EVEN BETTER AIRS IN MONTEVIDEO; BUT PERCUSSION FESTIVALS?

Uruguay is pretty sweet, like Argentina without (much) attitude. You get off the ferry in Colonia from Bs. As. and the first thing you notice is how quiet it is. The second thing you notice is how nice everyone is. When you go to Montevideo the comparison with Buenos Aires is even starker- there are no maniac drivers and no maniac pedestrians. Drivers wait to let pedestrians cross, the pedestrians themselves wait to cross, and there are still a few horses pulling carts, just like in the old days. The quarterback would probably still marry the head cheerleader, just like life’s supposed to be, except they don’t play American football here (only Thailand has cheerleading as a standalone art form). Okay, so maybe it’s not Boston to Buenos Aires’s New York, but it’s at least Philadelphia.

Uruguay belongs to a kinder gentler era (remember George Bush without the ‘W’?) when the middle class worked diligently to improve their conditions little by little and poverty was a condition of circumstance, not a social class to be forgotten or exploited. Some things are the same as in Argentina of course- 10am check-out time at hotels (wake up early!), the highest rate of baldness to be found in Latin America (yes!), and the Spanish dialect mutated farthest from the original, in its vernacular form on the verge of mutual intelligibility. This wasn’t so obvious until I said ‘gracias’ to someone and they responded ‘por favor’. Huh? But whereas in Buenos Aires they might hold this up in an outsider’s face for a cheap laugh at his expense (welcome to Thailand), in Uruguay they seem to make every effort at communication. Communication, now there’s a concept! So much for psycholinguistics…

Prices seem a bit lower in Montevideo. You can still get a No-Depression room for barely two figures (don’t try that in Bs. As.), and you can even sit down (sit down!) in an eatery and fill your belly for less than three bucks, on something besides hamburgers or hot dogs if you’re lucky, like maybe spaghetti or ravioli a la bolognesa of course, no baloney. You pay for the old-fashioned prices, though, in a reduction of selection. Chinese restaurants are almost unheard of here and the ones that exist still seem to be in ‘chop suey’ mode. That’s always a bad sign, as if they haven’t yet heard of anything ‘moo goo’ or General what’s-his-name and his famous chicken. The street food seems even more limited than Buenos Aires, and just as devoid of vegetables, what vegetables there are just as devoid of vitamins.

But there are plenty of fancy places too, almost like Buenos Aires, including a traditional market entirely converted to that use (pic #4). Those places are presumably of international standard, though obviously heavily invested in the beef industry. It’s a bit tough for a semi-vegetarian like my self. I hear the wines are good, but I don’t drink alone anymore, and if you thought Argentina was ahead of the game by offering mixed drinks on overnight bus trips, Uruguay one-ups them by giving free whiskey samples in the grocery store. Now that’s service! They don’t even do that in Thailand, and that’s party central! The coffee IS good and it’s maybe even a dime or two cheaper than Bs As. People dance tango in the parks (pic #3) and life is a sentimental affair.

There’s an old central core to the city which is surrounded by water on three sides, but struggling to make the transition to the modern era. Truth be told, somebody should have thought of that at least fifty years ago, before ugly 60’s construction moved in, including the ugliest building I’ve ever seen, right on the edge of a lovely central plaza. I don’t usually revel in ugliness, but this mother’s ugly (pic #2)! Still old town has some parts worth saving and, if realtors’ ads are to be believed, prices are not cheap considering its current mostly dilapidated state, like U$100K for a flat that needs total refurb. Ouch! And this is in a country that demonstrates in the street for a raise in the minimum wage to the equivalent of U$400 per month. It’s all psychological. There’s a sizeable Jewish presence in this part of the world, too, in addition to the well-documented German one.

So by some quirk of fate there just happens to be a ‘percussion festival’ going on this weekend in Montevideo. I couldn’t plan these things out if I wanted. I can’t help but wonder what a percussion festival would be like in Uruguay. With Seattle I got a pretty good idea, but Uruguay? That’s kind of like farms in Berkeley isn’t it? So I went, even shelled out good bucks for it. It wasn’t bad either, though more of a grad student recital than a festival I reckon. It was hardly a drum fest; let’s put it that way. With songs on the program from John Cage and Toru Takemitsu, you know that you’re probably in for something a little different, neither tribal drumming nor tablas. The fact that sheet music accompanied every piece was notable. Some of the same group members rotated through different line-ups and instruments, but PERCEUM, the Ensamble de Percusion de Montevideo, was the linchpin to the entire evening, weaving bells and drums and marimbas into an elaborate tapestry of sonic distinction, complete with choreography in the lighting also. These guys are well traveled and properly lauded in art and music circles and well worth the listen. Some of the students’ pieces were comparatively little more than filler and sometimes wallowed in cutesiness (pic #1), but still worthy efforts.

If I had more time, I might hang out for a while in MV, long enough to find a favorite café and bar and maybe a cheap hotel with wi-fi too. That’s crucial. People laugh at my insistence on cheap hotels, but there’s more than money at stake here. It’s part of an ethic, my own if not of backpackers, to see life as lived by regular people, not fancy tourists with their money and their cocaine... well, okay, maybe a little. But as it is there are other wild cards still to play. If they fall through, I can always come back here. The first wild card for this trip was Paraguay, but that’s long past now, filed away in the ‘forgettable’ category. The next even wilder card is Patagonia, written up many times from Theroux to Chatwin. I can’t remember what the big deal was; it sounds pretty boring, though the name is pretty and perfect for sportswear. For me the big deal’s the Arctic Circle, or in this case, the Antarctic. Maybe I’m an extremophile; I like those extreme conditions where the world becomes otherworldly. Of course you can’t go nearly as far south as you can north. Tierra del Fuego’s it. Any further and you have to hitch a ride to Antarctica. It’s only as far south as maybe Juneau is north, but still it’s farther south than either Tasmania or South Africa, the closest contenders from other continents. Hopefully temps will be warming up a little; what’s it like in Juneau in mid-May anyway? If I’m really lucky I’ll catch the aurora australis. That’s better than the midnight sun any day. You can’t have both, not in the same trip anyway.

This particular going to extremes should be especially significant, because that’s where I plan to vote in the US elections. I’ve already got the materials scanned to me and intend to fax them in from Punta Arenas. The people in Coconino County have been very nice and helpful. It’s ironic that that’s in John McCain’s home state. Till then I’ll spend my remaining day in Uruguay roaming the neighborhoods I’ve yet to see. Unfortunately it’s Saturday, so things shut down early. How many of us can remember when the US did that? If you closed all shops on Saturday retail sales would plummet in the US. You should see it here on Sunday. I finally found a warm jacket today so I’m ready for Patagonia. Now with the Uruguayan equivalent of two dollars left in my pocket to last me the next twenty-four hours, my options are pretty limited. Leaving a country with no extra currency to spare is an art. Of course having currency to spare is not the main problem. Having no currency at all is a REAL problem. This can happen even when you’ve got plenty of money in the bank and credit cards to boot. So I sit in the park ruminating, chewing the cud, where I’ve got a rogue wi-fi signal and I can plot trajectories on crystal balls, globes of the world every one, another country’s notch on my belt.