Oopa bread
Category: Uruguay
Olé Olé Pop Pop
Yes, the accents on Olé Olé are backward.
View from the top
I went with some friends returning to the USA to Piriápolis to help with legal stuff concerning their house sale. They insisted I ride the chairlift (aerosillas) to the top of Cerro San Antonio. Scary. At two points, you can almost touch the power lines beneath you with your feet.
They treated me to lunch at the top. Lovely day for it. I could actually see the World Trade Center building in Montevideo, 80 km away.
Moving to Uruguay is no more complicated than climbing a tree
Migración, despachantes de aduana, trying to find quality household goods and tools, anything vehicular, no-show plumbers – electricians – albeñiles – jardineros, looking at yet another house with miniscule rooms and mold. Just like climbing a tree. A certain type of tree.
“In a fabulous light”
Recently received:
“My name is__________________ and I’m casting an international travel show about expats moving abroad. We’d love to film in Uruguay and wanted to know if you could help us find expats who have moved there within the last 1-2 years or have been there for 3-4 years, but recently moved into a new home. The show documents their move to a new country and will place the country in fabulous light. I wanted to know if you could help spread the word to expats living there or are close to moving. If you’d like more information, please give me a call at ____________ or skype me at ____________. You can also email me at_______@leopardusa.com. Looking forward to hearing from you.”
(Leopard USA turns out to be House Hunters International.)
My reply:
“Hi ______,
I personally have no interest in promoting “unreality” shows. I was asked to participate in an International Living presentation on Uruguay, and dropped out when tipped off by a previous interviewee (I should have figured) that they always hype a location as “paradise,” or as you say, “in a fabulous light.” By the time that the DVD was produced, I personally knew 80+% of the people featured, and most of those singing the praises of the place had either left or only lived here part time.
In addition to glossing over the realities of Uruguay, I would hate to contribute to another “happy faces in an exotic sunny local” piece that inspires people to move here (or anywhere) without heavy emphasis on “do your own due diligence” or the reminder that “adversity breeds character.” I regularly read postings from people who have never been to Uruguay but want to move here because of something they read online: yes, the beaches are beautiful, and the people are friendly (though you’ll almost never be invited into their homes). Which is not to bash Uruguay — I’m in my sixth year here, haven’t left, and I’m a naturalized citizen, and despite being expensive at present Uruguay has a lot to recommend it. However, it’s the fifth country I’ve lived in outside the USA, my wife’s ninth. If you were to tell me your show emphasizes curiosity, the importance of acceptance, and (the key to salvation!) a sense of humor, I’d be much more enthusiastic.
Regardless, I am copying this to several people here with connections to the local expat community, some with regular mailing lists, whom I encourage to contact you or pass this on if interested.
For the record, based on my experience, “expats moving abroad” does not constitute a subset of “international travel.” Visiting a place and moving/living there are two memes best not commingled!
Best regards,
What some of those others have to say:
- Whew! What ______ wrote is a mess, and what you answered is spot on … This is definitely not something I would ever want to be involved in, and I would hate to get anyone I know messed up in this. What is actually needed, particularly for people in/from the USA, is information that makes clear to them what moving to another country entails. Hint: Other countries are not simply smaller versions of the USA that need to be prodded into being little USAs … there are lots of people who “want to move here” who have never been outside the USA, and they are totally unprepared.
- Amen.
- I would agree with “do your own due diligence”. Things looked much different when I did that IL interview … Today is not the same. I hope they do not make the show.
Sorry, _________ from Househunters International!
The little pleasures
Don’t mean to get all Instagram-y. Wife said oh take a picture of casual desert with friends, and I like the artificial and natural reflection highlights. The simple things 😉
Chinese food in Uruguay! (just kidding)
I think some friends recommended this “Chinese“ restaurant in Carrasco. Well, the friendly purveyor appeared Chinese, and spoke Rioplatense Spanish so fluently that obviously she knew that real Chinese food would hold no appeal for the Uruguayan palate. Unfortunately, that expounded to no taste other than soy sauce, and food that seemed to be leftovers, especially believable considering we were the only diners.
Consider this a “must miss” when in Montevideo. Oh, did I mention ridiculously expensive?
I used to taunt expats in Uruguay: what‘s your favorite Thai restaurant in Montevideo? It was a Schrödinger‘s-cat kind of thing, except that the cat was metaphorically dead. In reality nonexistent. Ditto Chinese.
What’s wrong with this picture?
I took these images from a back-to-school promotion from Géant, a large Wal-Marty place near the airport. All the other images of kids shared this same, most un-Uruguayan characteristic.
Is it as obvious to you as it is to me?
The fine art of geolocation in Uruguay
OK, red herring. Actually, I think I must have said “hell no” at some point when a web site asked to see where I was located. So this was the result when I looked for the distance to the closest branch of Scotia Bank, whose debit cards are replacing the Tienda Inglesa points cards.
Hint: we’re only about 40 km away.
But presumably I know now the geographic center of Uruguay, which is here:
So naturally, rather than do something productive, I switched to satellite view to find out where I “was.” Looks pretty remote:
But wait a minute! What are those shapes?
Why, L-shaped and triangular patches of forest, of course.
You can find all sorts of fun tree patterns on Google Earth in Uruguay, which apparently takes the growing of Eucalyptus trees more seriously than its neighbor to the northeast, Brazil.
But triangles … why triangles?
Uruguay factoids
Squinting at coffee packages in the supermarket the other day triggered this train of thought.
- Unless you look very hard for otherwise, the coffee you buy in a supermarket will have sugar in it (“glaseado”)
- cuts of beef are at right angles to what northerners expect
- It is almost impossible to buy a long-handled shovel (“you can buy a regular shovel, remove the handle, and put a long handle on it” – yes, I was actually told this)
- A vehicle with automatic transmission is considered a luxury and taxed higher (in one instance, a mechanic refused to drive a customer’s car onto the rack in the shop because he “didn’t know how to drive an automatic.”)
- (For North American drivers) Right on red can get you an expensive ticket (I just added to Wikipedia that right on red is not allowed in UY 😉
- If you take driving school in Uruguay, you will not be told:
- you should stay in lanes / that lanes have any significance (seriously)
- what distance to maintain between vehicles
- after passing, that you should wait until you can see the car in your mirror before pulling back into the lane
- If Uruguayans say they lived in the United States, you can almost never go wrong by asking “New Jersey or Rhode Island?”
- If you miss Uruguay in the United States, go to Elizabeth, New Jersey
- If Uruguayans say they’ve recently been to the United States, you can almost never go wrong by asking “How was the weather in Orlando?”
Feel free to add to the list. I expect I will.