(In which I prove to myself that I can still understand Spanish by translating portions of the book I am reading...)
Voyages
When the famas go on a trip, their habits for an overnight stay in a city are as follows: one fama goes to the hotel and carefully evaluates the prices, the quality of the sheets and the color of the blankets. The second goes to the customs house and fills out a form declaring all the movables and immovables of the three travelers, as well as the contents of all their suitcases. The third goes to the hospital and copies out the names of all the doctors and their specialities.
Having completed these tasks, the travelers reunite in the grand plaza of the city, relate their observations, and go to a cafe for an aperitif. But first they link hands and dance in a circle. This dance is known as the "Happiness of the Famas."
When cronopios go on a trip, they find all the hotels are booked up, the trains have already left, and the taxis either won't pick them up or charge ridiculous prices. But the cronopios are not discouraged because they firmly believe that these things happen to everybody, and at bedtime they say to each other, "The beautiful city, o the beautiful city." And all night they dream that there are grand parties in the city and that they are invited. The next day they rise supremely content, and that's how the cronopios travel.
The esperanzas, sedentary things, have left off traveling among things and persons, and are like statues that you have to go to visit because they can't be bothered.
Protection of Memories
In order to protect their memories, the famas embalm them like this: after all a memory's identifying details are tabulated, they wrap it from head to foot in a black sheet and prop it up against the living room wall, with a little card that says "Our Trip to Quilmes" or "Frank Sinatra."
The cronopios, by contrast, those soft, disordered beings, let their memories roam free about the house, yelling happily, and the cronopios themselves wander between them. Whenever they pass one running by, they pet it softly and say, "Don't get in any trouble, now" or "Watch the stairs!" This is why the famas' houses are orderly and quiet, while the cronopios' houses are noisy and feature slamming doors. The neighbors are always complaining about the cronopios, and the famas nod their heads understandingly and then go to see if all their little labels are still in place.
Clocks
A fama had a large wall clock that he would wind every week WITH GREAT CARE. A cronopio passed by and, upon seeing the fama, started to laugh. Then he went home and invented the Artichoke-Clock, or Choke-Clock, though you may call it as you see fit.
This cronopio's Choke-Clock was an artichoke of the largest kind, hung by its stem from a hole in the wall. The innumerable leaves of this artichoke marked the current hour and all the others besides, so that all the cronopio had to do was pull off a leaf and he would know the time. As he went pulling them off in a clock-wise fashion, the leaves always gave the right hour, and every day the cronopio would begin a new round of leaves. When he reached the heart, time could not be measured any longer, and in the deep pinkish-purple of the artichoke's center, the cronopio found a great contentment. Then he ate it with oil, vinegar, and salt, and put another clock on the wall.
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