Uruguay, the good, the bad, and the ugly.

Many Americans (and Europeans) come to Uruguay with expectations of cheap real estate, easy residency, nice climate, inexpensive living, friendly English speaking people, private and protected banking and so on.  The good news is that the people are friendly and many speak English.

Expectations are dangerous things.  Most of the expats we have talked to have really tried to do their homework before coming all the way to Uruguay (this includes us).  Many of these people are frustrated, disgusted and are ready to relocate elsewhere.  Unfortunately, the information available about retiring or living in Uruguay comes from people that wish to sell you their services or products.

We were attracted to Uruguay for many of these same reasons.  A cosmopolitan yet inexpensive lifestyle with no visa worries sounded like a wonderful place to spend the months from November through April.  So we came here to see and this is what we have found.

·         Apartment rentals can be very expensive during the Uruguayan high season which runs December through March.  In addition, availability is severely reduced by January.  Run down forty square meter apartments in Montevideo or Colonia run between $1,100 and $1,500 per month before the cost of utilities.  Punta del Este or Piriapolous will cost significantly more.

·         You can reduce your rental cost by executing a longer term lease but expect to be asked for a deposit equal to five or six months rental.  You can reduce this deposit amount by paying the entire cost of the lease up front. 

·         There will be an immobliario (rental agent) involved and you will pay them a commission equal to 10% of the lease or one month’s rental whichever is less.

·         It is best if you can find qualified assistance for the residency process although we understand it can be done by yourself.  We have listened to story after story about law firms here in Uruguay taking thousands of dollars from people for results that are never achieved.  The process, done right, by honest people who know what they’re doing is quick, painless and inexpensive although we have been informed that the process has changed significantly with the recent change in government.

·         Bringing hard goods, vehicles, furniture or appliances into Uruguay before obtaining residency (possibly after as well) can be problematic and very expensive.  Our friends were told it would cost $300 in fees (not counting transport or insurance) to bring their vehicle into Uruguay.  One month after their vehicle arrived in port and $3,000 later they have sprung their vehicle from the customs authorities.

·         Prices for food are similar to that in the United States but more than in southern Europe.  Beer and wine costs more; a liter of the local beer costs $3 plus a $.60 bottle deposit in the grocery store as compared to $1 in Spain.

·         Restaurants are not cheap.  Beef prices appear cheaper than in the US but it can be deceptive.  Uruguayans do not age their beef similarly and the cuts are very different so it is difficult to compare.  An average meal “menu del dia” for two will cost $25 to $40 (compared to $12 to $15 in southern Spain).  If you both have a steak and share a bottle of wine you will pay $65 to $80 or more.

·         The cost of consumer goods; clothing, appliances, furniture, etc. is very high and quality is very, very low.  This is due partly to the fact that there is very little or no manufacturing in Uruguay and these items must be imported.

·         We’ve been here for December through February and the climate has been simply divine.  Daytime highs in Montevideo generally don’t exceed 27 or 28 degrees Celsius and gentle breezes blow most days.  There are occasional hot and humid days without breezes but for the most part, summer here feels like spring to us.  Because of this we expect that the winters might be fairly cold although probably mitigated by the river and the ocean.

·         There is a lively and friendly expat community in Montevideo.  There are several different groups that typically meet in the evenings or on weekends so you can get plugged in fairly quickly.

·         The buses run constantly during the day and getting around the city is relatively cheap and easy once you figure out the routes.  The bus station, Tres Cruces, is the primary place to catch buses traveling to other cities.

·         Service is an interesting thing in Uruguay.  Wait staff do exactly that; they wait until summoned.  There is also the amusing overemployment issue where there is one person for each job and that is all they do.  Nowhere is this more apparent than in a fast food joint.  The cashier takes your order and makes change.  Another person looks at the ticket and gets your sandwich.  Yet another person obtains your french fries while yet another makes your drink.  While this may not sound so bad be advised that no action is taken on any ticket until the previous ticket has been fulfilled.

There’s much more of course.  We chose to live in Ciudad Vieja which is the old part of Montevideo and very near the port.  The streets are noisy nearly all night but the shops and other businesses close up and pull down their steel shutters by 8 pm on weekdays and earlier on the weekends.  This has the effect of making Ciudad Vieja appear to be a deserted ghetto which it is most definitely not.  We have had several people tell us (but not by anybody who has lived here for any length of time) that Ciudad Vieja is a dangerous place to live.  You wouldn’t want to be walking around alone at 3 o’clock in the morning but that would be true about most other parts of the city and in fact, most other cities.

The language is definitely different.  We are intermediate Spanish speakers and learned our Spanish in Andalucia.  Being relatively new to the language it has taken us some time to adapt to the idioma here in Uruguay.  They have trouble with our soft” c’s” and “z’s” and we struggle to hear a “y” or “ll” pronounced “sh”.  The formal “usted, ustedes” verb forms are utilized (not common in Spain) and word usage varies dramatically as well. 

Interestingly for us, many Uruguayans will answer or speak to us in English when we speak Spanish to them.  At first we thought that our Spanish was so difficult to understand that people were encouraging us to switch the conversation to English.  Later we find that this is normal and is a way for them to practice their English while we practice our Spanish although we have been told that Castellano spoken with a strong American accent is indeed difficult for most Uruguayans.  Apparently nobody needs to practice listening in their second language.

Living in the cities of Uruguay is neither cheap nor expensive.  The people are friendly and the climate benign if not absolutely divine during the summer months.  You can choose to live in a good sized city, an expensive tourist resort area, a small town or a tiny rural village.  Public transportation is good and reliable.  There are ways to avoid both problems and significant expenses once you know your way around and have connected to a few quality people.

Our advice:  Visit Uruguay once or twice before considering a commitment to living here.  Perhaps a visit in the summer and another during the winter months and stay at least a month each time.  Make connections with other expats and explore different parts of Montevideo and different parts of Uruguay.  Once you are comfortable that this is where you want to be then make a well planned, properly assisted move and avoid the costs and headaches others have experienced.  Most of all do this with your eyes wide open.

Gallagher's, Montevideo

On our fourth visit to a pub with an Irish name and a green lettered sign with shamrocks we found an establishment that tried to be an Irish pub.  Gallagher’s, located in the lovely Pocitios barrio of Montevideo has an impressively Irish looking façade and outdoor seating on a wood deck facing a quiet little street.

Upon entering we were impressed with the wood paneling, the lighting and large bar.  There are comfortable booths along one wall and a semi-private dining room on the second floor.  Music was playing at a comfortable level that didn’t interfere with conversation.  The menus were large but difficult to read in the subdued lighting due to the small, fancy print and because the drinks menu was black.  Because the bar was properly lit and comfortably furnished we give Gallagher’s two points for ambience.

The beer taps had no names on them but there appeared to be a large selection.  The friendly bartender only spoke Spanish, which, while disappointing, gave us a chance to practice.  It turned out that the bar had only been open for four months and was just now gaining a reputation and a following.  He explained that it was difficult, if not impossible to obtain Irish beer and ale in Uruguay and the need for a new bar to work closely with their distributor which means basically, that you serve what they offer.  For Gallagher’s that meant a selection of brews that were little different than that served all over Montevideo.  This pub receives one point for the bartender even though he was not Irish because of his friendliness.

What was a little different were two things: they had a selection of beers on tap “tapidas” known only by their color (rubia, roja, negro, etc.) and a selection of expensive English bottled beer called “Fullers”.  Some of these were priced at $50 for half a liter!  No Irish beer, ale or cider was to be found and worse, no Guinness.  No points can be given for the taps and the food menu was also typically Uruguayan but did feature a roast beef sandwich and fish and chips.

We ordered red ale and decided to split an order of fish and chips.  Both were disappointing as the ale was rather weak and the fish was tasteless at best.  We couldn’t fault the cheerful and responsive service however and give the pub one point for this service and for the attempt at fish and chips.  The bar is popular among the locals however, and by the time we left was quickly filling up.  Because we really like the music selection and because the volume was always at a comfortable level, we choose to award one point for entertainment.

Overall, though we were disappointed at Gallagher’s lack of “Irishness” we were happy with our comfortable experience and would certainly not hesitate to return with our Uruguayans friends although we might not chance the kitchen again. 

We award five total points to Gallagher’s.

Ambience                                            2

Bartender                                            1

Taps                                                    0

Food/Kitchen                                      1

Entertainment                                       1

This puts Gallagher’s into a tie for fourth place for the moment.

Hannigan’s                                          Granada, Spain                       13

O’Reilley’s                                          Lanzarote, Canary Islands       9

Devil’s Forest Pub                              Venice, Italy                            7

International Brewery Bringas            Madrid, Spain                           5

Gallagher’s                                          Montevideo, Uruguay             5

The Tower                                           Moraira, Spain                       5

Ciudad Vieja, the "old city" in Montevideo.

We chose to stay in barrio of Ciudad Vieja (old city) in Montevideo because that’s what we do.  Our experience has been that the history and the culture of a city we haven’t been to before can be found primarily in the oldest neighborhoods.  Ciudad Vieja turned out to have a flavor all its own.

After living for three months in Ciudad Vieja we definitely have mixed feelings about this particular barrio.  There are things we really like about it and things we really don’t care for.  That is the nature of Ciudad Vieja.

At first glance, Ciudad Vieja is ugly with graffiti sprayed on the walls of the grey cement buildings and steel shutters over all the doors and windows.  Rambunctious youths talk loudly with their friends in groups around closed doorways.  Dogs wander where they like doing their business anywhere.  In the evenings most of the streets are almost completely deserted, adding to the eerie feeling you get if you first arrive after dark.

The light of day reveals another Ciudad Vieja.  Graffiti disappears as the shops roll up their shutters and open for business.  Souvenir vendors display their wares along the pedestrian only areas of Calle Sarandi and police are at every intersection.  People of the barrio go about their business carrying bags containing their morning bread, fruit and vegetable purchases. 

Ciudad Vieja has approximately 16,000 full time residents but over 100,000 workers regularly flow into this part of Montevideo on business days.  On most days there will be one or two large cruise ships in the port which adds several thousand more people to the streets.  For a while, Ciudad Vieja is crowded, noisy and vibrant.

Like any modern city that experiences the wonders of hosting tourists, there is quite a bit of petty crime.  From our apartment window we have seen two men arrested for fighting, another chased down and arrested for reasons we know not, and a local man arrested when the police were trying to walk away from him but he could not shut his mouth.  By far the most common crime is purse snatching by juvenile delinquents.

While not criminal, there are two things we have found extremely irritating about Ciudad Vieja.  The first is the number and methods of the beggars.  Hardly a child in this part of the city can bear to see a person pass without asking for money.  These are kids who are wearing nice, clean clothes with new shoes playing outside of the buildings they live in with their parents.  Please bear in mind that we have lived here for three months and I know some of these kid’s names.  At first we would ask them “why” or “for what” and the first answer was inevitably “to buy something” and when we shook our heads the answer changed to “to eat” or “for food”.  Don’t you just have pity for these kids?  Not.

The second irritating thing just grosses us out.  We have seen this happen in Pocitos and Punta Carretas (two very nice parts of Montevideo) but it is a constant in Ciudad Vieja.  The dumpster divers.  There is nothing like sitting in a café trying to eat your wonderful and expensive chivito while facing a man eating out of a dumpster.  This is an endemic problem in Ciudad Vieja and dumpsters are rummaged through several times a day.  A regular dumpster diver (not an eater) will generally have a backpack and might be riding a bicycle.  In some ways, these regular dumpster divers are worse because they tear open garbage bags, looking for whatever they’re looking for and generally strew garbage about for the wind to blow around the streets.  We absolutely hate it. 

We stayed on the corner of Calle Perez Castellano and Calle Sarandi which is right on the edge of the tourist area.  Police stationed in the small plaza in front of our building regularly direct tourists in one of two directions (the other two directions being relatively undesirable).  Following either of the two “undesirable” directions will take you to the river and the “Rambla” which is a beautiful, wide, well paved walkway that runs for miles along the river in Montevideo.

From our apartment a walk up the Calle Sarandi will take you past several cafes and pastry shops (pastelerias) and ultimately to Plaza Constitucion (old name Plaza Matriz) which has a nice tree lined park, some fast food restaurants and two or three nice but expensive cafes.  Occasionally there will be a musical performance and there are always artists and other vendors displaying their wares.

A walk down Calle Perez Castellano toward the Mercado del Puerto has a little different flavor.  As you walk you will pass solid building with wonderful wooden doorways of many shapes and sizes.  The locals pass a good amount of their summer evenings sitting outside their residences and will respond with a cheery “buenos tardes” to your greeting.  Further down you pass a pizzeria, a butcher, a wonderful sweet shop, a grocery store and several produce stores along with a variety of other shops, markets, cafes and bars.

At the bottom of Calle Perez Castellano you will find the Mercado del Puerto which has the reputation of being the most dangerous place in Montevideo.  This is true if you are an obvious tourist, wearing a lot of jewelry and loosely carrying a purse.  This can also be true for you men if you are loosely carrying a camera (with or without case) or if you regularly keep your wallet in your back pocket while passing through crowded areas.  If you don’t insist on being a mark, Mercado del Puerto has several very nice but expensive restaurants to enjoy. 

We spent several nights a week with our friends Carlos, Selenia and Julio at El Peregrino where the parilla (barbeque) and the atmosphere are terrific.  We also particularly enjoyed the ravioli at Bebieca which is right around the corner from El Peregrino but all of the restaurants in this area have good food and are friendly.  Beware, the serving sizes can be huge in Uruguay and the parilla for two in any restaurant in Mercado del Puerto may well feed four of you.

From a practical standpoint, Ciudad Vieja is close to the port which means there is easy access to the ferries and the cruise ships.  Buses run regularly to other parts of the city most of which are within 20 to 30 minutes depending upon traffic.  It is far, perhaps a 45 minute taxi or one hour bus ride to the airport.  The main bus station, Tres Cruces, where you can catch a bus to just about anywhere in the country, is a 15 minute bus ride.  Getting around isn’t a problem.

Ciudad Vieja is also close to many of the famous Uruguayan Carnaval celebrations with the Tablados in the Mercado del Puerto open Thursdays through Saturdays, Murgas being performed every night for almost two months on the beaches in nearby Palermo and the Llamadas beginning in Barrio del Sur (an adjoining barrio or neighborhood).  Everybody simply goes to the beach for the actual holiday of Carnival.

All in all, an interesting experience.  You can stay in Ciudad Vieja with a little less spice if you rent a place near to or above Calle Zabala.  We’ve both enjoyed and hated our experience here and for us, three months has been quite enough.  We don’t need to do this again, but we’re glad we did it.  Go figure.

The travel day from hell.

It’s the last day of a mediocre 19 day cruise.  The ship is arriving in Buenos Aires early in the morning and we are eager to get a start on our busy day.  From Buenos Aires we are scheduled to take a quick one hour ferry to Colonia del Sacramento and from there an autobus to Montevideo where a car service will take us to the apartment we are renting, after stopping at an ATM for cash to pay the agent…….

Sounds complicated?  It is, kind of.  We are coming from Europe, our ship used the euro and was unable or unwilling to change money, we had spent two days in Brazil, we were going to need money in Argentina, the real estate agent required US dollars and we would be using Uruguayan pesos for everything else (food, drink, etc.)

The ship was an hour late, no problem; we had planned around this by requesting to be in the first departure group.  This is possible if requested 3 or 4 days in advance.  If requested too far in advance the cruise line will typically tell you to resubmit your request later or will simply forget.  Actually, our mediocre cruise line screwed it up anyway but Marilyn was on it and helped them correct this particular error.

All passengers had been asked to vacate their cabins by 7 a.m. so the housekeeping crew could get the ship ready for the passengers that would be embarking at noon.  Breakfast was available so this didn’t pose too much of a problem.  Everybody was then required to be at various disembarkation locations by 8 a.m.  The ship was supposed to have docked at 7 a.m. to handle the required paperwork and begin disembarkation at 8 a.m.  Unfortunately, the ship did not dock until close to 9 a.m. 

By 10 a.m. the lounge we were sharing with 200 or 300 people started to smell rather rank and we were beginning to be concerned.  Finally, the announcement……there’s a baggage handler strike in the port and nobody can leave the ship until the baggage has been delivered to the terminal.  No further information, in five languages.  Things were not looking good for catching our 12:30 ferry.  Good thing we had made the decision to spend the extra few dollars for changeable tickets.

Marilyn located an open bar on another floor of the ship and I spent most of the next hour and a half speaking with a wonderful Argentinian gentleman who tried to apologize on behalf of his country for the strike.  He was good enough to allow me to practice my pitiful Spanish provided he could practice his very good English.  Finally at 12:00 the strike was settled somehow and we all crowded off the ship, through the terminal and into baggage claim where the baggage for 3,000 people on a 19 day cruise was just now being unloaded….what a mess.

We eventually located our four heavy bags, put them on a cart, struggled through the mass of humanity still in baggage claim, and then struggled through a larger mass of humanity in customs and then through more between the exit and the taxi stands.  We had no Argentinian money, a few euros, twenty American dollars and some Brazilian reals.  There was no place to change money at the cruise port or if there was we couldn’t see it for the crush of people.  Thank God the taxi supervisor agreed to accept our last 20 American dollars to deliver us and our bags to the ferry terminal; it was close but a surprisingly long trip in the Buenos Aires port traffic.

We entered the ferry terminal and approached the check-in counter.  After looking at our tickets the lady jumped up and called across the terminal to a gentleman on the escalator who shook his head.  It was nearly 1 p.m. and we had nearly made our ferry!  But no such luck today.  Unfortunately, now we had to change our tickets and wait for the next available ferry at 4 p.m.  Although we would make up some time because this ferry would travel direct to Montevideo, we would still arrive 3 hours later than planned.

This was a problem because we had no phone, limited or zero access to WiFi and therefore no real ability to call another country to reschedule our pickup.  Taking a taxi to the apartment was an option but we would still not have had a way to contact the rental agent in order to tell her what time to meet us at the apartment.

We were able to change some euros into Argentinian pesos so that we could buy some empanadas and drinks in the café while we waited with enough left over for refreshments on the ferry as well.

Changing the tickets was certainly a new experience.  The very helpful lady at the check-in counter rebooked us on the next ferry and printed our tickets, we thought.  She then directed us to line up at the cashier’s window in another part of the building to pay for the changes (the ferry direct to Montevideo is more expensive than the route through Colonia).

After waiting in line and paying the change fee we had to return to the check in counter where we received our boarding passes.  We were then told that we couldn’t check our luggage in until 2 p.m.  So we hauled our luggage into the café in order to have a little lunch.  The empanadas tasted wonderful.  So did the beer.

Meanwhile, the ever resourceful Marilyn, after wasting several pesos trying to call Uruguay from a pay phone, sweet-talked a supervisor at the check-in desk into letting her make a call to our rental agent who agreed to meet us at the terminal since the car service would not drive to the port that late in the evening (8 p.m).

At 2 p.m. we returned to the check in counter, checked our bags and headed for immigration.  The Uruguayan passport control clerks conferred over our relatively new American passports (issued in 2010 with a new information stripe across the bottom) and stamped our documents; passport, boarding pass, immigration document.  After relaxing for another hour we noticed a line forming at the ferry puerta (gate).  We wondered about this since our tickets showed that we had been issued specific seat numbers.  Not having traveled in this particular area before we figured we better do as the locals did and got in line.

Good thing!  The ferries operate much like a discount airline, Southwest, EasyJet, SpanAir, etc.  You get on early, find a good seat, sit down and hope that nobody sits between or next to you.  On the ferry the legroom and seats are similar to the first class section on an American airliner but, there is no place to put your carry on luggage except in front of you or in an unoccupied seat.  They pack these ferries full.

The ferry ride was comfortable, had a snack bar and a duty free shopping area on the lower deck.  We actually took short naps and the ferry arrived on time and no baggage worker strike!

The ferry terminal in Montevideo is under construction and it took forever to work our way through the lines at customs which consisted of an x-ray of all luggage.  Finally, we were outside, in Montevideo and, after a little hassle, located our rental agent and loaded all of our bags into her small station wagon.  Off to find an ATM for those US dollars we would need..

The port in Montevideo is located in a part of the city know as Ciudad Viejo.  This portion of the city consists of one way streets and the shops close down completely at a relatively early hour.  Since there is quite a bit of graffiti and the shops have steel shutters rolled down when closed it did not give me a favorable first impression of Ciudad Viejo.  Did I tell you that the apartment we are renting is in Ciudad Viejo?

We finally found an ATM (most are on the pedestrian only streets we found out later), entered the secured area and started our multiple withdrawals.  If this sounds convoluted, it is, here’s why; the rental market is quite complicated in Montevideo and the rental agent insisted on US dollars.  You can withdraw either US dollars or Uruguayan pesos from ATMs in Montevideo.  The banks do however limit withdrawals from their ATMs to $300 per transaction.  We needed $1,100 for the rental agent and a few bucks for ourselves.  This required 5 transactions.

Just before completing our business, the lights in the small ATM room went out and a steel shutter rolled down.  It was 9 p.m. and we were locked in the bank!  The rental agent who had remained outside in the car with our luggage was frantically running up and down the block to find a neighbor to call the bank or find another entrance with a security guard.  Meanwhile we knocked on the inner glass wall and called for assistance.  After about 5 minutes a bank security guard came out and let us into the bank apologizing and explaining that the outside steel doors shut automatically at 9 p.m.  We were just happy to be out and thanked him as he let us out of the security door which functioned like an airlock where there are two doors and one has to be shut before the other can be opened.  I’m liking this neighborhood less and less.

I thought we had stopped in traffic when our rental agent pulled up to the dead end street by our apartment building.  Dead end is an exaggeration because it is simply where the street is closed to automobile traffic near the apartment (30 yards).  Surprisingly, the building is clean and secure and the apartment interior is modern and functional.  The agent showed us how everything worked in the apartment and we went over the rental contract with her (in Spanish), paid the rent (we had previously sent her a deposit)  and were suddenly on our own in a country we had never been in and where we knew nobody for the very first time in our lives. 

The next issue was that we were in a neighborhood where all shops, cafes and markets were closed down.  There were few people on the streets except for the hoodlums (my term, probably not fair) sitting out on the street drinking (probably soda) at 10:30 p.m. on a Friday night with 400 American dollars and no water or food.  We had heard that there is lead piping in the plumbing of most buildings so you don’t want to drink the tap water.

An American 100 dollar bill is a large bill late at night in Ciudad Viejo.  We hiked about half a mile and found a plaza that had some activity and a McDonalds.  We thought surely McDonalds would accept an American 100 dollar bill.  Of course they only accept bills smaller than $20.  We finally wandered into a restaurant with a very nice ambiance and were assured that they accepted American dollars.  The wait staff was wonderful and friendly.  They could tell we were exhausted and really worked hard to help make us comfortable.  After sharing a chivito (local Uruguayan sandwich), a glass of wine, and taking some bottled water (sin gas) to go, we strolled back to the apartment and fell into bed.