How to Taxi when you can’t

Yet again I am unashamed to say that this post will be about food, alcohol and Colombians. So for those after a slight change of social-scenery, I suggest you look elsewhere. As I write this, it is Tuesday evening and Karlien is cooking me dinner. As I said in my last post; this life, I’ve got it worked out.

This weekend past was one of the better ones. One of the Colombian girls, Manuela, and I had hit it off to a certain degree, so we thought; ‘why not go to Uruguay for a few nights and check out Argentina’s stable neighbour’. So we did.

After work on Thursday, we took a boat bound for Montevideo, the capital of Uruguay, however what we did not know was that it was a boat, then a bus. Thus, as the boat stopped at Colonial de Sacramento (the changeover), we sat on board for a lengthy period, wondering when it would leave to our final destination. Thankfully, a side-affect to being Colombian is fluent Spanish, so we (she) were able to work out what was going on and make a run for the bus. No harm done. For cost-splitting purposes, Manuela had bought the transport tickets and I had booked accommodation. I had booked the hostels quite easily, but it turned out that booking travel tickets was pretty difficult for my newest friend. She had somehow purchased my ticket perfectly, with one easily made mistake of putting my nationality as ‘Austrian’. Shit. I thought we would run into some sort of issue, I mean, we were crossing sovereign borders and I had my passport details, all perfectly correct, on the rest of my ticket, with the only error probably being the most crucial. I think it is a sign that you are in a pretty relaxed part of the world when not a single customs official, border guard, or ticket vendor questioned why my passport and bus/boat ticket had different nationalities. Imagine trying to do that in Australia? Craziness.

 

Notice anything odd?

As the Latinos eat so late, we thought it would be no bother finding dinner in Montevideo after our bus arrived at 11:30pm. Unfortunately, this was a little more difficult than anticipated for several reasons: Firstly, on arrival at the bus station, it turned out our hostel was a solid 4km away from the terminal so would require a taxi, which leads nicely into the second issue. There had been a Taxi driver stabbed to death the day prior and, in a show of solidarity, every taxi driver in the city had gone on strike. Effective. So we had an obvious problem. Luckily I had a Colombian handy and I roped her in to speak to a guy running a relatively successful hot dog stand immediately outside the bus terminal. The following conversation led to the pleasant man saying he knew a guy who could drive us to the hostel for around $250 Uruguayan Pesos (about AU$12.50). So we had to weigh up the following:

Against random driver:
He was a local in a city where a taxi driver had just been killed.
His car looked like it was home-made; in fact I think his gear stick was a spanner.
It was 11:30 at night.
The rear passenger door could not be opened from the inside.
Again, I want to reiterate: a guy was stabbed in a car, during the exchange known as ‘public transport’ less than 24 hours prior.

For random driver:
It was either that or walk 4km through the streets.
He came with glowing recommendations from the owner of the hot-dog stand.

So, using our better judgement, we took the car to the hostel and on the way had a very nice conversation with our driver who was a good chap. Sometimes you just have to trust people.

Immediately after checking into the hostel (around 12:30am by this stage), we started looking for our first Uruguayan dinner. Luckily we happened upon a little place that fed us ‘Milanesa (like a veal parmigiana, but bigger and with more varied toppings) para llevar’ (to take away). Quality.

The next day we were to partake in arguably the second-best meal I have had since being away. Manuela had quite easily convinced me to visit ‘El Mercado Puerto’ (The port market) to check out their legendary Parrillas (BBQ’s). The tell-tale smoke signs around the old city of Montevideo showed us the way to this house of meat where anything and everything was barbecued on open grills in front of locals and tourists alike. Inside the market there were perhaps 15 massive open grills, each operated by a separate group who threw enormous portions of meat straight onto the heat. The smell was amazing. Seeking the full experience, we requested Parrilla for 2, which gave us a bit of each type of meat. The plate of meat which ensued was amazing, tasty and totally confirmed humanity’s place on top of the global food chain.

A notable highlight was the first meat I tasted on the advice of Manuela,
‘Here taste this, it is the best part! In my country it is an absolute delicacy and I want you to have it,’
How nice, I thought. My first impression of this innocent little piece of meat was that it was a little chewy but it certainly had plenty of flavour.
‘What is it?’ I nonchalantly asked,
‘Freshly cleaned small intestine’

Blurgh. That’s the last time I trust a Colombian.

Another highlight (?) was the black sausage, which strangely enough tasted like a sausage filled with savoury cake. There had to be some flour or something filling it to give it this texture. I asked the waiter what was in it,

‘Sangre y queso. Solo.’ Came the blunt reply.

Blood and cheese… Only.

Wow.

As the evening came, we took a bus to Punte del Este, a coastal town that is absolutely jammed during summer and relatively quiet in Winter. There are plenty of sky-scraping apartment buildings, but, as it was the shoulder season, it had a slightly eerie feel as they were deserted. The hostel was busy enough and had a great feel to it as it converted into a bar come the evening. Needless to say, we made use of the facilities that night and polished off a few bottles of various substances with the highlight being the local boutique beer called ‘Patricia’. She sure knows how to party. The beer that is.

The main tourist attraction in Punte is a giant hand that is half submerged and meant to symbolize a drowning man. Pretty weird considering the town makes its money off beach tourism. They may want to stop putting the idea of

What a beautiful hand!

drowning into the heads of prospective beach-goers. We did the touristy things and got plenty of candid snaps of the hand and surrounding beach, which was absolutely beautiful. The rest of the town also got a look in as we strolled around. Million dollar yachts adorned the harbour and it was clear that this was the place in summer where everybody who was anybody in South America came to ‘tan it, wax it, buff it and plonk it on the beach’ as Lonely Planet aptly put it. Shame that I was a skinny hairy white guy really.

That evening we were lucky enough to follow Manuela’s instincts and go to a little restaurant called Puerto Lindo for dinner. It’s catchphrase on the street sign was: ‘We have only a little menu, but we promise that the food will remain in your memory’. How right they were.

The food was absolutely sublime, and not overly expensive. The highlight was my seafood dish that came with a pink sauce. I can honestly say that it was the best seafood I have ever had, clearly fresh and cooked to perfection. The sauce was just fantastic. I don’t want to undersell this in the slightest, Lonely Planet needs to have a good hard look at itself and think about why Puerto Lindo is not the number 1 restaurant in South America. The owner of the restaurant was a great bloke as well, strolling around the tables and bantering with patrons. It was really fantastic. The company was ok as well.

Ah how I hate it how all good things must come to an end! That meal, that weekend. Unfortunately Sunday was stressful, ten hours of travel on a mix of boats, buses and taxis will do that. Especially when we weren’t entirely sure of times and locations etc. I also didn’t help the cause by forgetting some crucial paperwork required to get back into Argentina, luckily we worked it out.

I apologise for the length of this blog post, but hopefully you stuck with it and made it through to the end.

Till next time amigos!

Sauldos

‘I sometimes wander while I’m lost whilst wondering where I am, then I find it’ – Hugh