Atlantida, Uruguay and a Lesson

First things first - I am staying down here longer than I previously thought (surprise surprise eh?). February 6th is the date...I have a few things to do down here that I will explain later on in the due course. But enough of that. I AM HERE FOR MORE THAN TWO MORE MONTHS!!!!! YESSS!!!!

OK, today my Spanish lesson was to be out in the coastal neighborhood of Atlantida with Juan and two other students (Griego from Hungary and Ana from the south of Germany). I had a few cocktails last night, woke up late, and ended up catching the wrong bus to Atlantida, but it still arrived...and luckily I found my way around the small beach/resort town.

I say "luckily", but there was no luck involved. A few days ago while hanging out on the Peatonal Sarandi (the walking street in downtown Montevideo), Antonio my best buddy introduced me to a mother and her daughter who, by chance, live in Atlantida. Via them I found my way to class.

After "class", began another more interesting and insightful lesson - can you guess what was involved? If you answered beer or wine, you are wrong. Más mate claro.

My new friends, their friends, and Antonio my best Uruguayan bro hung out in a backyard for about four hours or so. That's it. No distractions beyond passing the mate around; everyone except me smoking as if the cigarrettes were going to disintegrate if not blazed up in succession; and the group singing together. Yes, singing. We sang. We laughed. We got to know each other. We enjoyed an utterly comfortable sunny day sitting on the grass. It was beautiful in Atlantida, to not describe the scene well at all.


And I confirmed two Uruguayan-isms today. "Ta" and "Vo". We'll get into that later...