Uruguay

On Easter, we headed down to the ferry dock in BA and bought tickets for the ferry to Uruguay. Buenos Aires sits on the estuary of the Río de la Plata, and at this point the river is so wide that it takes an hour to cross. We went through customs before getting on the boat. A man who looked a lot like Albert Einstein typed something on a computer and stamped my passport with an Argentine exit stamp. Then he pointed to a man sitting at the other end of the table and barked, "Uruguay!". He handed the man my passport, who glanced at the photo page and then stamped it with an entry for Uruguay. I thought it was neat that immigration officers from the two countries work in tandem like that. What do they talk about when no one is going through their line? Do they always work with the same partner? What if Argentina and Uruguay had a diplomatic crisis? Would they still work side by side, stamping and penning "90 días" (the period of permanency for tourists) into people's passports?

The ferry was a super-modern spaceship looking thing. Aboard we got our first taste of Uruguay: everyone was sipping mate out of hollowed-out gourds with metal straws. Every now and then they would add more hot water from thermoses to the gourds. Everyone was so low-key, happily chatting and sipping their mate. I got the feeling we would like Uruguay very much.

On the Uruguay side, we disembarked at Colonia. It is a very old port town with colonial architecture and cobblestone streets. We ate lunch and walked to the top of a lighthouse. You could just see the sunlight gleaming off the skyscrapers in BA far away across the river. I felt like we were worlds away from the hustle and bustle of the city.

At the bus station, we ran into a slight problem: all the buses to Montevideo were booked. However, we could opt to pay a slightly less fare and ride standing the whole way. The trip was 2 hours, and we already had reservations in a hostel in Montevideo. We agreed, and off we went standing while every seat was filled. We drove for awhile down a very beautiful two-lane highway lined with date palms. Soon the bus pulled over and the driver told us that there were two empty seats on the bus immediately behind us. I told PJ and Liz to go take them; I didn't mind standing the rest of the way to Montevideo. They walked to the other bus, which had pulled up behind us, and we were on our way again.

The Uruguayan countryside was composed of gently rolling hills with neat little farms and villages. It was extremely clean. I never saw any trash on the sides of the road, and the houses were immaculate. Now I see why Uruguay is known as the "Switzerland of South America". We pulled into Montevideo at dusk, and got a taxi to our hostel.

After unpacking, we set out to find dinner, accompanied by some other hostel guests (mostly Brits). It was Easter Sunday night and Montevideo was DEAD. There were very few people on the streets and even fewer businesses open. We finally found a restaurant that was open and ate. The walk back to hotel was even more devoid of other people. The place felt like a ghost-town. We saw an old building that was once the tallest in Latin America, testimony to the fact that Montevideo was once a very rich port city. Uruguay still is a wealthy country, but was hit hard in the economic crisis of 2001 in neighboring Argentina. Montevideo was recently voted the city with the highest quality of life in South America. I don't feel as though I got a very good picture of the daily lives of its citizens since we were only there for one night, but from what I could tell, Montevideo is an extremely laid-back city. The Uruguayan people are also very friendly. We managed to find a bar that was open (after a pointless and expensive cab ride whereby we were driven through a dark park and got directions from a prostitute) and mingled with a few Uruguayans and some Brazilians who were apparently there on vacation. Outside the bar, on the other side of the street, a lone policeman walked up and down the block making sure no one got too rowdy. I liked this very much: I felt very safe and yet the cop wasn't a threatening presence to anyone. He was just there, in the background, in the seemingly unlikely event that something should get out of hand. Montevideo definitely felt like a very safe city. Later, back at the hostel, we prepared some mate for ourselves to see what it was all about. It is a very bitter tea-like drink which would probably be an acquired taste for most. I took to it immediately.

The next morning, we caught a glimpse of the city coming back to workweek life as we headed back to the bus station for our connection back to Colonia and the ferry back to BA. The same quaint immigration procedures were in place before boarding the boat: a jovial Uruguayan officer working with a jolly fat Argentine woman who added more stamps into the old passport. I was disheartened to see that both of my Uruguay stamps were dealt with a rubber die so worn that the word "Uruguay" is barely legible. But I was there, nonetheless; in a country where seemingly so few visit. It's their loss.