Nesting ice trays

I had never seen anything like this before Uruguay. Obviously, the one time (you learn quickly) you stick a full ice tray into the freezer on top of another freshly placed ice tray facing the same way, you end up with a mess.

So why would someone design something so unpleasant for the user?

  1. Can be shipped in one-third the space,
  2. No one is accountable, and
  3. No one but the end user cares.

I know (from experience with other products) that were I to take this to customer service at Tienda Inglesa to point out the user-unfriendly design, the girls there would simply explain to me how to stack them “properly.”

If you live in Uruguay, you have to get used to the idea that there exists very little expectation that goods will be well-designed, well-made, or durable. The amazing thing about these lavender-colored ice trays, however, is that they haven’t broken, and most of the time ice doesn’t stick to them. Unlike the red and blue ones, which yield shattered ice only with a struggle, and tend to break in short order.

Discovering how well they worked (stacked “properly”), I went back to get more. And found only red and blue ones. And have never seen the lavender ones again.

Have tajamar, seek water

After yesterday’s pozo negro, our friendly backhoe (retroexcavadora) operator started in on the tajamar, or pond (background) in the local lingo, which we hope will fill with runoff water, for which here he’s digging a diversion channel from the road. ‘Tis an experiment; I’m not sure rainwater will be enough, but we always have the windmill, and by now a considerable length of hose, since I planted out fruit trees far from the house.

Backhoe carrying motorbike, rural Uruguay

Last night he parked his backhoe at our neighbor’s, because someone lives there. He left on his moto, and I was wondering about the logistics of that.

Lo me encanta, I said as I watched him strap the moto into the bucket as he prepared to leave. I love it.

Uruguayo, he replied, beaming, of course pronouncing it ur-u-GUA-zho.

Pozo negro

Insatllation of setpic system, rural Uruguay

“Black well,” or septic tank. The first part is three rings deep; the second one ring deep. It will receive water from the bottom of the first tank, and when it overflows go into a pipe 60 meters or so slightly downhill to a sewage lagoon, in which we’ll plant papyrus, and around which we’ll plant some willow or eucalyptus trees that love water.

The soil is completely impermeable. If you dig a hole 50 cm deep and fill it with water, it will still be full a week later. A septic field would be useless. A friend suggested a mound system, running perforated pipe through a mound of sand topped by soil.

Perforated pipe? They didn’t even sell that in Mexico. And I don’t feel like spending hours (or paying someone to spend hours) drilling holes in plastic pipe. This is what they do in the country, and it works.

Refrigerator redux

magnet-covered refrigerator, Uruguay

In addition to the powerful magnet that came out of a broken chargeable flashlight (upper left), our refrigerator is festooned with magnets handed out by local businesses. The little blue half-garafa (propane tank) I actually found in the street but thought pretty cool. Outside of paper ads, held in place by other merchants’ magnets, there is only one non-magnet on here. Can you guess?

The guys who fix refrigerators. They put on a sticker.

Living in a limited marketplace

refrigerators, Uruguay

People who move to Uruguay from consumer societies tend to get frustrated and complain about the lack of variety, and generally poor – no, make that piss-poor – quality of consumer goods. With reason.

We bought the refrigerator on the right new, the one on the left used from someone now a friend, who we now know spent a great deal of time and effort getting it repaired before selling it (he was leaving the country). Both are products of Bosch, a brand I had considered quality. No longer. Three of the door shelves have on the new one have broken, and it has been the object of a repair visit before.

Last night it stopped working. This morning it started working again, but not before we had brought the other from the casita (little house), and transferred all the contents. And called the repair people, fortunately not early responders so I was able to cancel.

But seeing them side-by-side reminds me of one of the oddities of this limited marketplace of 3.5 million people. Notice how both doors open to the right? So does virtually every other refrigerator sold in Uruguay. Can the hinge side be switched, as in North America? No. Same as with virtually every refrigerator sold in Uruguay. On ours, we could switch the hinge side, but without a way to move the handles, it would be just a bit awkward.

As a result, we designed our still-unfinished kitchen in the campo around a refrigerator whose door only could open to the right. Strange to imagine someone up north doing the same.

Hangin’ out

guy playing guitar
Mauro, back from over a year in New Zealand, surprised us with some intricate Beatles’ songs on the guitar Santi loaned me. Actually his sister’s, but hey.

guy with dog on floor
His fraternal twin (mellizo) Rodrigo, lounging in front of the wood stove, got something interesting going on with Gita (full name: Doguita), the poorly drawn dog.

guys on couch
Then Santi apparently morphed into the equivalent of human catnip, and had the crazed cat Oscar going wild.

Mauro and Rodrigo had their horoscopes read earlier, our birthday gift to them, by our friend Hazel, who turns out to be an exceptional astrologer.

Then we talked about psychic protection, lucid dreaming, clairvoyance…such a treat to be around young, curious minds.