Piriapolis isn’t so peaceful after all

This morning, my wife’s friend called to tell us that we made the right move when we decided to stay home this weekend.  Friday night, 2 people were shot to death next door to us on Cerro San Antonio.  My wife asked her how she knew all this and how did she know for sure it was the house next to ours.   She said it’s the HEADLINE in today’s newspaper.  So I went out and bought the paper just to make sure.   Yep, that’s the picture of the neighbour’s house (above). 

The full article below is in Spanish.  In plain English it says that a father and his daughter were shot there.  The father was a retired police officer who sold guns for a living.  His daughter was married with 2 children.  Her husband reported them missing.  Their bodies were found in the trunk of the father’s car which was abandoned in Montevideo.  After police found the bodies, the investigation led them o the top of San Antonio.  They found cartridge casings and bloody clothes in the house. Several people have been arrested from Monvetivdeo, Maldonado and El Pinar.  

Un vendedor de armas y su hija ejecutados a balazos
Doble crimen. Muertos en Piriápolis y dejados en Carrasco

La Policía cree que se trató de una ejecución. El móvil del doble crimen es una incógnita. El homicidio se consumó en un chalet de Piriápolis y anoche la Policía buscaba a varios sospechosos para interrogarlos.

Euclides Heber Viera y su hija Natalia Soledad fueron ejecutados en un chalet cerca de la cumbre del cerro San Antonio, en Piriápolis. El sargento primero, jubilado de la Policía, salió el jueves pasado rumbo a ese balneario. Iba a cerrar una transacción comercial y llevaba consigo al menos cuatro armas de fuego que no aparecieron. Quedó registrado su paso por el primer peaje sobre el arroyo Pando. Sin embargo su cuerpo y el de su hija fueron hallados en pleno Carrasco, dentro del baúl del Volkswagen Santana que pertenecía a Viera.

La lista de preguntas aún sin respuestas que tienen los investigadores de la División Homicidios es extensa. Desde la madrugada pasada los equipos de la Dirección de Investigaciones de Montevideo, de la Comisaría 14ª y los criminalistas de Policía Técnica trabajaron en la esquina de Lombardía y Ancona en busca de indicios.

Se debió pedir el apoyo de Bomberos para abrir el baúl del automóvil, donde estaban ocultos los cuerpos de las víctimas, asesinados a tiros.

Un vecino de Carrasco que había visto el automóvil gris con vidrios polarizados estacionado en esa esquina desde la mañana del viernes, fue el que, intrigado por esa presencia, dio aviso a la Policía ya en horas de la noche. Cuando los uniformados de la Comisaría 14ª llegaron frente al 5861 de la calle Lombardía lo primero que constataron fue que la matrícula SAG 2218 pertenecía a un coche requerido por el Departamento de Registro y Búsqueda de Personas Ausentes del Ministerio del Interior. La tapa del baúl estaba ligeramente abierta, apenas por una rendija los policías pudieron ver que dentro había dos cuerpos. Ya era la medianoche; la tranquila esquina de Carrasco comenzó a llenarse de móviles policiales.

DESAPARICIÓN. Euclides Heber Viera (62) se había retirado de la Policía con el grado de sargento primero. Se dedicaba al comercio de armas e insumos, aunque su actividad era fundamentalmente la de gestor de habilitaciones de porte y tenencia de armas para sus clientes.

Fuentes de la investigación señalaron que Viera se disponía a cerrar una transacción comercial en Piriápolis. Viera padecía de diabetes y problemas cardíacos. Como no se había sentido bien en los días previos, le pidió a su hija Natalia (32)-casada y madre de dos niños- que lo acompañara a Maldonado. Eso ocurrió el jueves pasado. La esposa de Viera comenzó a alarmarse cuando con el correr de las horas no tenía noticias de su marido y de su hija. Temiendo lo peor llamó a la Policía. Los mecanismos de averiguación del paradero comienzan a ponerse en marcha recién a las 24 horas de ausencia de una persona. La oficina especializada del Ministerio del Interior lanzó el alerta a todas las unidades policiales del país en la tarde del viernes.

“Nuestra preocupación principal es que, dado el perfil de esta persona, creemos que podía llevar armas consigo, no sólo tenemos una persona desaparecida, además podemos tener armas con un destino desconocido”, comentó una fuente del Ministerio consultada por El País. La peor hipótesis se hizo realidad pocas horas después.

EJECUCIÓN. Los investigadores de Homicidios están seguros de que se trata de una ejecución.

Al caer la tarde los investigadores dieron con el chalet donde fueron muertos padre e hija. Una pequeña y elegante finca ubicada cerca de la cumbre del cerro San Antonio. En el suelo del chalet se hallaron vainas de proyectiles detonados, manchas de sangre y ropas ensangrentadas. Un equipo de criminalistas de Policía Técnica viajó anoche desde Montevideo al chalet. El juez penal Federico Álvarez Petraglia tomó cartas en el caso. Al cierre de esta edición, la Policía buscaba sos- pechosos entre Montevideo y Maldonado. Uno de los procedimientos se llevaba a cabo en los alrededores de El Pinar.

 

Domestic Help - BPS

 

When you hire a person to work for you your household, you are supposed to subscribe them into the BPS (Social Insurance) scheme in Uruguay.  The heading for cleaning staff is ‘Servicio Domestico’.

The fees have changed in the past several months–upwards.  Our cleaning lady works for us 3 days a week.   We listed her total monthly income from working for us as UYP5300/month.  We pay her contributions to the BPS.  They’re UYP2600/month - about half of her salary again. 

It’s very important that you do this for 2 reasons.  The first is an ethical one.   These people make very little money, even by Uruguayan standards.  Paying for their BPS entitles them to a better health program (well, it used to before the reform - not sure what it means now), and to a pension when they retire.  Many Uruguyan domestics aren’t enrolled and when they’re old and cant work any more, they wont have this pension.   The 2nd reason is CYA.   If your employee reports you, especially after years of neglect, you’ll be backbilled, with fines.  No matter how wonderful the relationship is with your employee, times change.  In this case, not subscribing an employee really is a fool’s game. 

This is a copy of what the monthly bill looks like, complete with all the various deductions and what they’re for.   Double click to be able to read the details. 

The Movistar IQ (Idiot Quotient) Test

 

This one’s easy.  Just go to www. movistar.com.uy, click on usuario and try to get anything important done. 

Earlier this week, I had emailed Movistar’s ‘attencion al cliente’ advising them that the credit card they’re using for autodebit had been cancelled.  I had another one and wanted to change it.

I immediately received an email stating that ‘due to large volumes of emails at this time, they would get to me when they could’. 3 days later I got a nice email telling me, among other things, that I could use the web portal.   It said that your user name is the last 6 digits of your phone number.  Your password is your cedula or passport #, whichever applied.

This caused me great joy, (still haven’t learned my lessons about Uruguay).  I now had access to my account on line.  Couldnt wait to try it out.  I went to the site, clicked on ‘usuarios’, after a few attempts figured out it was my wife’s cedula on file and I was in.  This caused me even greater joy, (still haven’t learned my lessons about Uruguay). 

Access gets you to ‘hello Sra Fisher’ screen.  The sub menus are: Telefonia, Internet, Cambio de Clave and Exit.  None of these seemed to apply to what I want to; change my autodebit credit card, so I started my journey by clicking Telefonia.  That takes you to a sub menu with one item.  Consultar Factura.  That wasn’t what I was looking for but since I have online access to view and print my other phone bills, I decided to add Movistar’s bill to my electronic stable.  I clicked it.  This takes you to, ready for this one, another login screen.  Duhhhh.. OK..  Let’s see if I can figure this one out.  It asks for your Cuenta and then your PIN.  We only have one account with Movistar so I pulled last month’s invoice and entered the cuenta (account) number.  That left me with trying to figure out what the PIN was.  The only place I’ve seen PIN used with Movistar is with the phone itself-the chip.  So I looked up the PIN and entered it.  No banana.  So I rooted around for any other possible PIN they could be looking.   Still no banana.  So I tried my wife’s cedula again.  That brought me to the 3 strike rule and you guessed it, I’m barred for life.  This particular service is now bloqueado.   I guess that puts me futher behind than when I had no access at all.

OK.. So much for consulting your phone bill on line..  Let’s try something else.  So I went back and clicked on the Internet option.

There are a lot more options here.  First is that ‘consultar factura’ thing.  No point trying that now is there?  Then there’s Consultar Accessos, Activar Direccion de correo en USA, Paginas Pesonalex, Busquedas Web, Humanizadas, Casilla de Fax, Aviso de Email, Email Adicionales, Consumos IPass, Llenar la encuesta

So I tried Consultar Accessos… This one sounds pretty good.  I always wanted to know the details of my usage but the invoices dont show that.  They just tell you how many minutes you use.  The screen defaults to Marzo (this is March) so I stupidly clicked on that.  Nothing.  That’s becuase no cell provider calculates your usage dynamically, (none I’ve seen anyway).  They put that information up when they calculate your invoice.  So I clicked on Feburary… Still nothing.  That concerned me, so I clicked January, then December.  Nothing.   There’s no construction sign.  I assume that either this thing is going to work someday, is broke now or I have to pay extra for this to work. 

Let’s try Activar Direccion de correo en USA.  Whoah.  That one took me totally by surprise.  It’s an advertisement for Miami Box.  You can subscribe to the service from this web page.  Just what I needed.   Yah right. 

Next stop is Paginas Personales.  It’s also an advertisement.  You can have your web site hosted with Movistar…  How quaint.  In fact, Busquedas Web, and Humanizades are all propaganda for additional services.

Casilla de Fax, Aviso de E-Mail and E-Mail adicionales are services you can add to your account.  This gives you a number people can send faxes to which are then forwarded to you via email.

IPass looks like the old dialup internet service thing.  Had that with Sprint many suns ago.

The last one, Llenar la ncuesta means exactly that.  You go there to rate their services.  I dont feel right doing this because maybe the reason I cant get anything out of the website useful to me is my comprehension of the language.  I dont see anywhere I can click ‘English’

So here we are, no further ahead…. but you never know what can happen in the future.. intentionally or plain, dumb luck. 

 PS… When I emailed Movistar about the change of credit card, I also emailed Primus, my cell provider in Canada.  A Primus customer service rep replied the next morning, asking me for the new credit card info.  I replied.  Later that day I got a confirmation. 

Food

 

I never thought much about food back home.  For breakfast I made my own ham sandwiches.  For lunch, I’d go to a local, fast food restaurant.  Dinner was waiting for me when I got home from work.

Here, things are different.  It’s not that my eating habits have changed much.  It’s the food, or should I say, the freshness of the food that is different.

At home, when my wife shopped, she’d stock up on food.  Meats were frozen.  Bread was same day from the bakery and frozen or refrigerated.  Luncheon meats were put in a refrigerator for 7-10 days.  Here, you shop 2-3 times a week for anything perishable.  It’s not unusual to pick up your vegetables a few hours before you prepare them.  Me, I’m in the habit of buying my bread 15-20 minutes before I eat it.   That’s for dinner.  In the morning, it’s 5-10 minutes. 

I can recall a few times in my life I ate bread, still warm from the oven.  Here, it’s a daily event–and we dont have to bake it ourselves.  

Meats are NEVER, EVER frozen.  You buy what you’re going to eat a day or two before.  When I buy luncheon meats, like bologna, ham, bacon or sliced chicken, it’s always 100g, just enough for a day or two.

Living in this part of Pocitos clearly makes a big difference in how one eats.  With 3 supermarkets within 3 blocks and hot bread baked daily in one of them it makes no sense to do big, northern shoppings.  If we feel like a roast chicken, there’s a rotisserie 2 blocks from the house.  Fresh made pizza is across the street.   One of the best ice cream shops in Montevideo, La Cigal, is one block away.  There must be a half dozen chivito places within 3 blocks.  Marco’s (the most famous in Montevideo) is much farther–at 5 blocks away. 

Good thing I dont eat a lot

Live - from atop San Antonio

This is part 2 of Mobile Inernet in Uruguay (the previous post).  I said I’d write about what happened with our new mobile internet service on Monday.  But guess what?  It worked and here I am, sitting on the terrace (above) writing about how it went last night. 

We chose the USB modem instead of the PCMCIA modem.  We did that because with Mobile Internet, the exact placement of your antenna is critical.  With the USB, you can move it, not your laptop, around to get a good signal.  Personally, I prefer the PCMCIA because it becomes part of the laptop.  You dont have to lug peripherals around, no matter how small they are.  The other reason I preferred PCMCIA is power.  The manual indicated the USB requires 2 connections.  We only have 2 USB ports on our Dell.  That means while you’re using this thing, you can’t connect an external modem or keyboard or HD without adding yet another periphal, a USB hub AND a big, clunky power supply, which is only available here in single voltage, (which means buying another transformer or hub when we’re in Canada/USA.  I haven’t seen an electronic powersupply here that comes with a USB hub.   However, the good news is that (at least on this laptop), it works with a single USB connection only.   Some USB ports put out more power than others.  The modem’s needs exceed some laptop USB port’s power output.  My single ports seem adequate for this modem. 

The modem we got was exactly the same model that was advertised.  I asked the girl if the instructions were in English.  She said yes.  She was partially right.  The cover does say ‘Quick Start’ but that’s as far as the English goes.  I had to download a manual from the internet.  It’s a Huawei E226.  Had no problem finding Huawei’s website, but there was no E226 to be found.  There was an E220 which is identical for all intents and purposes.

When we got into the house last night, I first had to bring in the LCD TV and hook it up to my wife’s J-Win portable DVD player.  Got a chuckle out of that.  The video does work fine with the TV, but the audio is another story.  The volume control on the portable controls the output to the TV.  Even at full volume on the TV, it’s still louder on the portable unit.  Have to troubleshoot that back in the lab in Montevideo.  Dont have all my goodies with me here on the mountain :).

After the TV/DVD was done, it was time to try out mobile internet.  I did some Googling before I left Monevideo and all of the posts on the Huawei modem were positive.  One post in particular was great to know.  The poster detailed the entire bootup process.  That’s good for someone like me who would have been freaking out with the real boot process if I hadn’t read that post. 

When you’ve been around computers as long as I have, this process is always met with anxiety prior to starting it.  I long ago gave up having a stiff drink before I did this.  Had I not, I’d be a hopeless alcoholic by now :)   You get burned so many times, you figure the odds are against you and here I am, sitting on top of a hill, without any of my diag equipment.  But my wife was desperate to get to Latinchat, so I just bit down and started. 

The manual says you should turn on your computer first, then plug in the modem.  I read the instructions several times, to make sure I wasn’t missing any nuances.  There were two cables.  One normal cable with mini on one end and regular on the other.  Then there’s another cable with one mini on one end and 2 USB’s on the other end.  The picture and manual talks about the cable with 2 USB ends.  Based on comments from the first post, I’d say the single cable is used with a desktop unit, which has more power available per USB port than a laptop.  The one that I didn’t get the first time around was which of those 2 plugs goes in first.  Dont know if it really matters, but I followed it exactly as printed.  The plug that is part of the main cable goes in first.  I waited a few seconds, then plugged in the 2nd connection.   The sequence was exactly as the other post described it (and as Wilbur confirmed in the previous post’s comments).  The first thing it does is pick up the mass storage device.  That’s because there is a mass storage device built into the modem.  That’s where the software is located that it uses to install the drivers from.  That was kind of a neat thing.  Why have CD’s when you can put your software inside the device itself. 

It then installs a few more devices.  I believe one says it found a CD drive.  It doesn’t matter because it’s all automatic.  You just sit there and watch.  Eventually, it says it’s done, (which it really isn’t but who cares).  You agree to everything and it seems to be finished. 

After a while, this process starts all over again.  This is actually the important part.  This is where the modem itself is installed.  Then the software that runs it fires up.  The name of the software is Mobile Partner.  It’s equivalent to the wireless manager software you can run separately with most wireless cards.  The only difference is that this doubles as that and as your modem drivers.  Turn this thing off and you turn off your connection. 

I find Mobile Partner interesting.  In the image below, you can see most of what it does.  It tells you how fast you’re able to upload, how fast you download, and it tells you how much data you’re moving per session.  It also tells you how much data you’ve used in the calendar month.  I suspect this is how you audit the bills from providers like Movistar, that charge you by how much data you move.  CTI is ’unlimited’.  I was surprised by the very slow rate it shows for upload.  Something must be wrong with the numbers because I’m writing this post and uploading images, and I see very little difference in the time it takes to upload an image between here and the 128 or 256 upload speeds I have in Montevideo. 

 

When the modem installation completed, it takes you to a configuration screen.  The first option is language.  It defaulted to English and that was fine with me.  The next option asks you which service you want to connect to.  The options are CTI, CTI Uruguay and CTI Paraguay.  The girl back at CTI told me to choose CTI Uruguay.  She said you can choose CTI Paraguay if you are there and for Argentina, you choose CTI period.  I guess Argentina/Uruguay is like USA/Canada.  The big guys think they’re the centre of the universe, so there is no country distinguished.  The rest of us are foreigners :).   After that, the little bubble came up in the bottom right corner (Windows users), that said I now had a 7.2mb Intenet connection.  Dream on dude.  Now I have no doubt that someplace on this planet, this puppy can handle 7.2mb, but not here atop San Antonio.  But that’s neither here nor there.  The important thing was that it got connectvity and it just ‘felt’ OK. 

After that, I punched up IE and away I went.  My wife was drooling on the other side of the table, waiting for me to be finished but I managed to divert her attention by turning on her favourite soap, (Canal 7).  That bought me an hour.  It turns out I needed it because on my computer, Yahoo Messenger wasn’t installed.  I had to download it.  First big test of the speed.  Worked flawlessly.  About 15 minutes later, we were in the Yahoo world.  Then I updated Windows Live Messenger and setup a shortcut for Latinchat.  The soap finished and that was it for me.  I was banned to the bedroom :) 

To sum it up, I’d say that it works as advertised as long as you’ve got a decent signal.  That’s a big if.  RF is always a big ‘if’ and the the greater the distance between the tower and the receiver AND the obstacles inbetween, the bigger the ‘if’.  Adding the experience last night with my experience using this technology in Toronto, I really believe that the key is the placement of the modem.  In Toronto, I had to park my laptop within a foot of the Western wall of my cousin’s apartment to get decent speed.  While I was using, I watched the speeds go up and down like a yoyo.  Reminded me of the early years of the cellular industry.  I will know more about ‘obstacles’ when I try this at home on Monday. 

In my own little piece of this planet, I have no idea if CTI’s tower is atop Pan D’Azucar or 60m behind my house atop San Antonio, but whatever it is, it works fine.  The installation went without a hitch.  They’ve got my UYP1800 by now from my NATIONAL credit card (jajajaja) and I’m sure the autodebit will kick in next month on that credit card.  For UYP500/month, I honestly have to say this is a serious altenative for anyone who is fine with this speed and UYP500/month.  If you’ve got a laptop, travel around Uruguay and want to use your laptop in Colonia, MVD, Atlantida, Solymar, Piria or Maldonado/La Punta, I’d say this was your only option. 

If Arrancopelito ever answers my request from last week, I’d love to take this over to her place and see if it works there.  She’s not close to the Punta tower(s), but she may have line of site and that may just be enough. 

Mobile Internet in Uruguay

 

For the past several months, I’ve noticed an article here and there on the new mobile internet services being offered in Uruguay.  Movistar and CTI both offer this service. 

Mobile internet is a 3rd way of getting internet service in Uruguay.  The first provider in Uruguay was Antel with dialup.  Then it introduced ADSL.  Dedicado opened up shop with point to point microwave internet.  Antel’s ADSL service works through a telephone line.  Dedicado uses point-to-point microwave.  You get a small antenna which is pointed at their antennas.  Mobile internet is also wireless, but you dont need an antenna pointed at theirs.  You just need a small USB device.  It can be a plug in, like a jump drive or it can be a small remote USB modem.   Both are shown below.

   

The differences between CTI and Movistar as of today are several.  Let’s start with the way they promote it.  Movistar advertises it on their website.  CTI doesn’t.  Pricing is considerably different.  CTI launched the service at almost USD50 per month.  It’s now down to USD25.  Movistar is about the same, but not for the same service.  CTI offers unlimited use for that USD25 per month.  Movistar limits you to 10gb for USD25. 

Coverage is also different.  Whereas CTI supposedly claims coverage across the country, Movistar is a little more conservative, showing coverage in most of Montevideo, Colonia and Maldonado (Punta del Este).  If you go to CTI and look at their written promotion, it says the service is available in Montevideo, Zona America (I assume that’s Zonamerica-Canelones), Atlantida, Piriapolis, Jose Ignacio, Punta Del Este, Maldonado, Shangrilah and Solymar.  It says that more site are coming.  

The obvious advantage of mobile internet over fixed internet (as in cable, telephone line, microwave) is that you can take it with you, assuming that there is service where you’re going.  Not everyone needs this but for those that do, this is the answer to your mobile needs.  Not only can you take CTI with you here in Uruguay to Punta or up to Colonia, you can take it with you to Argentina, (eg. Buenos Aires, Mendoza, Cordoba, etc.) and to Brazil (Sao Paolo, Rio, Florianopolis, etc.) and Paraguay, (Ascunsion, etc.).  No roaming charges.  If Movistar lets you do this too, you can add Chile to the list. 

We went out tonight and purchased service from CTI.  Movistar was out because our summer house is atop San Antonio in Piria.  That’s the main reason we bought the service–so we could have internet in Piriapolis.  

I was somewhat prepared for CTI because of Wilbur’s (jajaja) post on totaluruguay.com, but like they say, you’re never fully prepared for anything in Uruguay.  We went to CTI’s Punta Carretas branch around 7:45pm.  There was no line.  We were served within a few minutes.  Before we could ask any questions, the girl went through a list of things we should know.  The service was up to 2mb but there was no guarantee what we’d get.  If you use it inside, the speed is usually slower than outside.  You had to take a contract for 2 years.  Your first month is free.  You had to pay for the modem–$1799 (pesos).  Then we got to ask our first question, ’Is there service in Piriapolis’.  That caused a delay as our salesgirl asked her boss who went inside and asked someone else.  After 5-6 minutes we were told that ‘it says it works in Piriapolis’  That didn’t warm my heart but considering there was no alternative, I accepted that at face value.

We then asked what the return policy was if it didn’t work in Piriapolis.  We were told we had 5 days to return the product for full refund.  There was one catch though.  If we connected to the internet, that meant that we accepted that it worked and there would be no return possible.  I explained that if we connected to the internet for a few seconds, then it went away and then it came back and this went on, that wouldn’t constitute a reasonable service.  That was answered with a blank stare.  So I said, well what if the service is so poor, that we get a very poor connection speed.  The supervisor said it wont connect under 256kbps.   Impasse. 

After a minute of indecision, we decided I knew enough to stay out of trouble so we said OK, we’ll take it.  That’s when she asked for a cedula and a phone, water, electricity bill.  Uh oh.  It’s been so long since I dealt with a new vendor, I forgot that you need to show that you actually have a contract with any company in Uruguay.  You could show them your Black American Express card and they’d still refuse to service you unless you show them an Antel, OSE, UTE or Montevideo Gas bill.  I went home to get one while my wife looked around. 

When I got back, there was a bit of a line, so we had to wait 10 minutes to see the girl who originally served us.  She smiled and took the Antel bill.  Then she printed out a 5 or 6 page document which my wife dutifully signed.  While she was doing that, I got a chance to read the posters in the store.  I guess I was bored because I read the fine print on the bottom of the mobile internet poster.  And that’s where I saw the published coverage.  There was Piriapolis… I was happy. 

After we signed all the forms, they asked us how we intended to pay.  As soon as my wife said ‘by credit card’ the girl said ‘it cant be an international card’.  This goes back to Wilbur’s post when he got frustrated, tore up his contract and walked out.  We were OK because we use our local credit card for small stuff in Uruguay.  When we told the girl we had a ‘national’ credit card, she was genuinely relieved.  I guess after hearing my wife and myself talking in English, she feared the worse. 

She gave us all the forms and we went upstairs to the cashier who stamped everything.  We went back downstairs and picked up the modem. 

When we came home, I opened up the box, took out the modem and looked at the manual.  One of the very few I’ve seen in Uruguay that come from China that aren’t in English.  Normally, that wouldn’t be a problem but there was a description of how to read the lights and another question in my mind about the cable.  I always resort to English when a misunderstanding could cause damage.  Checked on the internet for the manual in English.  The model we had, the E226 wasn’t there but the E220 was.  I figured that was good enough.  It was. 

The question I had with the cable was that it had 3 ends.  One for the device and what looked like 2 USB connections for the computer.  At first thought I figured it was to share another device if you only have one USB port on your computer.  But, believe it or not, it isn’t.  This device actually needs two USB ports on your computer.  One for data and one for power.  Maybe I’ve been away from the hardware side of the business too long but in all my years in IT,  I never saw a device that needed 2 connections to work. 

A device that requires 2 ports presents a dilemna for my wife.  She uses a Dell miniature laptop which has only one port.  I will have to give her my full size dell notebook to use in Piria.  It has 2 ports.  Or maybe I’ll purchase an external USB hub with a power supply.  Decisions.  Decisions.  Decisions. 

As of now, the chip is in the modem and it’s ready to go to Piria tomorrow evening.  I will have to bring my box of electronics with me in case I need to modify or fix something to overcome a glitch.  I’d do it here, but if I connect to the internet tonight, I cant return it if it doesn’t connect tomorrow.  This is typical of the kind of annoying problems you face in Uruguay that are unheard of (for at least the last 50 years) in North America. 

On Monday, I’ll write about the 2nd half of this project… Getting it to work. 

Shopping can be exciting

  Devoto Piria - scene of the ‘almost’ crime 

Note:  If you have no patience and want to get to the ‘exciting’ part right away - go to the 2nd last paragraph now.   

This was the first weekend of the year that we were able to get away for most of the weekend.  A family friend dropped by from BA on Friday so we took to the opportunity to go to Piria for Sat/Sun.

We left on Saturday morning for Piriapolis.  The traffic was light.  We only had to go back once because we forgot something.  When we arrived, everything looked beautiful.  A local friend volunteered to drive to the house every night and water the lawn and plants.  They really looked spectacular.  The best part was the new pool.  Last time we were there, it looked like Arrancopelito’s in the beginning–pea soup.  No matter how much chlorine I put in it, it was still green.  But like her pool, ours is now clear because she gave us her pool guy.  Yes, he really does a great job.  We could see the pattern in the floor clearly for the first time.  

That afternoon, we drove around quite a bit, showing our friend all the changes (she was born and lived here before she married and moved to BA).  We drove out towards Arrancopelito’s house, passing by Punta Fria, Punta Colorada and Punta Negra. Lots and lots of new houses…  Punta Colorada is fast becoming a very nice seaside resort. 

Everywhere we looked we saw signs for beachfront lots for sale.  Hopefully, a lot of people buy them and when we go next year, it will look even more fantastic.  I like the way the sand dunes move onto the road and everyone is zigging and zagging to stay out of them.  It’s great when the guy coming towards you is zigging when you are.  Always liked to play chicken.  My wife didn’t care much for it though.. You guys know how women get when we play these games

When we were almost at Arrancopelito’s place, we turned and drove onto to the beach.  We had Mordy, the dobie with us.  We wanted to let him run free–and run he did!!!  He just took off and ran from one end of the horizon to the other, almost knocking me over a few times.  This beach could aptly be called a ‘wild’ beach because it’s completely empty in both directions.  No wonder she likes this place.  We hung around there for a half hour or so.  Then headed back home.  Dropped the dog off on the balcony to guard the ‘casa’ and we went to the big Devoto in town.

We parked across the street because the lot was full (as often is this time of the year).  I thought the place was full but not quite.  The meat and cold cuts and dairy sections were jammed, but the boxed and canned food section was nearly empty.  That was unfortunate for my poor wife.  Like most American husbands, I headed for the part of the store that interested me while she did the boring stuff.. like buying food. I spent some time in the beer, wine and liquor section and then I moved to electrical, plumbing and finally, briefly, the AV section. After about a half hour, I went looking for her. 

I found her in the soups section. BTW, soups here are not what we think of back home.  I haven’t seen a can of soup since I got here.  I’m talking about vacuum sealed pouches soup section.  Anyway, when I came up to her, she was red in the face and looked ill.  Before I could ask what happened, she said something about smelling ether really strong and it made her sick to her stomach.  She said some guy walked past her or was near her and that he smelled really bad, like ether.  Now she had a horrifible headache.  Our friend was there and she said she smelled it too but by time she caught up to my wife, it wasn’t very strong.  I took her out front and sat her down and she was saying her ears felt like they were going to explode and she had this horrible headache and she was pissed.  We thought nothing of it until this afternoon, when her brother came to visit and she told him the story. 

He asked her to describe the guy and what he was doing when she smelled the ether.  She said he had some kind of pouch and he was putting something into it when the smell hit her.  Turns out this is a method used by the ‘bad guy’s to steal from people on the street and most recently, in supermarkets.  They carry ether in a spray can.  They spray it near someone like my wife.  The reason he chose her is that no one was on that aisle and she had her purse on the cart.  If her friend hadn’t come around the corner when she did, he would have taken the purse and gone.  Apparently, a lot of them use this technique but spray something in your eyes–which blinds you temporarily (not seriously), but you still end up losing your purse or whatever it was the thief wanted. 

The story ended well.  She woke up this morning without a headache.. And of course, thanks to our friend, with her purse intact.

It’s summer

Today I thought it would  be good to put up a few pictures now that our grass has taken root.

  Looking out the front of the house, notice our frequent police guy. 

 Looking up the side of the house to the fountain which we put back together again after the robbers were unscuessful at removing it this past winter.

  Looking out the side of the house from the bedroom.  There’s our friendly dumpster. 

The sound of horse hooves

Having a little trouble getting time to write in the blog lately….  Am trying a new approach… short, pointed posts…

At 8am this morning I awoke to the sound of the Toronto phone ringing.  Being that I work on Toronto time, I dont get up until 8:30 (5:30am Toronto).  It was a nurse calling from the hospital where my mother has been for the past month.  She said they’re moving her back to ICU.  I told them I’d call back later and speak with her doctor.

It was 25 degrees at 8am.  I opened the windows to get some cool air in and took a quick shower.  While dressing I heard the distinctive sound of hooves on pavement.  One of the many recycle guys, (the guys who jump into the dumpsters and remove things of value), was visiting the one on our corner.   

If someone had told me I’d hear the sounds of horses’ hooves while sitting in my bedroom, I would never have believed them.  Welcome to the life of living in a house in Pocitos. 

Much ado about nothing

 

For the first time in my life, someone gave me a planner.   Maybe it’s a hint :)   I’ve never used one before but I understand the principle behind them.  Nowadays, many schools sell these types of books to students (fundraising) and lots of my friends have used them for years.  My daughter was addicted to hers while in highschool in Toronto.  So today I opened mine up and after making a couple of entries for tomorrow, I decided to thumb through the beginning of the book.  There’s a ton of information there about Uruguay.  I decided to share some of it here.  If you’re into trivia, you may find this interesting. 

There’s a cryptic entry on the very first page…  ‘Remember Luxux Hard’   I wonder if that has a hidden meaning? 

The first few pages have entries for all sorts of good things… specifically Uruguayan I believe.. like both numbers for your hospital insurer and your emergency response insurer and places for your account number.  They’ve got a whole section for professionales.  Your lawyer, doctor, accountant, architect, dentist, escribano and very Pocitish… your veterinarian and chiropractor. 

For home maintenance, (a large % of Uruguayans own their own homes/apartments), at the top of the list is of course the albanil (the guy who works with blocks, plaster, cement, etc.. you get the idea), followed by carpenter, lock guy, electrician, iron guy (lots of iron bars here), gardener, painter, plumber and of of course, the TV technician. 

Under recreational, they of course have your local barkeep’s number, gym club, auto mechanic, hairdresser, both your preferred taxi AND limo driver and for those of us who remember what it ‘was’ like to have teeth, our acompanante. 

There’s a half page devoted to calendars with all the holidays for Uruguay, Venezuela, Brazil, Paraguay, Argentina and Chile.  The Uruguayan exodus of the 60’s although worldwide in scope, had a lot of people stay on the continent.  In addition, there are the US holidays and believe it or not, Israeli holidays. 

 I found the population figures very interesting.  I knew the country was around 3mil (about half of the metro city area I come from) and I knew Montevideo was about 40% of that (at 1.3mil).  I didn’t know the number of homes–1.3mil countrywide.  456K in Montevideo.  The book’s census figures drilled into that even deeper. 

I found out that where I live, (Pocitos), is the biggest neighbourhood in Montevideo with 70K people and 30K homes.  Carrasco, the upscale, closest to American suburbia neighbourhood in Montevideo ranks as smallest with 16K people and 4.6k homes.  

Some other interesting numbers.   Some expats live in Colonia Valdense.  No wonder you dont lock your doors.  You’ve got 3000 neighbours living in 1000 homes.  If there was a bad egg, I guess everyone would know who he was :)    The number 2 province/state in Uruguay is Canelones.  It’s got nearly a half million people.  Many of them commute to Montevideo to work.  We have a house there but I cant find our town of Salinas on the census.  I guess we’re too small. 

Punta del Este checks in with 7300 full timers in 2943 homes, just a hair behind Piriapolis at 7900 and 2800 homes.  We have more people but they have more money :)   The town of Maldonado makes a strong showing with 54K people and 18K houses.  Someone has to cut the grass and service all those vacant houses during the off season plus be ready to cater to the hordes of tourists in the summer.  Sorry to my other friends.  You’re in my Salinas boat.  Punta del Diablo didn’t score but La Paloma did sneak in there with 3200 people living in 1100 homes.  My wife’s birthplace (Castillos) came in with 7600 people and almost 3000 houses… I guess those folks like their space. 

 Under banks, the international community is well represented.  Foreign banks total 12.  Big names like ABN Amro, BBVA, Itau, Citibank, Discount, HSBC, Lloyds and Leumi are all here servicing both Uruguayans and itinerant Argentinos. 

The section on government offices is of course, very large.  Uruguayans love working for the government.  Most of the world’s countries are represented in Montvideo with official diplomatic missions.  Some of the more obscure are Albania, Angola, Libya, etc.  Heck, even Malta has a mission here.. Go Mary go.  They also list all the Urugayan embassies abroad.  My favourite is of course, Canada’s.  But they dont show the consulates so I dont get to see my most favourite, Toronto’s. 

There’s an outstanding graph that follows the peso vs. the USD.  We’ll know when the USD has really tanked when they change this graph to the peso vs. the Euro. But for now, it’s still the USD.  I like the graph a lot because it start in 1977… just a few years before I started coming here.  So it’s my history I’m seeing.  One day I’ll study it to see how much I really remember and how much I made up.  

 There’s anothe graph on what they call the Unidad Readjustable.  I think its supposed to represent an inflation index.  But the way governments manipulate this data, not sure how accurate it will be.  For instance, the adjusted rate of inflation for 06/07 was 8.25–which strangley enough, does sound right.  One day, I’ll get this out with one of my accountants here and he’ll explain it to me. 

The graph tracking the national interest rate in pesos is scary.  It’s been pretty good for the past 3 years but before that, during the crisis of early 2000’s, comercial paper ran from 40% to 120% at the peak. 

Foreign income is mostly associated with animal and plant exports with cattle leading the way.   If anything were to happen to the beef industry, like a boycot due to something like Mad Cow syndrome, the shock to the country would be unimagineable.  Uruguay, like many countries in the world, has been running a balance of trade deficit for many years. 

Unlike the USA and very much like Canada, Uruguay looks outward - on a global scale.  You can see it in the agenda as well as on the street.  Holidays, distances, populations, economic data from all over the world is represented in a personal agenda.