A BIG black Toyota Land Cruiser, racing by; there are a lot more of them than last time.
Young boy wearing only a pair of black shorts; no shoes, no food; picking his way down a rocky path.
A tall woman, beautiful, her skin a deep shining black, her long straight hair pulled back and tied with a string; almond eyes and a smile the Mona Lisa would understand.
A man of indeterminate age, wearing old grey slacks and a shirt that must once have been white, now stained with rain and urine and dust and dirt and the shreds of all his meals; his hair is so matted with dirt and the scabs of old scars that it is almost a helmet; his beard straggles down as he glides by, surprisingly graceful, on his bare, calloused feet.
Dust, dust everywhere, clouds raised by the street sweepers who are never going to get ahead of their task; dust in my nose, my eyes; coughing; fumbling out a handkerchief.
Black dog, skinny, shifty-looking, limps along, one leg stiffly held up beneath him.
People: all sizes, shapes, colors. I find their faces are written in a language I don't really understand. When they smile, does it mean they feel the same inside as I do when I smile? When they stare, flat-eyed and still, what are they seeing, what are their thoughts? It is foolish to assume that the messages I think I see are accurate. So much to know, to learn.
A stewardess from some airline, lovely, a little overweight, her uniform pristine and impeccable, a colorful scarf around her lovely neck; which of us is more out of place on this dusty sidewalk?
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