Well, the app on my phone says I have to check in for my return flight in four days, and I am less than thrilled about that. Despite the fact that I really have not done anything in Montevideo that I could not or would not do in Nashville, that is beside the point. It just feels different here in a way I did not realize I needed, and I am not exactly excited to leave. If Mazie Mae was here, I might have just said fuck it and stayed.
This trip has been a weird vacation, very unvacation like. I have done some “adulting in a foreign country” things, and I have done a whole lot of “staring at the ceiling and negotiating with my own nervous system” things. The last two days especially, I have not done shit. I walked to the grocery store, I grabbed dinner, and I came home. That is it. And here is the part that is harder than it should be. Tranquilo is the vibe here, and I am still learning how to let it win without feeling guilty about it. Most of y’all will blow right past that sentence, but I am being serious. I have never felt so much internal guilt over doing nothing, even a few sleepless nights and maybe a panic attack that I will deny if confronted. I am just now starting to realize how much TireHub fucked my head up.
Still, I have been running a small checklist since the day I landed, because that is who I am as a person. I found the hardware store. I found the pet store. I found the big grocery stores. I found a place to buy socks, because apparently socks are my new emergency supply category. I successfully had food delivered through a phone app without accidentally ordering a family sized bucket of something I cannot identify. Check, check, check. I am basically a local now, as long as you ignore the accent, the translator, and the fact that I still look around like a lost kitten that smells tuna.
Sunday was my “shop like a local” day, which meant Feria de Tristán Narvaja. This is the largest feria in the city, and calling it a “market” is like calling the ocean a small body of water. It was five blocks long and five blocks wide. You can buy veggies, jewelry, spices, toilet paper, furniture, clothing, pretty much you name it. I went for price comparisons and I left convinced it is a legit option for regular life. I paid my three American dollars for a kilo of honey, dropped about ten American for a chivito and a Coke, and picked up a small Christmas gift for a friend. And if I was living here full time you can be damn sure I would be the dude hauling the old lady cart full of groceries behind him, just like everybody else.
Then came the next mission, because you cannot pretend to be a functioning adult here without a bus card. I did get it, but it took two days because ChatGPT gave me bad info. The government office that used to be in the prison mall is no longer open, which I found out the fun way, by showing up like an optimistic idiot. So I regrouped, went to Tres Cruces, and came prepared. I had the translation on my phone before I even approached the window, and it felt like a movie scene where you are standing before a judge asking for bail. The lady read the phone, smiled, and ten minutes later I had a bus card in hand and was on my way.
Tres Cruces also handed me one of those small world moments you cannot plan. I was on the escalator and, for the first time in over a week, I heard English. With 98 percent of the population speaking Spanish, my ears snapped around like a dog hearing a cheese wrapper. I turned around, said something, and that is how I met Heather and her husband. They are from Greensboro, South Carolina, and they live up near Punta del Este, which is where a lot of expats end up. Heather is the admin for the Uruguay Expat Group on the book of face, and she and her husband have been here for over ten years, with their adult kids living here now too. We swapped numbers, and I walked away feeling like I just picked up a contact I will absolutely use later. And here is the part that weirdly calmed me down. They can get by, but they are not fluent at all. Both of them told me directly that they “do not speak it.” Heather can do a little, and her husband straight up admitted he is stubborn about it. If they can do ten years here with “just enough” Spanish and a lot of confidence, then I should have better results with actual effort.
And speaking of daily life, one thing I genuinely enjoy here is how universally the buses are used. It is everybody. All walks of life. All neighborhoods. All classes. It is not a “poor people thing” or a “tourist thing.” It is just the way you move around Montevideo. One of my last days here, I think I am going to get on the bus outside my apartment and just ride until I get bored. No plan, no destination, just a cheap rolling tour of whatever parts of the city I have not seen yet. Sort of my own tour bus, except cheaper and with a higher chance of me accidentally ending up somewhere that sells engine parts, live chickens, and a knockoff iPhone case in the same storefront.
Back home, I got the kind of phone call that makes you stop what you are doing for a minute. Devon called to tell me he finally signed on with a local union. At long last. Now he can bid on jobs and really start getting into the lineman work he has wanted for years. It has been a hard road for him and for me, but it looks like he is on the right track. Now comes the “come in, let us pick on you and make you eat shit” period, which every manual labor job seems to require as an entrance fee. But for those of us who have lived blue collar life, we know that is just part of the ride. So well done, Devon. I am proud of you. Do not give up.
He is also worried about his CDL A driving. He has the license, but not a lot of practice behind the wheel. As an ex truck driver, I know you learn by doing, but I also understand the fear. So if any of y’all around the Mitten have an opportunity to put him in a truck to practice, please let me know. It does not have to be a big truck. A stick and a trailer would be something I would happily compensate someone for. Even a little seat time goes a long way.
And here is the bigger thought I have been sitting with after these two weeks. I am starting to reconsider the pace of my plans. I still want to relocate here, but I think I might take a pause. One, because of the house price slide, and two, because I like the idea of working toward two livable locations, one in the US and one in Uruguay. Think small one or two bedroom places that are cheap and let me snowbird without needing a permission slip from my own bank account. More thought and planning is the order of the day. But the idea of successfully establishing two small homes and being able to rent one out while I live in the other is an intriguing option. I might finally get to build that container house I have been designing in my head for years.
Which brings me to today. There is one thing left on my list that matters for my long game. I need to make my way down to the cruise docks and see the layout. I do not know what it will be yet, but I have it in my head that when I get here for real, I will find a way to take advantage of the built in tourist trade. Over 110 ships dock in Montevideo annually, and each one is packed full of tourists with gold in their pockets and the decision making skills of people on vacation. I believe I can find a way to separate them from some of that gold. Respectfully. Ethically. With a smile. I just do not know how YET.
Today I am going to the old section of Montevideo, using the buses to get there. If all goes well, I will turn the photos into a little game of “Europe or Uruguay.” It is sort of like “who’s Bill and who’s Jill” from a bad Maury episode, only with less penises. And if you see a photo of me near the docks staring at cruise ships like a cartoon villain, mind your business. I am just doing research.
Q
Q is a meat Popsicle living in Nashville with hopes and dreams of running away to Uruguay to retire earlier than all his friends. Skilled in the witchcraft of not giving a damn about the Jones’ and filled with a did it or damn it mentality. His thoughts are his own, and he is no role model.
