By Emilio Urruty
There was once a young beaver, in the way to his new habitat, which mistakenly put his feet on the streets of Ushuaia. During the few hours that lasted his visit to the capital of Tierra del Fuego, he was able to meet a boy band players, the Chilean diplomatic representation in our city and some scientific researchers at the city center. The stay was somewhat stressful for the poor creature, but he was unhurt. What follows is the chronicle of his adventures.
Beavers are known to gnaw on wood, preferably logs to build with them their famous dikes and also to keep at bay their own teeth that grow too fast.
The beaver of this history was a tramp, who was by chance on the coast of Ushuaia and, seeing such sustained house on stilts, stood up and muttered: "Hmm! The ideal place to form a colony, where I come from there is no room for anyone ... "
Very little original in thought: some humans already had advanced a hundred years earlier. But the little beaver did not see the houses, but only tasty pile of logs.
Determined as often are these bugs, the animal was over-insurance disgust, produced by the miasmas of Encerrada Bay, and he moved toward the football popcorn adjacent to the building that houses the municipal swimming pool. He came, in fact, bordering the funds of the House of Culture, in which he was representing a play for children.
The beaver looked through a crack in the room, and although he was interested in the argument of the play, he went to football arc, as he would take it as an aperitif before attacking the alpine ushuaienses socks.
But his plan was not so simple. On the court, a few kids were fighting for a chopped and the passage of furry rodent immediately attracted the attention of almost everyone. Neglected the ball to the point that the few players who remained in the field became forty-six term goals in a minute and a half of the game. Is that the others had left the perimeter fence and followed a prudent distance from the animal, who was trying to hide his desire to look toward the poles. Gradually, the pilgrims proceeded to step beaver, the animal attached to the walls and the boys by its side.
"Beware, do not approach becuase it bites!" Shouted one. "Go out, these bugs jump!" Warned another.
For at least fifhteen kids with an attitude between naturalism and harassed, were snuggling the beaver. This, with some instinctive concern, saw too many moving uncomfortably muddy shoes around.
From his perspective, the ride was not heading for a delicious snack made of wood, but rather to a hail of sticks. The natives were beginning to be impatient and increasingly their vociferous sounded worse.
"Let us follow him to see what it does!" Suggested one of the nervous guys. "Clutch it" invited another. "Step on the tail" suggested a third. "Ufa! You have never seen a beaver?" Grumbled from afar another wanted to resume the game.
"Let him! Do you not see he's scared?" Advocated the most sensible of the group, the one that never fails to ruin the fun healthy infant.
The webbed feet of the wanderer little beaver soon discovered the road. Trying to ignore the uncomfortable company of children, on arrival at the curb, the rodent observed on both sides of Maipú Avenue to see if a vehicle was coming. Safe to cross, he fell to the pavement and, draining the step, beyond the first lane. But he lacked enough ...
Then, the group of boys who had been cowardly in the driveway looking with sadism how the animal would pass to a better life under the wheels of a car, came off the sensible one. Good boy ran up to the beaver and, opening his arms, stopped the traffic for a few moments to ensure that his protege had finally reached the opposite pavement.
After crossing Maipú, the little beaver found wandering with disappointment that there had not delicious post to gnaw, and harassment of young humans was becoming very annoying.
Passed the test of the avenue, perhaps the boys began to imagine other ways to make the visit to the city of the beaver unforgettable.
Fortunately, at that moment, from the windows of the building that houses the Consulate of Chile in Ushuaia, someone was watching the developments.
The beaver, cornered by the excited children's band, was about to gnaw a ankle when appeared a hand saving him, which dispersed the mob. With the look, the animal seemed to be seeking diplomatic asylum that was granted immediately. The Chilean representation doors were opened for him. The threat was over.
Inside the consulate, relieved, he asked go to the bathroom. From there, the beaver could feel cast double locked the door. Then he heard the phone called the Centro Austral de Investigaciones Científicas (CADIC).
Zas! Had he jumped from the coals to fall into the fire? He spent a long time and the door would not open. Finally, some white dressed people came to take him. He had been betrayed!
If with the guys from the popcorn he had been afraid, now he was terrified. He saw himself already embalmed in a glass case ...
It was a long night. He even had nightmares! Children playing football with a beaver-skin ball, cars stepped his tail, scientists experimenting ... Brrr!
But the next morning as he was prepared to resignation to a certain sacrifice for science, the same people who had taken out of the consulate, put him in a van and transported to a place full of appetizing lengas and evergreen. And he was released there.
The little tramp beaver could not believe it. "That was all? Advanced shy to the water before diving, looking back, they say that he reached muttering: "Thanks, guys!"