Well, I am pleased to report that our luck changed at the Uruguayan border. We found the bus company at 2305 - just five minutes after the last bus to Montevideo had departed, but instead of directing us to wait six hours for the early morning departure, the ticket seller quickly rang the driver, printed out our tickets and told us to grab a cab and catch the bus, which was waiting for us at the border checkpoint - only five minutes away. Passport formalities were completed in an instant and we reached Montevideo in the early hours of Saturday morning.
I have to say that I fell in love with the Uruguayan capital, though it is hard to put my finger on the precise reason why. It isn´t beautiful like Cusco and the vaguely Soviet-looking poastcards, featuring 1970s public buildings, highlight the lack of obvious tourist landmarks, but as you wander around the old town, you can´t help but be struck by how many beautiful buildings there are which have been abandoned and in their current state of decay only hint at what they must have been like in their prime. Our hotel was one such building - beautiful proportions, high ceilings, tiled floors, but there was mould creeping up the walls and white emulsion blanking out the stained glass set into the internal doors... what I wouldn´t have given to do a quick restoration job on the place. The staff there were in the same state of decay as the building - a very charming old gentleman and a similarly ancient lady who fell for the Inka´s charms and became quite giggly and girly as she flirted with him. I told him that he had carried out a highly successful renovation job on her, uncovering the carefree young girl she must once have been.
Perhaps what I fell for was Montevideo´s laid-back feel - no blaring horns and choking exhaust fumes here; perhaps it was its compact size and the fact that you could walk its length and breadth with ease or perhaps it was just the delightful novelty of being somewhere flat after the vertiginous excesses of Cusco. Whatever the reason, I quickly felt at home here and found my bearings.
The first thing that struck me were the number of theatres in Montevideo relative to its size. I immediately decided that I had to test my Spanish so we opted to watch a Neil Simon play because that at least offered me the luxury of a familiar story. I am very pleased to report that after only three months´exposure to Spanish, I managed to follow the action and we both agreed that at around five dollars a ticket, the theatre really was a bargain.
Something else that appealed about Uruguay was its inhabitants´sneering contempt for the rules of healthy living. Although there is a law now which prevents smoking in bars and restaurants, the crowds huddled around doorways nursing cigarettes make it clear that the Uruguayans have no intention of ditching their tabs. In restaurants they serve up a carnivore´s wet dream of bleeding red meat and charge more for the house salad than for a steak. Add to this a sweet tooth which is satisfied by an imaginative array of cakes and pastries and even grappa which comes with a sweetening of honey and you can see why every Uruguayan over 60 is a walking miracle.
The other thing you can´t help but notice here is that the Uruguayans love their herbal tea, or mate - young and old alike walk the streets clutching their mate in one hand. They drink this herb infusion through a silver straw and have a thermos tucked under their other arm to replenish the cup a regular intervals. Perhaps there is some magic component in this herbal brew which counteracts all the ill effects of their terrible diet... well, it´s one theory.
El Ultimo Inka was adamant about one thing - he wanted me to hear candombe music in Uruguay - this is the traditional music dating from slave times and its rhythms have a distinctly African feel. The musicians play on drums of three different sizes which hang from straps which they wear slung across their shoulders. On Sunday evening, we headed for one of the backstreets of Montevideo. First the drummers, who all come from one barrio, built a little fire by the roadside and placed their drums in a circle around the fire to heat up the skins. There were about 25 drummers in total and once their preparations were complete, they lined up in three rows, filling the narrow street. A crowd of about 50 people accompanied them - some like us marching along with them, others forming an impromptu dance troupe just ahead of the drummers. The rhythm is hypnotic and, as we made our slow progress down the streets, I watched the drummers, some of whom seemed to go into an almost trance-like state as they played. All of them had bindings of different kinds on their hands and when they stopped for a break near a little shop selling wine from the barrel, I could see that the skins of their drums were stained with blood and the drummers themselves were dripping with sweat from their exertions. The candombe rhythm is so insistent that even non-dancers like me found themselves moving to it and it was several hours before the beat in my head subsided enough for me to sleep.
Although we had a great time in Uruguay, I´m afraid that neither our business nor the Inka´s personal quest went well. We arrived in winter, so people were more intent on buying scarves and gloves than T-shirts and earrings so the Inka decided to leave his stock with a Chilean friend and return in summer to flog it all at the beach. As for his son, he learnt that he and his mother are now living in Spain, so there was no reunion either. El Ultimo Inka´s natural ebullience does not really allow things to get him down for long, so my agony aunt services were not required, but I did feel for him in his disappointment that he could not discover how his son had changed in the last 10 years.
Well, on to Argentina now and another South American experience. I have to say that it is much harder to write about somewhere like Uruguay, where everything felt familiar and comfortable and we had no major problems... maybe you have to suffer to write interesting travel blogs, so my apologies if this entry strikes anyone as boring, but I would heartily recommend a short stay in Uruguay if anyone decides to travel in this part of the world. We all need to recharge our batteries from time to time...
