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UruguayLiving.com

 
The best lifestyle in the world for the price…
This is the journal of The Southron, an Emigrant from Florida who has spent the last decade living in the West Indies, former Yugoslavia and Costa Rica. He moved to Montevideo, Uruguay at the end of February 2006...

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Archive for the 'Everyday Life' Category

Green means Go; sometimes…

Posted by The Southron on March 14th, 2009

Driving in Uruguay can be quite an adventure, especially for the uninitiated.
The first thing you must learn is that the lines dividing the lanes are purely ornamental, and that if you insist on trying to stay in the center of what you thought was a lane of traffic, you will be an obstacle to progress.  [...]

Spring forward, fall into confusion…

Posted by The Southron on March 8th, 2009

Early this morning, Uruguay changed from Summer time (UYST) to standard time (UYT). Since it is fall here, we turned our clocks back 1 hour. At the same time we made that change, the US made its spring foward to daylight saving time. The total relative time shift was 2 hours, some [...]

Uruguay’s State Religion

Posted by The Southron on February 4th, 2009

It is widely published that Uruguay is the least religious country in South America, that less that 2/3 of the people consider themselves Catholic, and that unlike Argentina, in which Roman Catholicism is the State Religion, Uruguay is a secular State.
But, I beg to differ; at least in part.  Uruguay is not very Catholic, but [...]

My Annual Clothing Care Package from Omar the Tentmaker

Posted by The Southron on December 28th, 2008

My nephew arrived for a week’s visit yesterday morning and brought with him my annual resupply of gigantic clothing from my favorite King Size Men’s Store; Omar the Tent Maker.  His motto is “if it was big enough for Goliath, it ought to fit you too”.  The only problems I have with them is that [...]

Buying Anteojos (glasses for those who know less Spanish than I do)

Posted by The Southron on November 15th, 2008

I love small businesses! While some can be very bad, many are extremely good, and almost all are distinctive.
In the last few weeks I had the opportunity to visit a small business that was so friendly and helpful that I decided to give them a plug here.  The business is Meerhoff Optica at the corner [...]

The Joys of Doing Business in Uruguay

Posted by The Southron on October 12th, 2008

By now, most everyone knows that in Real Life (if you can call it that) I work in the offshore banking industry.  We do no banking in Uruguay–because it is slow, expensive and difficult–but we do have am administration office here.
As a normal part of our  business we open financial accounts with various institutions around [...]

Panama versus Uruguay

Posted by The Southron on May 4th, 2008

Very early this past Thursday morning I returned home to Uruguay after a 12 day trip to Panama. I had not been there in four years and was interested to compare it to Uruguay since it had been the prime alternative to moving here.
Panama was incredible! It was the most dynamic city I [...]

Summer’s last hurrah…

Posted by The Southron on March 16th, 2008

Despite the fact that Uruguay is the least Christian country in South America, I am amazed at the increase in piety whenever there is a Christian holiday to be celebrated. Its seems that even communists and atheists are converted, at least for the duration of the holiday. To show this piety, the majority [...]

Health insurance? What’s that?

Posted by The Southron on March 15th, 2008

It has been more than 17 years since I was last covered by health insurance. Because of the brain tumor I had removed in 1990, I was considered “uninsurable”.
Providentially for me, I enjoyed decent health until the accidents that crippled me in 1998. By that time I was living outside the United States, [...]

Spring forward, fall between the cracks…

Posted by The Southron on March 8th, 2008

About six months ago, the time change was easy: the US and the EU went back to standard time, while Uruguay simultaneously started using summer time. The net effect was that we became two hours farther from the US, and two hours closer to the EU.
At two o’clock tomorrow morning this process will [...]


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