The Adventures of Camp

Javy, Febrruary 12, 2015

Teo and I are going to a camp.  We go every day.  We ride our bikes there.  Our mom leaves us for four and a half hours and we get to play whatever we want.  We play soccer and ping-pong, and there is a fun place to climb, and a pool - a big pool that is at least the size of a jumbo jet.  There are not enough kids to fill up the pool!

The kids are pretty nice.  We met some new friends named Lucas and Joaquin and Maximo.  We kind of talk and kind of use hand motions to signal what we want.  We're understanding a little bit but not enough to communicate very well.  We hope that we can understand better by the time we leave!

Two Festivals and a Birthday

Marilyn, February 8, 2015

We are lucky enough to be here in Uruguay at a time of year when there is a lot going on.  As Teo and I have reported before, it's Carnaval season, plus summer vacation, and there is much to see and do.  This past week, we've moved from Montevideo to Atlántida, where the year-round population of 5,600 grows to about 20,000 in January and February.  The beaches and shops and restaurants are crowded and the we're having to dodge a lot of traffic when we go out exploring on our newly-purchased bikes.  We're enjoying being here, but also looking forward to having the beach and town more to ourselves in a few weeks.

We timed our move so that we would still be in Montevideo on February 2, the day of an annual festival on the beach near the apartment we were renting.  The festival celebrates Yemanjá (or Iemanjá) Day, which honors the goddess of the sea in the Umbanda tradition of Brazil.  Umbanda, which combines African religious customs with elements of Roman Catholicism and Native American beliefs, originally was practiced by African slaves in Brazil.  Now their descendants continue the religious traditions, and many others in Brazil, Uruguay, and elsewhere appreciate the festivals and traditions from a cultural standpoint.

This statue of the goddess Yemanjá stands across the street from the beach, and not far from the U.S. Embassy.  She's looking out across the water, as if protecting the sailors and sea creatures in her care.  Around Yemanjá Day, flowers are left around the statue.  This photo was taken by our friend Steve Anthony.

In the late afternoon on February 2, crowds began to gather on the beach and on the Rambla above.  Many little stands sprang up, selling flowers and other items to offer to Yemanjá.  The boys and I wandered around among the worshippers and sightseers trying to take in and understand all that was going on, and Gene joined us later as the sun was setting and the energy of the crowd increased.  There were way too many sights, sounds, and smells to try to adequately describe, but I captured as much as I could in these photos.

Candles are an important element of the festival, but the strong wind blowing off the water makes it hard to light them.  So all over the beach, people dig holes and put the candles down inside them.

Here's someone who actually got a candle to stay lit for a little while.

Besides candles, offerings of fruits, popcorn, and other foods are made.  Watermelon is especially popular, maybe because it also makes a good candle holder.  

Other offerings are placed on little boats so they can be pushed out to sea to honor the goddess. 

Some families construct little shrines with their offerings all laid out in the sand.  

Individuals, groups, and families will take their boats and offerings and walk far out into the water, then push their boats out to "sea," although this is still the estuary of the Rio de la Plata, not the open ocean.  As they return to the beach, they walk backwards out of respect, not wanting to turn their backs on their offerings.

As the sun began to set, the image of hundreds of people wading out into the water and returning, still facing the sea, was pretty striking.  

Here and there on the beach, and spread out in the shallow water, were priest-like people (I'm not sure what they are actually called) who were giving blessings to all who requested them.  I was later told that the priests are most likely Brazilian.  Both male and female, they were dressed in white, flowing robes, and to my surprise, did not appear to be of African descent.  

A band with lots of drumming, also typical of the traditions of Brazilians and Uruguayans of African descent, played from above the beach on the Rambla.  

Along with the elements of religious solemnity, there was also a definite carnival vibe.  Ice cream and cotton candy vendors walked up and down the beach shouting out to potential customers,

and Javy taking a moment to be silly with a jellyfish he found didn't seem out of place at all.  

There were about as many cameras as there were candles, so I didn't feel awkward about asking to take pictures.  Journalists abounded, and this one who was barking out orders to his crew in what we took to be German was especially bent on getting a good story.  

As we were leaving around 9:30, I noticed a group of people with these t-shirts on, proclaiming that they care for nature.  I assume that they are part of a small but growing effort I had read about encouraging people think about the environmental effect of all the candles and offerings floating out to sea, and about the trash left behind on the beaches by tens of thousands of festival-goers.  They certainly have their work cut out for them.  

On our walk back home through the crowded park to our apartment, we saw busloads of people still arriving.  The festivities continued long into the night, and even though we turned in early, it seemed like a wonderful way to end our time in Montevideo.

Four days later, it was time to return to Montevideo for another festival that I felt compelled to attend, Las Llamadas.  (See this link for an article that is poorly translated but has good information and photos.)  The boys and I headed to the bus stop in Atlántida around 5 p.m., and after almost getting on the wrong bus a couple of times, we were helped to choose a correct, but crowded, one heading for the city.  Javy and I ended up standing much of the way, but eventually got a seat and Javy even dozed for a bit.  He was awakened by a busking guitarist and flautist who boarded the bus as we approached Montevideo and serenaded us with some lovely music.  I was especially impressed with the flautist who didn't seem fazed by all the bumps that were jostling the rest of us all over the place.  We got off the bus near Gene's work, and met him at a Fresh Market (same chain as the upscale groceries in the U.S.) which had food that looked wonderful as well as wonderfully familiar.  But the prices and the length of the check-out line intimidated us enough that we went off in search of a restaurant instead.  While eating our pizza and burgers (mine was a hamburguesa completa, meaning, I discovered, that it came with ham, olives, and half a boiled egg on it), Gene told me that his colleagues had strongly advised him not to carry a backpack to the Llamadas, because of the risk of getting it stolen.  We had between us two backpacks containing three (yes, three, embarrassingly enough) iPads, a lot of cash, our credit cards, and passports.  We reviewed our options, including the option of just taking them with us and guarding them with our lives.  We finally decided to ask our very nice waiter if we could leave them at the restaurant.  So, I started the conversation with, "Our friends have told us it's unsafe to take our backpacks to the Llamadas."  He responded, "And you want to leave them here?"  So it was settled, and we turned our backpacks over to him with assurances that we'd be back before the restaurant closed at 1 a.m.

We got on another bus, complete with busking guitarist/vocalist, who was not as talented as the musicians on the first bus, but who I tipped anyway, as I have been in the habit of doing since becoming a parent of a musician.  Twenty minutes later, the driver told us it was time to get off, another passenger pointed us in the right direction down a busy street, and soon we were in the middle of the crowd of Llamadas spectators.  Loud, excited, pushing, shoving, smoking spectators, all intent on snagging a good viewing spot that no one else had yet discovered.  We rejoiced when we found what on first appearance seemed to be an ideal corner, up against a building that had a 3" ledge that we figured the boys could perch on when the parade started.  And when they climbed up there and leaned against Gene and me for balance, they did in fact have a decent view, even after the three tallest young men in all of Uruguay decided to stand right in front of us.  What we had not counted on was that since we were up against the building, the eighteen inches of sidewalk between us and the people filling in along the street became the thoroughfare for the multitude of people who thought the view might be better around the corner.  It seemed to me that the fact that thousands of people were heading west on that narrow thoroughfare might have been a clue to the thousands that were trying to head east that there was no good view to be found, but apparently I wasn't understanding the situation correctly.  In any case, for the better part of an hour that we waited for the parade to start, and the better part of another hour that we watched it trickle by us at a snail's pace, we had a whole mass of humanity pushing and shoving to get past us, with hardly a "perdón" being uttered.  I kept trying to imagine what it would have been like to have a bulky backpack or two further impeding this flow of bodies, and was awfully glad we weren't finding out.  A couple of times when the boys grew tired of perching on their precarious ledge and came down to the sidewalk, I was seriously concerned about the risk of them being trampled.  We decided to stay until the first drumming group passed us, since the drumming was really what the whole thing was all about.  I managed to hand my phone up to Teo, who was leaning on my head in most uncomfortable fashion, to take a few pictures of what he could see.

He also managed to film this video:

Following the first wave of flags and feathery dancers, a regiment of drummers came thundering by, and we decided we'd had our requisite cultural experience.  We peeled ourselves off of our wall and writhed our way into the river of bodies in front of us.  Our spots were vacant for less than the time it took for me to pull Teo in front of me, and I guided him out of there, shielding him with my body from the waves of torsos above him.  Just around the corner was relatively open space, and it seemed like a different world entirely.  We hailed a cab without any problem, and answered the driver's curious question about didn't we want to stay and hear drums?  It turns out that the cab driver was the best part of the whole night for me.  He was a very animated older man with bushy eyebrows that leapt almost off his face when I said we were from Atlanta.  What do you know, but years ago he had had the chance to go work in a synagogue in Atlanta but because of visa issues, ended up instead in France and Spain.  More excitement when I mentioned that I teach geography.  Why, he was a geography teacher, too!  We just babbled the rest of the way to the restaurant, and I learned more about English architecture in Spain than I every would have imagined possible.  I decided that if I really want to become fluent in Spanish, the best thing I could do is hire a taxi to drive me around for several hours and day, with the driver telling me all of his life's stories.  

We were greeted at the restaurant by our waiter who had our backpack ready to go for us, and soon were on the bus back to Atlántida.  It was standing room only for most of the hour-long ride, and we were more than ready to be home by the time the bus let us off.  

Sunday, Gene's birthday, was a day to be celebrated as well, though we did it in a quieter way.   A new Canadian friend took us on a tour of the area surrounding Atlántida, which was very helpful for getting our bearings.  I was nursing a sore knee, so Gene and Javy went out in search of a birthday cake at a pastry shop that this friend recommended.  The line was too long and the service too slow (as we are finding is typical), so they settled for going to the local supermarket and buying what appeared to be a chocolate cake but turned out to be more of a glob of chocolaty goodness in a chocolate crust, with rolls of milk chocolate on top.  

The boys whistled happy birthday, and we all watched Back to the Future 3.  Besides driving around for hours in cabs, watching movies in English with Spanish subtitles seems a pretty great way to achieve fluency, so there may be more of that in my future.  For Teo and Javy, I'm hoping that the summer camp program they started this week will be just what they need to get them over the language hurdle.  In the meantime, we'll keep taking advantage of whatever opportunities come our way to acclimate ourselves to the language, culture, beauty, and frustrations of this wonderful place!

Moving to Atlántida

Teo, February 6, 2015

A couple of days ago, we came to the house that we are going to stay at for the rest of the time we will be in Uruguay.  It is very close to the beach, so we can just walk down a little path and get to the beach.  

The path to the ocean

The bridge over the stream on the way to the ocean

This house is a duplex, and someone else rents the space next door.  Javy and I have a very nice room with bunk beds that are kind of too small for us, and the mattresses are rock hard.  

We have been having lots of fun.  Yesterday we went to the outdoor market.  It was big, but there weren't very many people there.  We bought fruit, laundry detergent, a bar of soap, sunscreen, eggs, and nuts.  For lunch, we got empanadas and they were very, very tasty.  On the way home, we stopped for ice cream by a McDonald's and a little amusement park.

We also go to the beach a lot.  We play in the waves and try to get huge waves over our heads and try to get washed ashore.   We have found some neat things, like a crab and three jellyfish.

  

I like it here a lot!

Yummy Cheeseburgers

Javy, Februray 2, 2015

In Uruguay, some of the food is odd.  Here is an example.

We were at the park on Saturday.  Teo and I were hungry.  We were going to go get something to eat at the deli, but it was closed.  We decided to go to a little food stand at the park.

They sold hamburgers (hamburguesas), hot dogs (panchos), and sausages (hungaras and chorizos).  There was a super-duper big hamburger that had cheese, bacon, and ham on it, more than I could eat. You would say what you wanted, and the people would cook it, and then they would ask you what you wanted on it.  Here were the choices:  olives, onions, peas, corn, pineapple, red peppers, cucumbers, mushrooms, pickles, papas pay (which are like shoestring potatoes), garlic, parsley, and some sauces, including one called golf sauce.

This is the food that you could put on your hot dog or hamburger.

I chose a hamburger with cheese on it and papas pay.  Teo had a hot dog with catsup and the same potato chip stuff.  Dad got a cheeseburger and olives on it and our mom had a cheeseburger with pineapple.  It cost 300 pesos, or about $12.

My hamburger was very good, but the bun was too small for the big hamburger patty.  Teo said his hot dog was good, too.

There were lots of pigeons trying to grab the bread we threw out to them.  Little birds were successful in getting the bread pieces, too.

It was nice to eat in the park.  It was neat to have that food, and it was very yummy.

Exploring Montevideo

Marilyn, January 28, 2015

After our adventures of the last few weeks traveling hither and yon, we are back in Montevideo for two weeks.  We are renting a seventh-floor apartment that provides us with a beautiful view of a large park with the Rio de la Plata beyond, complete with breathtaking sunsets.  Gene is easing into his work and is feeling very optimistic about the research he will be doing and the colleagues he'll be working with.  We are all starting to figure things out a little better.  The boys are understanding a good deal of Spanish, I'm communicating adequately in most cases, and Gene is doing an admirable job of putting the few Spanish words he knows together with clues from his translation apps and a good deal of sign language to get the information he needs.  He also dealt beautifully with the neighbor who called the police the first day we were in our apartment because she thought we were breaking in.

View of Parque Rodó from our balcony

My guidebook says that one of the few things that people in other countries know about Uruguay is that it has the longest Carnaval in the world.  (Are you one of the people who knew that?  I wasn't, before I read it in the guidebook.)  New Orleans has its couple of weeks of Mardi Gras, Buenos Aires has its ten days or so, but here the celebrations last for a month.  On Thursday, we went to the parade in Montevideo's Old City that kicks the whole thing off.  It was kind of an adventure getting there.  The boys and I got on the wrong bus, which would not have been a problem if we had gotten off of it at the right point.  But we overshot our destination by many miles, and then had to make our way back through unfamiliar territory, creating yet another opportunity for me to model for my children resourcefulness and confidence in spite of not having a clue what I was doing.  Subway sandwiches, ice cream cones, and meeting up with Gene re-energized us, and we ventured into the throngs of people gathering along Avenida 18 de Julio and tried to figure out Uruguayan parade-watching protocol.  We staked out a prime patch of sidewalk and waited patiently (some of us more patient than others) for the parade to begin.  Teo shared his impression of the parade here; later he made the additional comment that the parade included "a lot of skin," which it certainly did.  For my part, I thought it was a lot of fun being there and found it easy to get caught up in the excitement of it all.  I also loved looking across the street to the crowd on the other side and into a sea of faces all of different hues.  It may have been the most diverse group of people in terms of skin color that I've ever seen outside of a Norman Rockwell painting.

Who's behind that mask?

On the sidewalk in front of us were two or three rows of chairs that extended for blocks up and down the street.  Only people who had pre-purchased tickets could sit in those chairs, and they were pretty closely monitored by parade officials.  A couple older women in the chairs near us seemed to take a particular interest in Teo and Javy, as many people here do.  (As a "conspicuous family," we're even more conspicuous here, with people clearly confused about why we look different from our kids.)  When a guy came by passing out bags of confetti to the seated spectators, these women were very determined to procure a bag for each of the boys.  We didn't really know what all the fuss was about and I was a little surprised to realize that they were making such a scene over bags of hole-punches.  (What were they called in the 2000 elections in Florida?  Chads?)  Whatever they are called, the many thousands that the boys were gifted with produced a world of delight.  Most of them ended up in my hair initially, and all over our apartment floor eventually.  But they did help the boys get into the spirit of things.  The confetti lasted almost as long as our interest in the parade did, and after seeing the hundredth group of scantily-clad dancers flanked by banners advertising beer, we found a bus home, satisfied that we had adequately taken in all the culture the parade had to offer.

The weekend held more touristy adventures for us.  Inspired by the geocaching that Luke and I did at the beach last month, we set out to find a geocache hidden in Montevideo's botanical garden.  That expedition took us to a part of the city that was new to us, and to a very large park that reminded me a bit of Piedmont Park in Atlanta, though less well maintained.  The garden itself was peaceful with interesting plants, some pools with tadpoles just waiting to be caught, and enough statues of nude people to exasperate Javy.  After a good bit of searching, we did find the geocache, and felt pretty victorious about that.  Having walked for quite a distance, we easily convinced ourselves that we deserved a dinner out, so we headed to a pizza place that looked inviting.  Two very accommodating waiters helped us understand the menu, and we learned that if you want cheese on your pizza, you don't order from the pizza menu but from the "mozzarella" menu.  We also learned that Uruguayans' affinity for boiled eggs extends to pizza (and mozzarella) toppings.  Gene and the boys enjoyed watching a soccer game on television while I busied myself picking most of the olives out of my calzone.  Olives, olives everywhere.  Olives, boiled eggs, and ham must make up most of the calories consumed in this country.  

Back at our apartment on Saturday night, we could hear the music from the murga across the street.  These performances go on all during the month of Carnaval, many of them on the stage in "our" park.  It was really pleasant going to sleep hearing the music wafting in through the open window, but somewhere in the middle of the night, the music morphed into a loud, repetitive clanging and by about 5 a.m. I had totally given up on going back to sleep.  Getting up and looking out the window, I saw that the source of the clanging was metal poles used to set up tents for the feria, or open-air market, that happens every Sunday morning in the park.  I was still harboring a good deal of resentment over lost sleep when we ventured out to check out the market later in the morning.  Most of this particular market is crafts and clothing, but there are a few stalls where you can buy organic vegetables from independent farmers, one of the few places, apparently, in Montevideo where that is possible.  Coming home with eggs, vegetables, jam, and pecans put me in better spirits.

In the afternoon, we embarked on another adventure to Forteleza del Cerro, a fort built in the early 1800s on Montevideo's namesake "monte," which really just a low hill.  The fort now houses a military museum.  The long bus ride, plus the view of the city from the hill once we got there, gave me a new appreciation for just how large Montevideo is.  We drove through neighborhoods that just seemed to go on and on and on, and we were just skirting around the bay, with a whole lot of city to the north and east of us.  When the bus finally let us off, we had a wilting uphill trek in the hot sun between us and the fort, and we stopped making fun of those Portuguese sailors who had decided to call this hill a mountain.

The neighborhood we were walking though is pretty bleak, but we were happy to find a house that had been turned into a shop of sorts, dingy and unwelcoming as it was.  I stood in line outside an iron grating and when it was my turn, I asked for a bottle of water, which was retrieved for me, and I passed my pesos through the grating in exchange for the water.  We all drank our fill and were revived enough to make our way up the rest of the hill.  We passed several other homes of small-time entrepreneurs, one here selling underwear, another there offering snacks, and between them a hand-written sign pointing down a dusty path and advertising "hamburgesas completas."  In spite of

Home down the hill from the fort

the attraction of the fort and the breathtaking view it offers of the city and port, this neighborhood apparently hasn't been give the support it needs to become a place where tourists would want to come and spend money.  It left me feeling a little depressed.  On the other hand, neighbors were out on their porches, enjoying the afternoon, drinking mate, watching toddlers cool off in kiddy pools; kids were kicking soccer balls around or dare-deviling it down the harrowingly steep road, three piled on one bicycle with not a helmet among them, and then limping back up the hill, nursing injuries.

Our hike to the fort was definitely vale la pena (worth the effort -- a new favorite phrase of mine).  The museum was filled with weapons of all kinds, which fascinated Teo and Javy, of course.  I was more interested in the history, or at least as much of it as I could translate.  Looking out over the port with its cargo ships and cruise ships, and the vast Rio de la Plata, I was impressed again by just how interesting this place is that we've landed for these months, and felt very, very grateful for the chance to be here and absorb what we can of the culture, boiled eggs and all.

View from the fort

Monday afternoon, the boys and started a final week of Spanish classes.  We've been enjoying the park, with its pedal boats and amusement rides, and the beach.   Next week, we move to our "permanent" house in Atlántida.  It will be good to be finally settled and able to start making some Uruguayan friends.  But I will also miss this magical city with all its activity and hubbub, and which has started to feel a bit like home.

The Beginning of Carnaval

Teo, January 23, 2015

Yesterday we went to a parade that marked the starting of Carnaval.  There were lots of floats with musicians on them and clowns being very funny.  Ambulances and taxis escorted important people in the parade.  Men were standing around selling potato chips.  It was very crowded and noisy.  There were lots police officers.

There were some Antel people that were driving down the street and giving out little packs of confetti.  Some women in front of us were yelling at the guys and telling them to give some to us.  We managed to get some and we threw it up in the air and our mom got it all in her hair.

There were lots of advertisements.  On the cars that were driving past us, there were signs advertising Antel, the phone company.  There were people waving flags around advertising beer.  A penguin who was dancing around advertised ice cream.

We left a little bit before the parade was over because it was loud and noisy.  We came home and got ready for bed and when we woke up this morning, we found a lot of confetti around our apartment!

A Few of My Favorite Things...

Javy,  January 22, 2015

We finished our stay at Ecoparque Uruguay on Tuesday, January 20.  There were some fun things we did there.  Here are ten things that we did that I liked.

1. Teo and I got to drive the tractor.
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
2. We got to swim in the river.
   
3. Teo and I rode (not rowed) a boat to an island and made a fort out of sticks and leaves and some trash.
   
   
   
4. The work was kind of fun, like weeding and mowing the grass, and raking.
5. There was an air gun and our host, Steve, would put in a golf ball and pump in lots of air and he would try to hit parrot nests.  They are big nests made of thorns so predators cannot get them.  Some of their predators are hawks, little owls, and eagles.
6. There were huge lizards called tegus.  They are like  Komodo dragons.  Imagine me standing up.  My leg would be the size of a tegu.
   
7. We liked going to our little shop to have a snack.  We got there by walking and biking.  When we walked, it was very hot.
8. There were some campers with two boys and they showed us how to catch little minnows to use to catch fish.  They would have an old bottle, say an old Coke bottle.  They would cut a little hole in the bottle and take a cracker and crumble it up into the bottle and set it in the water and wait for a couple minutes.  Then they would lift it back out and they probably caught more than twenty minnows.  Then they would have a big bottle and they would pour the minnows into it and bring it back to their little camp.  To catch fish, they used a trot line.  A trot line is a long rope with hooks.  You would put the minnows on the hooks and wait a night or two.  Then you would go out with your boat and lift the rope up and get your meal.
9. Another thing that was nice was that you could see the stars.  You could see Orion's Belt, Venus, and Mars.
10. Most of what was fun was being with my family.  We got to spend a lot more time with our dad than usual.