Thursday, December 6th, 2007...2:08 pm
Shoeshine Surprise 2007
Last year I posted this photo with a bit of a story of the fellow, Jesus Villalobos Germiniano (what a great name), in Parque Juarez whom I visit periodically for shoeshine and conversation.
This morning I took some sugar cookies to Jesus and had a shine. I periodically take him cookies or banana bread I’ve made.
Jesus always asks where I’ve been since I last visited. I told him of my walk to Rancho Viejo and my drive the previous weekend.
Here’s a shot of a shoeshine lineup in Parque Juarez. Jesus is the fellow at center with the light colored shirt and white belt. You can see the canopies over the chairs contain campaign advertisements, though I don’t get the idea that the shiners necessarily support the candidate advertised on their canopy.
You can see just this side of his stand the lawn chair in which Jesus sits while awaiting customers. When I arrived at his station this morning there was a fellow in the chair and another waiting, while many of Jesus’ competitors were without customers the entire time I was there.
As Jesus was finishing up the shine he pulled this model of his shoeshine station out of a bag and presented it to me. Like the box above, he crafted the station from cedar in his carpinteria at his home in San Bruno.
Kicking Calvin in Playa Baracoa.
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