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.  If 5 little cars can travel alongside each other in 3 lanes, it would be selfish to try to claim a whole lane for yourself.

The second thing you must learn is to drive defensively, sort of like you would going through a war zone.  Uruguayans have a congenital visual deficiency which prevents them from being able to see clearly in the mirrors on their cars, thus, they simply don’t use them.  Consequently they will blithely dart in front of you with mere inches to spare and then be truly shocked if you tap your horn or glare at them.

Pedestrians are just a little worse than the drivers.  I have a sneaking suspicion that pedestrian fatalities are Uruguay’s secret answer to population growth.  One of my favorite pastimes is taking bets on which pedestrian is going to get run over in the striped pedestrian walkways along the Rambla.  Most of them do not have a traffic light, and the pedestrians sort of meander across the walkway in ones and twos, totally oblivious to the speeding traffic which threatens to turn them into roadkill.

Then there are the technical issues.  In most parts of the world, a solid green signal means you can go forward, turn left or turn right.  NOT HERE!

A solid green signal means you can go forward or turn right, but you cannot turn left, except on a one-way street, unless there is a green arrow signal.  Otherwise, you have to continue on until you can find a left turn without a signal, hold up traffic waiting to make the turn, and then meander back towards your target.  This is especially interesting when driving in Centro where most of the streets are one way; complicated by the fact that the one way streets alternate in directions, but only more or less:  one street will go left, the next 3 will go right, than 2 will go left, etc.

Another innovation brought in by the current government is the requirement that you must drive with your headlights on at all times.  Allegedly this is a safety feature, but, since it requires more fuel to burn the headlights all the time, and since the government has a virtual monopoly on fuel importation, plus high fuel taxes, it is a secret tax on the driving public.  (Who said the socialists weren’t smart?)

But, there are good point to driving in Uruguay as well.  Where else in the world can you see on the highway virtually every model car ever made from the Model T Ford to the latest BMW?

I was the “guest” of Ospidale Italiano (Hospital Italiano)for two weeks, during which time I had two surgeries.
The most amazing thing about my two weeks there was that everyone seemed to really care about my health and about doing their respective jobs properly, and, even cheerfully!
I suspect there is some infinitesimal grain of truth in the claim that I am “not the easiest patient” one could have—though I can’t imagine on what basis such could be claimed.  Nevertheless, the nursing staff were unfailingly pleasant, every during the most difficult periods—nurses in the US would surely have strangled me with my bed sheets or at least smothered me with my own pillow.
One night, I even received a visit from the Chief of Surgery at Hospital Militar.  He heard I was in hospital at Hospital Italiano, and since he had another patient there, he stopped in to chat with me for 15 minutes or so.  I was incredulous.
Perhaps even more amazing was that two or three times during my stay (I can’t remember which due to the medications dripping into my veins) a representative from COSEM stopped in to make sure I was satisfied with the care I was receiving!  I cannot imagine that happening anywhere else.  If I had told a US insurance company that I was pleased with the care, they would have moved me to a cheaper hospital that afternoon.
I could go for pages with the random acts of kindness I received, and which I never experienced in hospital anyplace else in the world.  I simply do not understand why anyone would want to go to the US when they have a medical problem and endure its faceless, money-driven bureaucracy.
Since then, I have returned to Hospital Militar to have the balloon removed from my stomach (after having lost about 35kgs), and my plans included several more hospital stays in the coming months.  All will be in Uruguay, and while I don’t exactly look forward to them, it is easy to face them optimistically.

Nevertheless, we have an opportunity to do it now. We don’t need to make a choice between going to the

• Southeastron Coastal Uruguay Living in Piriapolis Party (SCULPP) OR
• Noche de las Luces in Montevideo.

I know what a Southron is, but what the heck is a Southeastron? Sounds like someone from Miami (and real Southrons know it is pronounce My-am-ma, not the Yankee version, my-am-mee).

Anyway, the Piriaoplis gathering is starting in the afternoon, and the Noche e las Luces, by definition doesn’t start until the night.

So why not do both? I am… Details on the SCULPP are at: http://www.sociedadsouthron.net/forums/viewtopic.php?f=12&t=1198.

See you there!

Every year since 1992 the people of Montevideo have lined up to buy as many Big Macs as they can from celebrities and public officials working the counters at Ronald McDonald’s place.

WOW! I can finally be a junk food junkie and feel good about it—at least for the day. How does that jingle go again: “two all beef patties, special sauce, lettuce, cheese, pickles, onions on a sesame seed bun…”

Ray Kroc would be proud!

]]> http://www.uruguayliving.com/2007/11/16/big-mac-day-in-uruguay/feed/ 1 http://www.uruguayliving.com/2007/11/14/hollywood-in-parque-prado/ http://www.uruguayliving.com/2007/11/14/hollywood-in-parque-prado/#comments Wed, 14 Nov 2007 18:19:23 +0000 The Southron http://www.uruguayliving.com/2007/11/14/hollywood-in-parque-prado/ Last night Borko and I were having dinner at Cafe Misterio in Carrasco with an attorney friend. We were there mainly so I could have good sushi and Borko didn’t have to endure it. For some reason the only fish he likes is a nasty bottom feeder that only lives in the lakes and streams of Montenegro….go figure.

Anyway, as the story goes, we were sitting there minding our own business when a well known face went by. I vaguely recognized him, not being much of a movie buff (the last time I went into a cinema was in 1991) and Borko and our friend immediately knew who it was–Mickey Rourke the actor.

It turns out he is here making a movie in Parque Prado( I have no idea about what) and that it was broadcast on the radio that “if you think you have seen Mickey Rourke, you have”.

With Hollywood here, the neighborhood is surely going to HELL. (I was going to say, “to the dogs”, but I LIKE dogs!)

I looked up and saw two kids running away as fast as they could–a split second later I saw two of our staff, Mikey and Rodrigo, chasing them.

One got away, but the other one (he had the car radio in hand) they chased all the way to the Oceanographic Museum (the ugly pinkish building with the Minaret on Rambla) where the thief jumped into the water.

Rodrigo was starting to strip and go in afetr him, when Mikey, suggested tha better part of valor was to wait for the police–that was a good call. No less than 9 cops arrived in minutes, including the SWAT team. They “persuaded” the malefactor to come out of the water and carted him off to the local precinct. Rodrigo and Mikey went along and gave their statements.

But somebody must have been watching US TV–a few hours later, Rodrigo and Mikey had to go back to the police station because the juvenile thief had alleged “police brutality” and his mother was there raising the roof.

Rodrigo and Mikey trekked back for this nonsense, avverred the police acted correctly, and came back to the office–at some point they may have to go in front of a judge in support of the police. As far as I am concerned, the police did a great job and are to be rewared.

Of course, so did Batman and Robin….and they went home with bonuses.

At this point you may be thinking: Thank you Southron for the weather report, but what the heck does this have to do with Supergas?

Because of the mild temperatures nine months of the year many houses (and even apartments) here do not have any heating system beyond a fireplace or two. During the cold months they rely on very efficient space heaters fueled by Supergas, more commonly known as propane gas, bottled gas, or simply LPG.

The sole importer of Supergas is ANCAP, the state-owned company that provides oil, gasoline, propane, and (believe it or not) cement. To the best of my knowledge, ANCAP does not distribute Supergas directly to the public. That task is handled by a goodly number of distribution companies.

In normal times, this system works very well. Each of the distribution companies have rolling fleets of trucks which deliver the gas in 13 kg (28 lbs) tanks, usually within 30 minutes after you call in your order. But, because of the extreme fog over the last few weeks, several shiploads of Supergas were delayed, and a shortage developed here in Montevideo. To my knowledge very few people actually ran out of gas, but in many cases, our own included, we ended up using our entire backup store of gas before we could get any refills.

The response of the “powers-that-be” at ANCAP was amusing. It was a perfect example of a bureaucracy making matters worse.

In order to reduce the amount of Supergas consumed, ANCAP allowed the distributors to reduce the amount of gas per tank from the standard 13 kg to 8 kg. Of course, some scalawags took advantage of this situation and started putting only 4 kg of gas in each tank. But ANCAP moved with alacrity to counter such gouging, and ordered that tanks that were sold with only 8 kg of Supergas would be required to have a black sticker over the nozzle instead of the usual red one. (This is almost as good as the childproof bottles in the US that only children can open.)

I guess the idea was to more evenly distribute the amount of gas that was available, but what ANCAP neglected to factor in was that tanks with less gas would need to be replaced more often, thus burning more gasoline or diesel in the delivery trucks… then again, since ANCAP is the primary supplier for gasoline and diesel fuel, perhaps they did factor it in. ¿Quien sabe?

The good news is that the fog has lifted, the weather is back to normal, and Supergas is super again!

While sitting here in my office and staring into the fog on the Rio de la Plata I had a vision….

At first I was in a place that seemed a pleasant enough, but no matter how hard I tried it there were always obstacles that I had to climb over–the harder I climbed, the more obstacles there were, until one day I slipped and fell…

As I tumbled through space I tried to get my bearings: I finally landed alongside the river. This place seem bigger and prettier and certainly flatter than the place before it. But, it had a problem too: some of my friends were allergic to it, and every time I left it, I had a bigger and bigger hole in my pocket. It bothered me so much that I could not sleep. Finally, well after midnight, I fell into a fitful sleep while weighing the contradictions…

I awoke to a cacaphony of music and voices and found myself in the midst of a celebrating crowd–but the crowd was so big that I couldn’t move; I was caught like a sardine in a can with mustard sauce. The noise became so great that I shut my eyes and put both hands over my one good ear until I finally blacked out…

And lo, and behold when I awoke I was in familiar surroundings with a fireplace cheerfully crackling, my little dog Harry sleeping next to me, and my big dog Lucy at my feet.

None of that really happened! But, I thought it was kind of an artistic way of retelling the story of our peripatetic Sunday gatherings.

The time for a change has come again!

In fact, this time there will be two changes:

• First, the meeting with will be reincarnated from its Sunday life to a new life on Thursday; and,

• Second, the meeting will be trans-migrated from Don Pepperone to Casa de Southron, UruguayLiving.com’s office in Buceo.

• Instead of a Sunday brunch, we will host a Thursday happy hour from 6 to 9 p.m.

From the beginning we had hoped to have more Uruguayos participate in our get-togethers, but Sunday is a difficult day for them, as it is generally reserved for family events. Restaurants have proven unsatisfactory for one reason or another, but perhaps the worst feature was that it made it hard for people to talk to anyone except those seated nearby.

UruguayLiving.com will supply potables, both potent and otherwise, as well as basic snacks. Everyone is encouraged to bring along anything they would like to share.

There is plenty of parking on the street, and we have a newly built ramp in the front for wheelchair access.

People will be able to gather around the fireplace, or the card table; at the dart board or the foosball table.

Valiant though undoubtedly insufficient efforts will be made to accommodate both smokers and non-smokers–disputes will be resolved in the square circle according to the Marquis of Queensberry rules (that’s a joke, I think).

We purposely have chosen an early starting hour so that attending is convenient for people on their way home from work, is before the weekly “guys night out”, and well before the local Thursday night revelries begin at 10 or 11 o’clock.

This happy hour is open to everyone, and no reservations are required–we hope to see you here soon.

Don’t forget your favorite mantra: Ommmmmmmmmmm…

]]> http://www.uruguayliving.com/2007/05/21/reincarnated-and-transmigrated/feed/ 2 http://www.uruguayliving.com/2007/04/28/cultural-icons/ http://www.uruguayliving.com/2007/04/28/cultural-icons/#comments Sat, 28 Apr 2007 15:15:46 +0000 The Southron http://www.uruguayliving.com/2007/04/28/cultural-icons/ In every country in which I have been there is a least one cultural icon that is emblematic of that country.

• In the United States it is the single family car, the very embodiment of individual freedom of action;

• in the United Kingdom, one might argue that it is the Bobby–a police constable with a funny hat, the living representation of polite society, modern democracy, and the monarchical anachronism;

• in Switzerland it is certainly the extremely expensive and highly accurate timepiece–great efficiency at great cost and

• in France it is, of course, the Eiffel Tower: garish, empty, and unfinished (where the heck is the siding anyway?).

Like everything else in Uruguay, it’s cultural icon is understated and at first, not entirely obvious. But after living here for more than 14 months, I have come to the conclusion that the real emblem of day-to-day life in Uruguay is the little machine with the sign on it that says “retire un numero—take a number”. These little boxes are everywhere: banks, stores, restaurants, government offices, service counters–about the only place I haven’t seen them is in the bathroom.

A few weeks ago I was shopping in perhaps the largest furniture store in Montevideo. The store was filled with clerks and almost devoid of patrons. It was obvious that I was there to buy something, but no one came near me. I checked to make sure that my zipper was up and that I didn’t smell like an oversized crock of Limburger cheese. A quick glance in the mirror indicated that my fangs remained filed down and that my visage was no more intimidating than usual.

Despite that, I was being ignored.

Then it struck me, “retire un numero—take a number”! I asked Borko to go back to the entrance and get a number. Immediately he did so the polarity of my personality magnet was instantly changed from “repel” to “attract” and the sales clerks came swarming. In many restaurants you will experience a similar change of polarity when you put your menu down and close it.

The “take a number” box is Uruguay’s ubiquitous guardian of egalitarianism: it recognizes neither rich nor poor; neither prince nor pauper; neither busy nor indolent. Everyone takes a number and waits, and waits, and waits…

As vexing as this may be, it does remind us that time is paid out to us minute by minute, hour by hour, day by day; and regardless of our station in life, time is the one thing that we all get equally in daily measure…

Then came April.  At first I thought it was an April Fools’ Day joke perpetrated by the cosmic weather powers–it was just too nice.  But now halfway through the month I realize that this year, March has come in April.  I’m not exactly sure how that works, but I guess I’ll just add that to the list of Southern Hemisphere phenomena that are beyond me.  (Those who spent their lives researching the secrets of the Bermuda triangle should take on something really challenging like explaining how the laws of nature and science work in the southern hemisphere.)

The anomaly having been noted, I cannot help but enjoy the beauty of the day: a blue sky filled with puffy cotton ball clouds; gentle breezes wafting in from the river; and a temperature of 23C/74F with low humidity.

Whenever the weather is nice, Uruguayans are outside.

The local football team is practicing in the park in front of my house, the sidewalk along the Rambla is slowly increasing in the number of runners, walkers and bikers taking advantage of its magnificent vistas, and the professional dog walkers are unloading their jostling packs of canines from their pickup trucks for a romp through the park.

All in all, it is a fine day to be in Montevideo, Uruguay; and I for one and glad to be alive.

I know many of you have been wondering exactly what was going on: whether I had abandoned this project, or was injured, or ill, occupied, or perhaps even imprisoned.  The short answer is: ill and occupied.

As many of you know, I am handicapped and have had to undergo a goodly number of physical challenges, not the least of which has been a six-year-old Staphylococcus infection, which has done its damnedest to kill me.  The good news is, that God-willing, the infection appears to finally be beaten.  The bad news is that it has left me with a left leg ravaged as if I had third-degree burns.  My particular version of the infection was the kind known as “the flesh eater”, and it did a fine job of living up to its name.  Because of this, the healing process is extremely painful and I cannot promise you, at least for the next few months, how productive I’ll be.  I can promise you that I will do as much as I can as often as I can, and that under no circumstances will I give up.

Every time I feel like giving up I remember a section in C. S. Lewis’s book “Screwtape Letters”, in which Screwtape tells his nephew that there is no greater joy in Hell than when someone gives up just before they would’ve succeeded–I have no intention of giving Screwtape, Wormwood, or Lucifer himself that joy.

In the words of Sir Winston Leonard Spencer Churchill, “never, never, never, never give in, except to convictions of honor, or of good sense”.