When
the girl at the hostel reception told me that the most exciting things I could hope
to indulge in, in Montevideo (being winter – whispering conspiratorially) was catch
a movie in a neighboring theatre or sip maté on the roof or by the sea watching
the sun sink across the bay; I should have known better to take the next flight
out. But Uruguay is my 145th country and tenacity is my name and
self-inflicted injuries to my mind are what I specialize in and I wasn’t going
to give up Uruguay without a fight. Living with ‘zero’ expectations and being
‘disappointment proof’ has their own rewards and nowhere else has it been
proven as conclusively as in Uruguay, the country that many dream of visiting. I
spent the next five days in this flat nation and this is the story of what
happened or rather didn’t happen during those interminable hours.
