Goo, Gu, Gew

The first thing I noticed in Uruguay was the speech - it´s a little different. The term here for "Wow" or "Oh my gosh" is "GEW!" And it has to be said animatedly to work correctly.

I learned this while spending my first night in Paysandú, a historically industrial city hugging the Rio Uruguay on the western edge of the country, which is slightly smaller than the state of Missouri.

The night was one of my most interesting in South America because I hung out with a large number of homeless men. I met some artesans on the street and they invited me to stay at their place as well as have dinner with them. I grabbed a room elsewhere and then headed off into the night with them. The destination was an old Lion´s Club (Rotary, Lion´s, and quite a few of those other philanthropical clubs are all over Latin America) in which about 30 grown men bed down every night. Ages varied from 18 or so up to about 60.

The food, music, and company were fun, but it was a sad night overall. I helped out a little with groceries and drinks, but it struck me very hard that I had the means to sleep in a decent hotel (it was $6 for a nice place) and if I needed to, I could leave the country at any point and fly home.

Most difficult overall, though, was greeting the same men the next day as they walked the streets and panhandled outside of restaurants.

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On a happier note, I unexpectedly received a personal tour of one of Paysandu´s structural gems, the opera house. It is an amazing building that is supposed to have the best accoustics in South America - but who knows about that.