Argentina: Mercedes Cotoli, Barrerito, la infancia de la frontera

I visited Barrerito for the first time in 2010.
A small rural area, 3Km from the coast of the Uruguay River, the border that separates Argentina from Brazil.
I was 22 years old.
On the first visit, like all the trips that followed, I slept in the school of the colony.

With the children we play, climb trees, harvest ""pitangas"", we ride oxen, watch cars that pass along the road. We cross streams on truck wheels, I watch them slaughter a cow they will later sell. The school bell rings and we walk together to their homes, eat some blackberries or medlars from the trees we find on the way. It is almost always hot and it rains.

In these ten years, we grew up together. We learned the value of the time shared and that innocence, that even though it doesn't last forever, can be recovered for a while.