Montevideo dream sets imagination on fire

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Dear reader

Lately, we’ve been reading and talking so much about Buenos Aires and Montevideo that it's got to the point where Guapo’s having dreams about the River Plate region. He who never remembers dreams told me this …



“I dreamed that we were in Buenos Aires which was looking pretty run down with a lot of shops closed and boarded up. And better off people were employing gofers to scavenge for them.

Then we were crossing the Rio de la Plata on a very long bridge and the river was in flood and the water was washing up around us knee height.

We arrived in a to me unfamiliar part of Montevideo which was bustling and in good shape. We just kept walking until I could find somewhere I could recognise which ended up being the harbour where the port is.

And we could see the Cerro (the hill with the fortress on top). And there were a few very tall buildings next to it which I couldn’t remember from before and also some needle like rock formations which also weren’t usually there.

Then we were in the Ciudad Vieja walking towards Plaza Independencia and the Avenida 18 de Julio. And just as we got to the Plaza there was a Norse bar on the corner which was closed and which had a note on the door:

“Erik esta de vacaciones in Australia” (Erik is on vacation in Australia).

And then I woke up.”



I laughed so hard I choked on my toast! There's been a lot of flooding in Australia, but in my imagination Erik (possibly a relative of mine), wisely staying away from towns with boarded up shops, is having a great time in St Kilda (why not?), which is nicely sheltered by Port Philip Bay and from where you can see the distinctively shaped You Yangs in the distance, not to mention the City of Melbourne skyline ... (where Guapo lived for twenty plus years).

As for the gofers, Australians have their own version of scavenging. Yes, there are people who forage for food from supermarket bins. Op-shopping is another form of scavenging. For some a drive to the tip means searching through others' discarded gems. We also have scavengers who come out at night, combing the neighbourhoods just before the Council truck is due for a kerbside pickup of no longer wanted belongings left on the nature strips by the materially overloaded. But most people, even the wealthy, would be too cheap to pay someone to scavenge for them. Or would they?

Dreams about decay and prosperousness aside, we're now at the camera buying stage, which is proving a right challenge.

Bye for now
Guapita

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