You Can't Miss It (standard:adventure, 3369 words)
Author: GXD	Added: Aug 23 2007	Views/Reads: 3345/2202	Story vote: 0.00 (0 votes)
When I went looking for a coffee-sack factory in the Dominican Republic it turned out to be a surrealistic quest

YOU  CAN'T  MISS  IT 

Frangipani blossoms littered the pile of reeking garbage beside me at
the bus stop.  A small crowd of people surged ahead of me, clambering 
into the bus and depositing their bundles here and there.  I grabbed a 
thin pole which bent under my weight, and hauled myself up beside them. 
 Too many people.  The engine chugged and churned, the gears clashed 
and whined but nothing moved.  A few people dropped out the back door 
and began to push.  Slowly, then faster, the bus gathered momentum near 
the curb and turned to blend with the stream of morning traffic.  
Several blocks later, it came to a stop at the semaphore.  I wondered 
how it would get going again, but when the light turned green, it 
seemed to have no trouble.  From somewhere on my right came the clatter 
of pneumatic hammers.  They were building new hotels, I heard someone 
say. 

After a long ride up the broad expressway, over the bridge, circling
around flowering glorietas (traffic circles), each adorned by a bronze 
stature of a dead hero, down the bumpy narrow streets of one 
neighborhood after another, to the dusty byways of the industrial 
district -- a very long ride indeed -- I got off the bus at the end of 
the line.  For the first time, I noticed that it was really painted 
white with on red stripe. 

Around me, this district had no salient features.  Ahead and to the left
were empty curbs stretching for blocks, with empty lots or piles of 
broken bricks on both sides.  Far in the distance, a blue ocean 
shimmered in the sun.  To my right were small blue houses with tan 
window frames.  Behind me stretched the bus-road, lined with more small 
houses, equally featureless.  A lone coconut palm grew across the 
street, its leafy head broken and dangling over. It was not very tall.  
Nobody was in sight.  Invisible insects hummed.  Somewhere, faintly, I 
heard the shattering of glass.  Beside me, the driver gunned his 
engine. 

"You going back?" he asked.  I shook my head "No".  An instant later,
the bus was gone.  Its dust settled very slowly in the still air.  
Somewhere around here, I had to find a textile mill that made coffee 
sacks. 

Two days ago, at the Ministry of Commerce, they had told me, "Take the
White-and-Red bus to the end of the line.  You can't miss it." 

After three weeks in Santo Domingo, I was getting pretty sharp at these
things, and wouldn't fall for that kind of advice any more.  No matter 
what kind of directions people gave me, I made a point of double and 
triple checking to be sure it wasn't a wild goose chase.  So my next 
stop was the Ministry of Transportation to confirm the bus line.  I 
called to the clerk who was watching television. 

"Do you operate a Red-and-White bus line?  Where does it go?"  She got
up and turned reluctantly in my direction, glancing back at the TV now 
and then to catch the dialog. 

"A red bus, you say?  That's line forty-four.  It goes to....." 

"No, no, no!  A red bus with white stripe.  Or maybe a white bus with a
red stripe" 

She cocked her head and looked puzzled.  Her eyes were very soft brown,
and she had dyed her hair brown, too.  One of her cheek bones was 
larger than the other, and her lips were aslant beneath a pug-nose.  
Beneath her faded purple chiffon dress, an ample brassiere traced the 
outline of two enormous breasts.  Like her cheekbones, one was larger 
than the other.  All the same, she was patient with me and very polite. 
 From the shelf behind her, she took down three large map-books, 
labeled "WEST", "NORTH" and "EAST".  (No buses went south, since Santo 
Domingo lies on the Southern coast of the island. Only ferries and 
steamers, fishing vessels and sailboats went in that direction.)  She 
turned page after page, volume after volume, finding nothing.  I 
waited.  Suddenly, she brightened up. 

"Here it is!  The White-and-Red.  It goes to Veintimilla West." 

That was precisely the bus I wanted, of course, but I had to be sure,


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