedges (dark green and brown from the heat), with benches, lawns and play areas laid out along the sides. The paths were filled with locals, mostly older (the local school was still in session), ladies chatting as they walked, older couples and singles watching from the benches, gentlemen playing cards in the picnic area near he concession stands. The park was surrounded by apartment buildings, cement blocks twelve stories high, and these plus the trees created a nice shade.
Along the eastern border were a series of apartments, newer and slightly more stylish than the others, and I detoured off pavement to take a look. The ground floor, the other side of a narrow street, each side packed with cars, alternated empty garages and finished open space (possibly for studios and shops) with enclosed alcoves for reaching the apartments above. There were terrific views of the canyon and neighborhoods beyond, but it all looked a bit unkempt, as if people only passed through counting on a non-existent someone else to keep things up. I found the juxtaposition between the two, the old world of the park and the new world of the street, the manicured wealth of the school and the shabbiness of the neighborhood a bit jarring. I quickly grew tired, and made my way to the Metro station.
Dinner was an egg and croissant from the bus station’s automat (not for looking, I will spare you that tale of woe). As night fell I turned in, feeling restless, and tossed in my sleep for most of the night.