My last day in Uruguay has begun. On my mind is yesterday's sunset, which was applauded by hundreds of people watching it while sitting on the beach. What a scene. My last similarly impressive encounter with unexpected applauding was 10 years ago in Ukraine, where people regularly applaud scenes while watching a movie at cinema, they respectfully wait until the scene is over, and then applause sets in. In La Paloma, people wait until the sun goes, and then it's Bravo from all sides.
I walk to the printers I saw in the corridor at my hotel. Why not print out the schedule of the ferry options back to Argentina? So, here I am, two printers, one computer. Pure luxury. I start to play around and try to open a web page. All of a sudden, I see tons of bizarrely looking documents open and I don't understand a word about them. The browser won't open although I shut most documents; it's one of these reflexes. Suddenly, a thought crosses my mind: what if this is someone's private computer? Although it would seem odd that someone would travel with TWO printers? I walk to the reception and ask. Disaster strikes. The different people speaking English and Chinese I already ran into yesterday night at the hotel are actually "oil people". This is how the room cleaner describes them. I probably just shut down an entire oilrig off the Uruguayan shore. Or I sabotaged the latest Chinese project to get control over the La Plata. I need to get lost soon, before the oil people return. So I'm off to the beach.
There, someone is just hanging around. A cross with Jesus watches over one of La Paloma's super-fine beaches. The area's coastline is stunningly beautiful, sandy beaches everywhere, really long bays. The majority of tourists here are Uruguayan teenagers, or very young students, which seems to be a seasonal thing. Their hot spot is La Pedrera though, which at nighttime changes into one big outdoor disco, a stark contrast to the relaxed La Paloma feel. It's just great out here, and there is my friend Julio, who drives me around in his Toyota that I described in a previous post. Of course, I was wrong. His car is actually a Jin-Bei from China. Google that one, as you might have to get used to it. Julio jokes around that the best way to remember the car's name is to say Beijing the other way round. Well there is some truth to this. Mandarin speakers please excuse.
There is a certain hippie feel to this place, even more so as Julio's daughter's hamburger joint is somehow Bob Marley-themed while blasting Uruguayan rock music. Great. We eat at a restaurant called Palma de Mallorca. There is not a single German there, not really doing justice to the Spanish city of the same name but it's needless to say there are no Germans needed here. After lunch, Julio drops me off at my very decent Bahía Hotel, he has work to do for his local newspaper. I did not know when I met him in Cuba that he was a newspaper impresario dominating La Paloma and beyond. I will become even more part of his life later that day; there is an asado to which I am invited at his house. A barbecue, my Spanish allows for understanding that, but I have no clue what expects me. The oil people, by the way, are not here. I hope they went to nearby Brazil (the border is only 90 kilometres away) and have discovered something generating capital and won't come back before tomorrow morning when I take the bus back to Montevideo and then the ferry to Buenos Aires.
As barbecue time has come, I am being driven outside of La Paloma, to Julio's neighbourhood. His house is yet another big pleasure dome that can compete with the Montevideo house I was staying in. Uruguayans, or at least the ones I know, seem to be very keen on very individually styled homes, and angry locals probably have chased out IKEA a long time ago. At Julio's, it's five cats or more, three dogs but maybe I miscounted, there is a parrot, there are tons of recycled old things, a parabolic antenna he has taken from Fritz Lang's Metropolis, a flipper machine from a time when we watched "Who you're going to call? Ghostbusters!" Just to name a few. On the huge porch the action takes place. There is a fireplace with meat for about 20 people or so. Hallelujah. It's Ballantine’s straight away without questions asked but I could have tried another 15 different whiskeys, in between posters and banners he has brought from his various trips to countries such as Cuba, Venezuela, Nicaragua and counting. Here I am, and three of his friends show up. The first one immediately sets up a camera. Channel 8. Uruguayan TV. Interview time.
It was pretty obvious that this blog project would end in general fame from the start. The interview begins, the reporter speaks at lightning speed and he speaks Uruguayan Spanish, which I have only just discovered five days ago. I try to do my best though. The Ballantine's was a triple one, I guess, Julio-style, and I mistreat the Spanish language hardly, for which I beg pardon to all Spanish-speaking people in the world and to his majesty in Madrid himself. Por qué no te callas? This is what he probably said in Madrid when watching this but the problem is, this is not the only interview to give tonight. And not the only Ballantine's to swallow, plus there is beer and: meat. It is one big feast, other people come in, and meat plates go round and round. The only thing missing is the wedding society. But we're a good bunch of folks, discussing local matters. The others, that is, I am being kept busy with eating. Plus, what should I have said? Except from giving an explanation why the oilrig somewhere between La Paloma and Antarctica probably exploded. The next interview takes place after midnight, and it's a radio interview with Cadena de la Costa. Luckily, it's a lot about football, among other things. Will the final in Russia be Uruguay against Germany? What is your favourite team in Uruguay? I said FC Danubio Montevideo, because I'm from the Danube, too and that's a great connection, I thought. No matter what, Five days in the world's best country has undoubtedly won the World Cup tonight.
To savor this big success, Julio's friend Miguel takes me to have ice cream in La Pedrera, where all the adolescents parading up and down seem to have had just one party too much. The atmosphere is of the "Let's leave tomorrow" kind. This what I have to do, as a shooting in Buenos Aires awaits me. So I head out to Montevideo the next morning, say goodbye to my new friends Camila and Francisco and their simply fantastic house. Then it's Colonia del Sacramento again and the ferry, we had all this in the first episode. Buenos Aires is still two hours away, but one can already see its skyline from afar across the La Plata. Wow. Back to the big city we go.
Uruguay has blown my mind. What a country. And I have only seen a tiny little bit of it, and I have only met a few of its people. Its capital is a real must-see, especially the old town. The West coast around Colonia DS and Nueva Helvecia is just profoundly pleasant, rural, and authentic. The East Coast is a mega-stunner. And it gets better the further you go, with more time I would have gone to the Natural Park towards the Brazilian border. What I can confirm is that the general laid-back atmosphere of the country is contagious.
I'm sure inland there is a lot more to explore. There are thermal spas, wide plains, and even a little mountain range. One village just right next to the Uruguay River, which shapes the Western border with Argentina, is actually called Nuevo Berlín. It's a shame I could not go but the name clearly sums up the truth I will now massively feed with the help of weird hash tags to the world: Uruguay is the New Berlin.