From Music to Disaster!

Well, I feel like I'm playing catchup with my January posts. The last few weeks of January sure were eventful. January was in the throngs of summer with hot days and fun filled nights. It actually had been too hot what with the temperature in the the high 90's and the nights in the 80"s

January 16th, a Thursday night, saw the first full moon concert held in El Fortin de Santa Rosa
January 17th, on Friday was the "White Night" event in La Floresta.

January 18th, Saturday, I heard that a music concert was to be held at the beach parking lot near my house. I have my congregational meetings on Saturday nights instead of Sunday. After coming home that night, I ate dinner and then I did something that I should do, more often. Because there weren't any mosquitos out that night I went out to my terrace with a Rum (Ron in español) and coke in hand and my now 3 dogs in tow to stand guard for me, I went out to enjoy the warm night. I was happy that I could hear the promised music concert, so clearly, coming up from the beach. Concerts here usually start with the most well known bands then move on to the lesser known and in need of more practice ones. It was true that some trees were blocking my view of the bands but I had the best of both worlds, no crowds and my bathroom just inside of my house should I need it. I stayed outside all night with my feet up listening to the beach bands play. Little did I know, how much that respite would mean, or how things were about to change.

January 23rd, Thursday I had my congregational meeting. The night was somewhat clear. After the meeting I came home and I had dinner and dessert, then I let the dogs out to pee and poop for the night. Right after that, it started to rain. Then the winds started to blow and blow and blow. I was glad that the dogs were already inside for the night. Then it struck! The winds started to slam into our neighborhood. Coming up from the water, Southward and blowing North inland, the force was intense and loud. Nathan, my cat ran to my bedroom door and when I opened it he ran under my bed. That is something he has never done before. He is no scare-dy cat but is normally quite fearless. Then the electricity went out in the neighborhood and the telephone service. I went to bed.

January 24th, Friday, we were without power and phone until 1:30 PM. Others toward Atlántida didn't get theirs turned on until 3:30 PM.  When I went outside. I saw that my front yard dog house had been blown out from its corner and was now on my front steps.

My planter, filled with bamboo, had fallen over (it was a little top heavy in design). It had stood upright however, through other wind storms. Surprisingly the ceramic cup it fell onto remained unbroken but the saucer under it broke instead. My heavy wooden patio furniture had been blown as a group (they are chained together for security reasons) across the entire patio and they were now up against my shutters. I am so thankful that I have heavy locked shutters covering my huge picture windows, otherwise the furniture corners would have broken my window.

Those things were the things moved by the wind, they were not damaged. The only real damage that occurred was to my solar hot water heater. I lost 4 tubes.

Since I didn't have power or phone and it was lightly raining, I decided to wait until Saturday to call around for a person to fix my solar heater and replace the tubes.

I was very fortunate that I didn't sustain more damage. The reason for that was that I had already cut down all of my dangerous trees and had them hauled away last year at great expense. Now I can sleep like a baby during any wind storms unlike before the tree removals.

Friday morning, I went out into the neighborhood to see what was what. The neighborhood didn't escape the storm as unscathed as I did.



My street entrance was now blocked from 4 fallen trees lying across it. The 5th tree had fallen away from the street.

My neighbor up the street had a tree now leaning just on the edge of his roof. It amazingly didn't really damage the roof itself.

Around the corner gates were smashed. Fallen trees were everywhere.

Last year, one corner lot on Avenida del Mar had 19 trees fall, well this storm blew the rest down. I guess that corner is a terrible wind catcher!

Going past my few blocks, I started to see some heavier damage towards Salinas but still in my barrio of Marindia.

The worst damage by far was captured in the photos below by a person posting on Facebook to the Balneario Marindia site. These photos may have been taken by Maria Cristina Franco because they said "with Maria" and there were no people in the photos. I am just trying to give credit were credit is due.

The middle picture of a wooden cabin style home shows a house that used to be 1 1/2 stores high having an attic bedroom and window, now it was reduced to only 1 story. The last photo is of an interesting garage in my neighborhood. Part of the main house has the same odd design as the garage. These are all from my barrio of Marindia. These photos are near the highway by the Estorill store.

Amazingly, the power got turned on very promptly as already mentioned, by the next day.

The work of cleaning up the neighborhood went about orderly. It is still going on. The air is scented with pine bark and needles. The sound of chains saws fill your ears. Life goes on without grumbling.

The weather is now overcast and the days are cool but humid. Who knew that when I was outside enjoying music from my terrace on a hot summer night a week ago that things would change so quickly. From music to disaster what a difference a week makes.

"White Night" in La Floresta

Wow, January 2014 has had some interesting moments and events. It is the height of summer down here in Uruguay and the days and nights have been HOT, HOT, HOT both literally and figuratively!  Daytime temperatures have been around 95 degrees F /33c. and the nights have been in the 80's.

Thursday, January 16th was the first Full Moon of the year. This usually means that the folks in the town of San Fortin hold their yearly public concert on this full moon night and so they did. Even though, it was a Thursday night, the natural amphitheater was packed. My friends who live there, the ones who invited Wally and I last year, gave me a blow by blow report. My Thursday evenings are spoken for, what with my congregational meetings and Bible study. Still, Most events don't start here until late in the evening 9:30PM and on (due to a power outage the event was delayed in starting until10:30), which meant, I could attend both the meeting and the concert. However, I had been so over heated that day from walking in the heat (my feria/ grocery morning is also on Thursdays) that after the meeting I decided to skip the concert and just go home. I was saving my energies for the next night, the 17th of January!

Friday, January 17th , the city of La Floresta was holding their celebrated "White Night" event. This event has nothing to do with the moon at all. I've done a post before on the little beach town of La Floresta and as mentioned in that post, the people of La Floresta like to sponsor art events. The city has sculptures scattered all through it. It also has some interesting and varied architecture which the "White Night" event highlights. 

This night was bright ( remember the full moon was only the night before) and it was hot, so we waited until 10Pm to arrive. The idea of the "White Night" theme is that during this night the city is bathed in bright spot lights to highlight the various styles of houses and as a sort of "snap shot" or Kodak moment into the life of that town. Residents who own odd, interesting or old houses allow bright lights to shine on their houses and present a little vignette of how charming or interesting their place is. Often, they themselves will sit out in front of them and "pose" and stay frozen in that pose, in a sort of living still life. People like me will stop and take their photos. It's like we are peeking in on their lives.  

Many of the houses will have its history listed out front so you can read about it while passing by. Some houses mention things like who lived there, maybe the town doctor or some famous or important person. Others, mentioned that theirs was the first or second house built in the town or things like that.

The vignettes they provide are very charming! In addition to the community cast and their homes, tucked in here and there are little bands of musicians and various art booths. 

When we first arrived, there was a stage we walked by, where two young women were shaking their stuff in a fast and furious Salsa dance. The stage and lightening setup was grand but the music was canned and they may or may not have been lip-syncing. I politely stopped and watched for a minute, I took their photo and moved on. However, hidden down one of the town's streets was a band of young men under a simple blue light who were really playing some fine contemporary music . Their sound was mellow and smooth. I liked them so much that I stopped and recorded them. I would have stayed but my friends moved on, so I followed them instead.

If music wasn't your thing there were art displays and fun art like statements spread around. Some pieces were actually woven into the city. A picnic area now had knitted "Granny squares" lining the support poles. and one street had a canopy of rag ribbons tied overhead to walk under.

Some streets had lighted candles and fabric flowers hung in their trees. I just had to get a picture of myself under that romantic scene.

The local church in the big plaza had singers out front singing songs about Uruguay. Of course, always my favorite to view, were some antique cars on display. I even got a photo of an original "paddy wagon" a jail truck.

Everyones' favorite attraction of the "White night" event however, was the techno light presentation that was held at midnight. The main, art deco styled, hotel building in town is transformed into a giant outdoor screen.

What is so interesting about the show is that all of the lights in the hotel are turned off by midnight so the windows are blacken but the light show called mapping takes into account the many windows in its display. The windows and the building are part of the show.

I hope you can see how wild and weird the giant screen show was by watching this section that I filmed. 

Click on this link to watch

I will be posting on 2 other events that happened in January, this first month of the year.

All in all, 2014 is off to a running start and I have camera and blog (pen) at the ready!

The Garden Gate!

My vegetable garden (mi huerto)

It may seem strange to you up North in the midst of winter to hear me talk about gardening but for us down here in South America, in Uruguay we are in the throngs of summer. Tomatoes and watermelon are a foot. This led me to think about Expats and Gardens.

I've noticed that expats usually follow, some similar stages of progression upon moving to Uruguay or any foreign country for that matter. It involves 3 steps.

Step one is deciding on where to live. Some travel around the country briefly, this is sometimes done on prior visits. A city, coastal area or the campo/rural place is then chosen.

Step two is that, once they have decided on the area they want to live in, the exciting hunt for real-estate in their chosen city, town or field begins.

Step three is hiring all kinds of workers to improve their newly purchased dwelling. Some enlarge their dwellings, others gut them. Nobody is ever 100% satisfied with them!

Once these 3 steps have been accomplished they need to start a garden, particularly a vegetable garden. Even people who have never kept a garden before, seem to have this compelling need to start one, upon moving here. Only then, do they feel truly settled! All of this, as a matter of course, is done during the first year of their arrival.

I followed these same phases as well but unlike all the other expats here, I never finished my garden in "my first year" here. I just petered out in my efforts. My vegetable garden back in Seattle, Washington, USA was very, very nice, at least I thought so! It had raised vegetable beds and gravel walkways in between and I wanted to do the same thing here. My garden back in Seattle was full of clever ideas, and speciality items.

My ex-Seattle garden. Can you guess which 4 herbs are planted under the sign!

I grew different types of lavenders in pots like English, French and Spanish lavenders. I even had a light yellow lavender, Yeah, lavender that was not lavender colored and a variegated leaf one called silver something??

More of my Seattle Garden in the USA. Collard greens in the bed and Raspberry vines.

For my garden here in Uruguay, I thought about getting older in Uruguay, so I wanted a low maintenance garden.  Since we have dogs that do, "like to dig", sometimes (Yeah, I know, out of boredom), I wanted the whole thing fenced in.

This is the entrance to my UY vegetable garden and why I needed to fence it in!

 Meanwhile other expats were already harvesting and eating their home grown garden produce like delicious tomatoes. Somebody gave me collard green seeds to get me started (Thanks John) since back in Seattle, I was well-known for my collard greens at dinner.

 Well, 3 years passed!

Cantaloupes grow well here by the beach.

Last year (year 4), I did attempt to start it up. I filled 2 beds with soil and had a great crop of bell peppers. I also tried my hand at growing melons for the first time, cantaloupes!

They were a rousing success! I got 10 full sized delicious melons from just the two companion plants that I bought in a dixie cup from the feria.

I also grew Eggplants. I read somewhere that since eggplants were heavy feeders that an interesting way to get them off to good good start was to plant them with an egg, no-less. I mean a real, raw, whole egg! Just dig your hole and put the whole egg in the bottom of it. Cover with only a little dirt and plant your eggplant on top. Fill in the rest of the hole as you would normally.

An eggplant grows well with an egg!

It must have worked because I had so many eggplants that I lost count of them. They were nicely spread out over months. With some just emerging from their flowers while others grew suitably large.

I found out that you can grow lettuce in a fairly shallow hole. I had left space for a rectangular planting spot in among all of those cement walkways. I wanted to break the space up and grow something. Well, when I went to plant something there I found out that there was a cement footer just under the surface belonging to my neighbor's wall, I guess?

I went ahead and planted the lettuce there anyway along with some basil and I had no problems in growing the lettuces, I grew both green and red varieties. I bought the starts for only 5 pesos each from the local farmer's market/feria.

I also, finally, after 4 years of living here, added a clothesline in my garden area (other expats had already done that also, in their first year).  I tried my hand at drying clothes with pure solar power, THE SUN!!. There is an art to that because depending on the weather it's not always successful (drying clothes in the rain doesn't seem to work, LOL)

Clothes and towels get stiff, scratchy and hence itchy when lined dried. To prevent that, several suggestions are to hang them up during the cooler parts of the day and to use vinegar in your rinse water when washing them (it doesn't leave an odor). Right before you hang items up, give them a good shake and rub or roll them to loosen up the fibers, then hang them up. Whew, I never knew about all of this preparation. Of course, some men like rough scratchy towels to dry off with. If you're one of them, just hang them!

My Uruguayan Huerto/Vegetable garden is enclosed with wire fence.

So now, it's been 5 years since we have been living here in Uruguay. In order to give me some motivation to keep adding to the garden this coming season,  I have installed a needed garden gate! (The title of this post!)

My garden is enclosed with wire. In all these years, I have had to lift away a panel of heavy wire to go in and out of the garden. So I hired some Hierro/iron guys to build me a gate. They are different guys then the ones who did my trash can. Those guys wanted to charge me 6800 pesos and I believe they would have  hung the gate on the existing wooden posts (logs really). I thought that price was a little high.

The phone number had nothing to do with the poster.

I looked around for someone else and saw a telephone number written on an old wooden board (Herrero means blacksmith), it was hung up on a street corner. I decided to call the painted number. I left a message. Then a man named Sergio called me back. I told him where I lived and what I wanted. An appointment was set.

When two people arrived at my house, I was pleased that they were quite professional considering their street sign, they even handed me a preprinted flyer.

These two were also a father and son firm, Nuñez is their last name.  They wanted to include the installation of new metal posts in their price and remove the old wooden ones. That got me interested and so I asked them, to also include, the cost of another fixed panel next to the new gate. That would allow me to remove more of the wire fence so that the new gate wouldn't look so tacky butting up against the old wire.

old wire fence gate. Just a panel  lifted on and off to get into the garden.

They quoted me 500 pesos more then the other guys but for that price they included my panel and the new posts! So I jumped at the chance. I went to Abitab (a bill paying place) with the workers cedula number/ID # and his phone and street address. I paid a down payment for the materials (4000 pesos). It cost me 100 pesos for the office transaction. In 2 days, they started the work. Upon completion, I paid the remaining 3300 pesos I owed them and that was that (¡Se acabó!). Their job had cost a total of 7300 pesos.

I am hoping that this new entrance gate, will inspire me to start taking care of this garden once again.

First, I will have to sweep up the walkways, then pressure wash the walls again and of course, buy more dirt, plants and finally plant an even bigger garden. Maybe, next year!

Okay, I admit it, I like garden designing more than actually gardening, you caught me!

2013, End Of The Year!

Well, it looks like, I managed to survive 2013! So I thought, I'd write a little end of the year wrap up post.

This last week of December has been HOT, HOT, HOT!!! Is it too intimate to say (?), that I sit here writing this post in my undies, scanties, skivvies, smalls or unmentionables (ropa interior) because even though it has "cooled down" to a tolerable 85 degrees today, I'm still remembering yesterday's roasting 95 degrees F. / 35 C; weather.

Especially, during hot days like these, I try and keep little trays, full of water, out for any thirsty birds or bees to have a drink or splash in. I even have a large shallow plastic dish (from the bottom of a flower pot) full of water for the resident frog to sit in at night.

Yesterday, in the wee hours of the night, the extreme hot weather broke with a thunder storm. It often does that here, when the hot weather reaches a certain point, but only a quick 20 minute rain/sprinkle was all we got last night. That means, my grass is now brown and crunchy. I'm not a morning person, so I never think about watering until maybe noon when it is then too hot to water. So I thought, I'd post some front yard garden photos to remind myself of how good looking it was, "before", this heat wave.

Throughout the year, I take hundreds of photos (or thousands) of ordinary, everyday types of stuff because I never know, what I might need to show and use in a post. Most are kind of junky but nonetheless, I thought I'd use a few of the photos for this wrap up post.

          Daylilly,                         Bird of Paradise,                   White Agapanthus

For you plant lovers and gardeners, I usually try and show you what types of plants grow here in Uruguay. Above, I have included some photos of my summer blooming plants that I keep in my front entry garden.
Let's face it, we blog readers, like to,"peek a little", into how other people live. So I thought you'd also like to see, one of my favorite places in my house. It may seem odd.

For some reason, I just love my hallway! It's wide enough to walk down it without feeling crowded. It leads to the private section of the house, our bedrooms, bathrooms and laundry room. I have put up pictures along its walls as a sort of art gallery. So that I don't knock them off in the middle of the night, I had Wally bolt them to the walls, kind of like they do in a bar.

I have the hallway painted a relaxing Cappuccino brown to help subdue us for sleep. We have two bathrooms. One bathroom is just for the ladies or Damas it's in pink and the second one is just for men or Caballeros, painted in blue. The men can finally leave the toilet seat up and I don't care!!!

Something that I do, from time to time, is try and take pictures of the sky, full moon and of the stars.

Since I don't have a professional camera with all of the F stops, etc... it is a bit of a "hit or miss" hobby.

The milky-way seems to go right pass over our house at night and the 2 most recognizable consolations that I see all of the time are; Orion's belt and the Southern Cross.  The 4th star, in the kite shaped formation of the Southern Cross, is very hard to see and take, as it is faint and winks out just when I snap it's photo.

Orion's Belt                                       The Southern Cross

My camera always picks up some difference in color between the stars as if some are hotter and others are cooler. Some are more red in color than the other bluer ones. Are the red ones dying? The consolation with Orion's belt, looks like a primitive drawing of a guy dancing on it's side. It has two stars spread out at the top like two arms outstretched and two stars, like feet are spread at the bottom The "belt" of 3 stars is wore stylishly at an angle across the body. There are always 2 faint stars that also show up like a metal worn on a shirt. That's my take at least, on the stars of Orion and his belt.

Of course, no end of the year post would do without photos of the gang. Nathan the Cat, Sheila and Barney.

Nathan's eyes match the color of my dinning room chairs. He has a white nose except when he gets some sun or toasty warm, then his ears and nose turn a bright pink! Sheila likes to sleep alone. She is my loyal companion and so is Nathan. Barney is just Barney (or Barney Baby Boy) odd but sweet. He always has some complaint and lets you know it. He's allergic and sensitive to everything. Poor guy!

I'm still working on my Spanish but on nice days I try and remember to bring my books outside.

I have a small vegetable garden in my back yard but that will be a blog post for January. I did have some raspberries finally appear on my vines this year, so yeah!!!

This winter we had a week of almost Arctic weather with a cold blast. I took in a lost dog that week. I keep a bowl of water and a dog house for guest or wandering dogs in front of my house. One little lost dog went in it to sleep but since it was soo cold, I eventually let her come inside our house to sleep. Nathan the cat, seemed to like her.

Then one week later, when the weather warmed up, I guess she heard her master calling, so she went outside running and joined the little old man. I called her Sally, from a Cyndi Lauper song, Sally's Pigeons.

This month, I left a message on Facebook with a Uruguay expat group, mentioning that someone had abandoned a pup. Probably gotten as a present, it ended up across the street from me. Because the weather is so extremely hot it took up residence under the drain pipe to stay cool. I brought it water and food, my neighbor took its picture to give to our local vet. I showed it the "guest" dog house and it started to sleep there. Being a puppy however, it moved around so much that my dogs starting barking at night. Finally, I took it into my backyard. Someone in Montevideo "may" take it but all of our cars are broken down, so the pup is in a holding pattern until transportation can be arranged.

It is a real sweetie and looks to be a BLACK, "Golden" Retriever. It is healthy, and was smelling good even before I gave it a bath. I am calling her Noche (Night) for the time being. Barney doesn't like her. Sheila is okay with her and the cat is okay until she comes close and wants to play. I hate that people don't put collars on their dogs with their cellular phone number on it so people can call. Also, dogs and cats should be neutered OR the pups and kittens given away responsibly. I got both of my dogs at the feria (farmers' market) from people carrying around the puppies. One tall and handsome Uruguayo was strolling around the feria years ago with 2 pups in his arms. You could see him across the crowd. He had tied a blue ribbon around one pup and a pink ribbon around the other to show their sex.

We got the Pink ribboned one and Sheila is now my constant companion. Barney was in a box at the feria and the lady took him out and made me hold him. He was actually an ugly pup but has since grown up into a dog quite handsome and with comic character. So if you can't afford to neuter your pet or don't want to. Please either guard them when "in heat" OR get good homes for each one of the resulting offspring.  Just don't abandon them in the street or field, Please!!! Even my boy cat is neutered.

This coming year I plan to go into Montevideo more and take lots of photos and notes on things to buy and do.

Like reminding people that in Montevideo they have lots of flower stands where you can buy and make up bouquets of flowers or just buy 1 or 2! I say this because each year, all I ever say to Wally, is that I would like some flowers for our wedding anniversary and he feigns like he doesn't know where to get any. There was a shop in Atlántida that sold some a while back. After a quick fight once, I showed him the shop and a few days later he got me some. However, I'm still waiting for some for our Anniversary. I'm not holding my breath however.

For any of you more romantic types, remember the flower stalls when visiting MVD.

I will also be eating in more restaurants this coming new year and reviewing them for people on a budget like us.

Oh well, my neighbors who are professional musicians have just started to play for a party of theirs and beautiful music is wafting across the airspace between our houses and into my delighted ears. So I will grab my "Gin and Tonic" with lime (my favorite hot weather drink) and I will close now. I leave you with the typical, end of the year, neighborhood fireworks display.

It's a good thing I don't have to leave the house for the music, my drink or the fireworks show, otherwise I would probably be arrested, I just don't feel like putting on any clothes. It's still too darn hot!