--- If you play Rayuela by Gotan Project it would be great, and if you continue with Zitarrosa or Pa' bailar by Bajofondo I'll pay the bill and everything.
A night owl by necessity, the writer Maximiliano Rodríguez Vecino arrives at the Bar at dusk.
After commenting on the beats that will set the rhythm of the conversation, he asks for "a very cold water" and leans, now with everything in its place, on the bar.
And let the conversation flow.
"I am the son of Teresa and Carlos ---begins the author, born in Minas, Uruguay, in 1986---. I studied at the Juan José Morosoli school, the same one my grandfather had attended, the place that before being a teaching center was the cradle of one of the best Uruguayan writers. In that school, thanks to the teachers, I learned to read and write and developed a taste for stories."
--- Were you already passionate about writing since childhood?
Maximiliano Rodríguez smiles and shakes his head. "What I wanted to be was a soccer player, and follow in the footsteps of Rubén Sosa and Chino Recoba, but I could only go to the field and wear the jersey of the most beautiful club in the world as a fan. I had no talent to be a soccer player, nor could all the love I feel for Club Nacional de Fútbol make that dream come true."
Maximiliano's childhood and adolescence seem to have passed with a certain normality with passions such as soccer or cycling, a sport in which he put a lot of effort: "Short distances in the velodrome were what I was best at," but the illusion of becoming like his admired Miguel Induráin or Marco Pantani "was adrift when I decided to get off the bicycle to focus on my studies."
The fact is that, when he was 15 years old, in 2002, the life of the regular and his family took an unexpected, radical, and, essentially, dramatic turn. "An economic crisis exploded in Latin America and we had to tough it out. The family became distant. My old man emigrated to Gran Canaria, it was hard, but what we lived taught us to get up from the ground. While my old man saved money to bring my sisters and my mother to Spain, I had to work to help at home and study at night. I earned a living in a bicycle shop, in a bar, as a collector and as a door-to-door salesman."
In explaining this whole process, in Maximiliano Rodríguez's gaze, a certain pride shines, the result of having been able to resist and overcome obstacles that do not make anyone stronger, but rather determine who has the strength to face adversity, taking all its slaps.
The difficult reunion
After graduating in Nursing, writer Maximiliano Rodríguez finally traveled to Spain to reunite with his family. "Leaving my neighborhood, my family, my friends and starting from scratch in the land of my ancestors was a key moment. I went to Gran Canaria. We were united again, but illegal. It was difficult to find work, the degree was useless. To top it off, just when I arrived, a crisis hit here. I was getting out of one and into another. Years passed until they gave us nationality. And after so many years of waiting, and time to assimilate it, I can assure you that the regularization process is an ordeal that all xenophobes should experience so that they can be cured of their illness."
In 2011, and stabilized, Maximiliano Rodríguez met his partner, Susana ---"the best, no doubt," he smiles---. Then he began to study Psychology, but then something stronger than life imposed itself on him. Perhaps, the fact of feeling for the first time in years in control of his life and, at the same time, the need to narrate everything he had lived, endured, and suffered. "I quit. It was an impulse that pushed me to Barcelona, in 2016. Here I wrote my first novel and here I remain."
"Years passed until they gave us nationality. And after so many years of waiting, and time to assimilate it, I can assure you that the regularization process is an ordeal that all xenophobes should experience so that they can be cured of their illness"Thus was born Néstor Bandama, a Canarian police officer who stars in the thriller The Last Combatant, published in 2018; whose sequel,Concrete jungle and lizardshas just seen the light for Editorial Amarante with a Bandama already converted into an ex-policeman involved in a plot with cunning businessmen, golden gun mafiosos, and racist boors in a Barcelona on the verge of self-immolation.
A literary production that promises continuity with a third title ---it is not known if starring the same character--- that the regular is preparing. Of course, after having risen from so many, if he has anything, it is a lot to tell.
A bomb of creativity
"Moving to Barcelona made my skull explode, for the better. This city is a bomb of creativity and people walk and breathe differently. And then there's Sant Jordi, an inexplicable celebration," narrates Maximiliano Rodríguez, confessing that, despite all the city's virtues, a certain feeling of love and hate for it has taken hold of him, irrefutable proof of becoming a true Barcelonian.
Here, Maximiliano faced another of those trials that life subjects you to with the full weight of its inexplicable and random bad luck. "I was working in the emergency room at the peak of the coronavirus until I got sick and spent two months unable to walk, stuck in bed. I had to learn to take my first steps and accept that I have an illness."
"In Barcelona, people walk and breathe differently"After these words, the writer recovers a smile as if to say "but it's okay, we're still here, at the foot of the cannon," despite what he doesn't like about this place: "The politicians who don't represent me, the proletarians who are xenophobic and homophobic… Ah! And those people who feed the wild boars of Collserola!"
--- Here there are no wild boars among the locals, but we feed our customers. And very well.
With the speed of a Wild West gunslinger, Maximiliano Rodríguez Vecino catches the offer on the fly:
--- They told me that the menu of this Bar is cheap and finger-licking good!
--- Well, they've given you very good directions!