Cars, wagons, drags, they all stop. It's a perpetual to-and-fro. It seems they should be less, in fact, they are, but still enough for the restrictions of the moment. Adriano doesn't rest and doesn't get tired, or at least, he seems that way.

Las Tunas, Cuba.- The inclement sun of these days and the high temperatures affect him at his job: as soon as a vehicle arrives, there he is, with the equipment in hand, spraying everything on four wheels.

At this hour (in normal times) he should be at home, in the classroom or in the hospital, perhaps on one of the rotations typical of his training as a nurse; but he is in El Yunque, miles away from the city of Las Tunas, on the border with the municipality of Guáimaro, Camagüey.

This tall boy is among those who fight against the COVID-19 in the province; he does it from one of the border health surveillance points, which checks the entry and exit of travelers in the territory. He does not wear the uniform of a nurse, but that of the Cuban Red Cross, the society to which he belongs and for which he is here, with body and will.

Uniformed in a suit that must be extremely hot, Adriano Betancourt Pacheco looks like an ant, he does not stop performing and goes here and there, and vice versa. We wait for him, he doesn't give up and he doesn't allow himself a break.

We interrupt, at last, the dialogue, brief, fruitful: “Here we share the work. We take 24-hour shifts. We fumigate cars, measure temperature and take data, and in this way, we distribute ourselves so as not to overload ourselves. I haven't stopped today. We have a lot of work, some leave and others arrive all the time”.

When this task is finished, another very valuable begins. Niurka, his partner, who is also a Red Cross volunteer, tells me that this boy doesn't stop, that he is a train, and it is appreciable!

“Currently, I work at the Martyrs of Las Tunas Pediatric Hospital. When I finish here, I go there on my day off, so as not to affect my teaching and continue with the volunteer mission. At the hospital, we are constantly evaluated on the content studied. We used to work for four hours, but now we plan to do the eight hours, every other day”.

At a stop they have established the work point, there is no lack of good treatment for those who arrive, some eager “to cross the border” without any major justification; others, irresponsible, travel without the notion of danger; and there are even those who hide stowaways, in a journey interrupted by those who also help to cut off the passage of the new coronavirus.
“I am happy to be able to help the Homeland and the people, that is our reason for working, he says”; then he goes away, the line grows if he stops. The work is urgent.

It is curious when life surprises you when you don't expect it. He has a vocation as a teacher and he personifies it in people who give themselves and put the Homeland in the same sentence that places other words that allude to happiness, joy, solidarity, or the work that teaches so much. As I write, I think, of Adriano and of so many valuable souls who at this time of year steal hours from every day, multiply their energies, grow in the face of anguish and continue working there, on the frontier of duty, stories are born to tell.