You can find more posts about trash here. Fascinating subject, eh?
Tag: infrastructure
Takes away all the fun
After losing the closest trash container to fire three times, and the next closest once, and both at the same time most recently, we were glad to see them replaced. In our case, however, replaced with other beat-up plastic bins.
Meanwhile, closer to the beach, new metal ones have joined the aging plastic bins. They still have plastic tops which will no doubt rot in the Uruguayan sun, but at least the whole thing can’t be burned to the ground!
Previous posts about the “modern” garbage containers.
Update: basureros
Not sure what inspired them to get to work again, but they have.
Beach nice and clean again, even a liner in the “trash can.”
The street not as much, but still a major improvement. If there were any full-time residents living near this one, someone like me might take a shovel and finish the cleanup.
Not sure what’s up with the basureros
basura: trash
basureros: them wot spozed to quitar the basura
The day before tourist season officially starts, it appears the basureros have decided not to work.
When they resume, will they pick up all the overflow? Curiously, along the Rambla (beachfront road), the containers have been emptied. The two closest to us were burned to the ground (one for the third time) about a month ago. When I called the Intendencia to inquire, they explained that they were waiting for new, equally flammable (OK, they didn’t say that) containers, so at present had no replacements.
Meanwhile, the usually-diligent beach crew seems to have slacked off as well.
In case you’re curious, the breed of that hunkering creature in the background—who has gone from 10 kg to over 20 kg in less than two months—has finally been established. It’s a rare Oriental Spinkle-Faced Sand Hound.
More about the funky, UV-prone, flammable trash containers:
- A new, modernized trash collection system
- Not the start of a trend, we hope
- Trash containers, over time
- Plastic doesn’t fare well in Uruguay
Cajun-style comadreja
Cajun-style comadreja, with essence of plastic
I’ve spoken of our trash collection system before.
Last night, for the third time, our closest container was burned. Yeah, it makes some kind of great sense to collect trash in flammable containers.
Just as it makes sense to purchase for Uruguay trash containers from a country with absolutely no UV problem: Germany. Plastic doesn’t fare well here.
However, the irony—or synchronicity—in this current destruction is that my wife took a shovel yesterday to remove the body of a dead possum (comadreja) from the road, and threw it in that container.
So the little critter got a proper cremation.
Well, almost. From the attention our garbage-hound Gita gave today, apparently there are some Cajun tidbits still edible by her standards (shared by almost no other living thing besides ants and bacteria).
Southern winds
We’ve had several days now of persistent, on-shore wind. Here in Uruguay, off-shore points to Antarctica. Yeah, it’s been chilly. And I’m finally feeling righteous about finally having a proper winter jacket! (Purchased last November in Miami, when we were heading into summer here.) And so, for the first time in six years, we had a wonderfully mild winter, one that barely required a winter jacket.
I’m not implying causality, for the record. But, erm, uh … Uruguay, thank me if you will. It’s been pleasant, no? But this cold wind….
The Rambla (beachfront road) in Parque del Plata has always had a ridiculous stretch that half-fills with sand during the winter. Prior to tourist season, a front-end loader and dump truck appear, scoop up the offending dunes and deposit them upstream in the Solís Chico river, making a nice little beach for the locals. Which can then wash back down the river, into the sea, and — OK, let’s not go there.
This year, they have their work cut out for them, thanks to these cold southern winds.
Meanwhile, the dune — above the boardwalk built to prevent further erosion of dunes — has gotten high enough that today I walked through the neighboring gap instead. Sort of like the gap where they built the boardwalk. But, hey.
Except for a 6-month amazing stint in Lincoln City, Oregon (1986-7), I have never lived near a beach, until the last six years, and the constant changes fascinate me.
Unlike my father, I’m not an engineer. Nor as smart. But I don’t think I’m thus unqualified to ask, what exactly are we not “getting” here?
OK, forget it: nature is amazing.
Different approaches to filling pot holes
I don’t want to seem judgmental, but
mine’s the one on top.
Public hospital
Ceiling in patients’ bathroom. Much evidence elsewhere of delayed maintenance. But, for my friend, 33 days and zero cost. So.
(If you like this sort of thing, you’ll love my photo tour of the legendary Hotel Termas in Argentina!)
What? A line?
The repaving of the bus route (see here and here) has actually turned out quite nicely. Avenida Mario Ferreiria has become a pleasure to drive instead of a nightmare. I’m not sure about having a line down the middle of a two-lane road in Uruguay, though, given the challenge so many drivers have deciding whether to drive in a lane or on a line.*
*0:50 here if you missed it
I thought they had fixed this (rain)
Back in February, I made a short video about our road the river.
In June I mocked the attempt to repair it, only to change my mind, change my mind again a week later, then again within 24 hours.
Alas, this year’s freakish weather has proven too much for it.