The days of mandatory social isolation were passing, back in March 2020, as a consequence of the Covid-19 pandemic. From the bars of my balcony I could see how loneliness, fear and uncertainty wandered through the streets of Buenos Aires. The air walked free and tenebrous along the sidewalks of the great city, while thousands of people watched from their windows. One day, from the bars of my balcony, I saw a man reading a book on the street. I wondered what he was reading, why he did it, and how he experienced the pandemic down there. I immediately argued with my parents to be able to go down. I took some cookies, I put on my mask, I crossed the sidewalk and met Valery, although in the neighborhood they called him “Russian.” He was born and raised in Ukraine. In 2001 he arrived with his mother to Argentina, with whom he soon became estranged due to alcohol addiction problems. The “Russian” is a great lover of literature, every time I came across him, a new book dangled in his hands. It was his way of passing time by, of surviving, of forgetting for a while what his reality was.

This work was made with a cell phone.