September 2012. First time in Europe. England, the birthplace of indie. One night in London, I had one of the most memorable moments of my life. I was coming back from an indie party I had found on Facebook. Public transport in London is amazing, but to get back to my hotel I needed to take two buses. Instead, I decided to take just one and walk the rest of the way —about 4 km. It was 3 a.m. From that moment on, I was never the same.
I vividly remember those 40 minutes on foot. A kind of freedom I had rarely experienced. A euphoric state. On top of the world. I was 21, and “I’ve never been this far away from home,” as Kaiser Chiefs sing. Ten thousand kilometers away from everything that had been my life up until then, with adolescence still knocking at my door. And there I was, walking alone through the streets of London at 3 a.m.
The internet and smartphones weren’t that advanced at the time, so I had to memorize the map in my head, noting the streets I needed to turn on. Those few seconds of hesitation —Am I lost?— only to be followed by the joy of finding my way again. We were happier before technology.
Many readers of this newsletter aren’t Brazilian, so this deserves some explanation. Walking at night in Brazil is, in many cases, a risk. Even more so in the early hours of the morning. Of course, in busier areas, there’s more security. But doing what I did —walking for miles through quieter neighborhoods— is very rare and dangerous. That’s why I was so amazed.
Being a man helps when it comes to walking with confidence, but many Brazilian girls who don’t feel safe walking in Brazil do so freely when they’re in other countries, whether on foot or by bike. There will always be risks, but as I wrote earlier, the lack of safety in Brazil undermines the nomadic, tourist, and everyday experience.
So, if you’ve done this your whole life, know that you’re privileged. Not that I haven’t done it a few times in Brazil —thanks to youthful stubbornness— but always under a constant state of vigilance and tension.
I’ve been back to Europe three more times —Madrid, Barcelona, Paris, Budapest, and Rome— and in every city I exercised my right to nighttime freedom. In Rome, I took it to the extreme, wandering aimlessly almost every night while having long phone calls with friends and family. I barely saw anyone on the streets. I felt like the owner of a city that once belonged to Julius Caesar.
On these nighttime walks, I look at each building —silent, dark, deserted— trying to picture the family inside, sleeping in the middle of their routines, their lives, their stories. And there I am, a Brazilian night wanderer, lost in thoughts, connecting such distant worlds.
These walks have given me plenty of stories. In Budapest, a little tipsy from drinking, I mistook the square where my Airbnb was (I ended up in one that looked very similar) and felt completely disoriented, as if I had stepped into a Brothers Grimm tale.
In Madrid, I locked myself out of my apartment, the owner wasn’t answering his phone, and I spent hours trying to find a hostel or hotel. None had vacancies. I finally found one around 8 a.m. I was exhausted. In Buenos Aires, I made a Brazilian friend, and we wandered the streets searching for a party that suited us.
In the end, these stories are more mine than for the readers. The universal discussion is that everyone should have the right to walk freely at night, whenever and wherever they want.
