Category: Atlántida

Halloween in (non-urban) Uruguay

halloween-01

I stopped a posse of trick-or-treaters with ¿puedo sacar un foto? (Can I take a photo?) It took none of my school-picture-photographer expertise for them to expertly group. In response to my ¡Perfecto! Muchas gracias I heard several de nadas.

OK, still broad daylight, but here are unaccompanied kids, acting “abnormally” (in other words, as kids), and it’s all OK.

Which is not say I saw no parental guidance (but certainly none distrusting or fearful!). Just that adults had to be there only for the really little kids.

After I took this picture, I assumed that Junior Senior (left) had been distracted. On the second take, I realized his mother was telling me in heavily-accented English that he doesn’t like pictures. Cool. Gracias. Cooler: an advanced soul recognizing the danger of facial recognition technology? LOL. Maybe.

Name that beverage!

Uruguay tap water this morning

If you said, tap water this morning, congratulations! A few hours later, the tap water has cleared up again.

We had thunderstorms starting in the wee hours yesterday, but apparently it was the flooding from the rain all day that caused the electricity to go out five or six times, for a few minutes each, much later.

Apparently 162 people were evacuated from their homes, and 9,500 houses left without power.

The potholes in front of our house are growing as a result , but at least  the road did not become a river as it did before they fixed it.

Voting day

politicos

Today is voting day #1 — a runoff election will occur in a month if no one gets a clear majority today.

An Uruguayan friend explained to me yesterday that if, instead of putting the list from one party in your voting envelope, you put a blank piece of paper, your vote goes to whoever gets the most. You also have the option of annulling your vote (voting is required by law). One way is to put two lists (“votes”) in your envelope. I suggested she do this so that if her father, who votes Colorado, asked her who she voted for, she could say Colorado, and answer her mother that she voted like her, for the Frente Amplio.

I’ll be eligible to vote in 2019, and though I generally have little interest in politics, I do find it inspiring to live in a place where they actually offer choices, unlike voting for one or the other half of the Rich Lawyers Party in the United States.

A “new” restaurant

La Cuchare de Madera Restaurant in Parqu del Plata, Canelones, Uruguay

La Cuchara de Madera restaurant, Parque del Plata, Canelones, Uruguay
Click to enlarge

‘The Wooden Spoon’

Excellent food, ambiance, and presentation at reasonable price (entrees UYP 290, a little over USD 12). One block form the bus station. Surprisingly, it has been open for three years, but we’d never heard of it until recently. Open daily noon to midnight.

I would have taken a picture of our lunch but I don’t Instagram 😉

Ten syllables later

impermiabilizaciones

I was actually trying to remember this word, which I’d first seen on the side of a van, shortly before walking past this. Roof sealing.Go ahead, give it a shot 😉

La Casa de la Azotea means “The House of the Roof,” casa meaning shop, or business. Which reminds me, I’ve always wanted to go into La Casa de las Ruedas (“The House of Wheels”) in Montevideo, whose owners obviously also own La Casa del Caucho, “The House of Rubber.”

An hour with a paint brush…

casa-vende

House on a lovely lot nearby for sale. Especially after recent staining, couldn’t help but think how an hour with a paint brush would improve the looks.

I don’t know the situation of the owner (might be old/poor/far away), but reminds me of one car we looked at long ago on a consignment lot, with a broken interior door handle. When I asked if it could be fixed, the salesman told me that the owner would fix that.

After someone agreed to buy it, which of course we didn’t want to, partly because of the broken door handle. What’s the thinking?

Pothole gods

There must be pothole gods. Or demons. Or entities.

Otherwise — now that our road is fixed and well-drained — why do all the potholes (pozos, same word as well) form right around our driveway?

potholes

Today a little kid — just-removed-the-training-wheels little — fell in one of them. Mama cajoled him, stopped his crying, encouraged him back in the saddle to ride on.

And perhaps admonishing him: next time, be careful around THOSE PEOPLE’s driveway.

 

What a difference a brush makes

Finally doing some much-needed maintenance on wooden ceilings.

ceiling

Phase 1 is the lambriz, thin tongue-and-groove. Next are the beams, in a darker color, for which I splurged and bought an angled sash brush. Which, believe it or not, is a big deal. The only place I could find one was in Tienda Inglesa. Yes, the supermarket.

And, of my goodness, does it make a difference!

brushes

The bottom brush is typical of what you find in hardware stores here: with short, coarse bristles that tend to spread.

Perhaps when next up north I’ll wander through Home Depot and salivate.