Uruguayan Diary: Day One.
Day One was very uneventful. The entire workday seemed to go smoothly. The one thing that I learned is that toilet bowls in the Southern Hemisphere don’t necessarily flush in the opposite direction (Counterclockwise? Who notices these things?) than those in the North; the one in my hotel room flushes straight down. The handles are routed through the wall, which seems like it would make replacement fairly expensive…

Uruguayan Diary: Day Two.
Day Two began with a lost and clueless cab driver, and ended with a 190kph wind/rainstorm.
I was met at my hotel at 8:15am for a 7:30am pickup. Not a horrible wait, but wait—the 15-minute cab ride to work took 1:15. This time period included asking one pedestrian, one gas station attendant, and one passing driver for directions—all of whom the driver found time for in between our passing the correct exit four times. After waiting for the arrival of work-related parts for six hours (I shipped them, for $800, exactly one week ago), I was finally able to make some progress at work. The weather rapidly turned nasty during the ride home, and ended with the above mentioned winds (plus a bit of hail) that slowly swayed my 25-story hotel back and forth (I’m on the 23rd floor). This made me mildly curious about Uruguayan building codes, and I imagined what I would think if I were back in Illinois, reading a news headline about the collapse of a 25-story hotel in Uruguay and of the handful of Americans that died in the rubble. Along with the sudden realization that one of those people could be me was the comforting (but unscientific) thought that because I’m aware of the situation, it couldn’t happen to me. I had the same feeling once while flying a Caribbean airline to Guyana via Barbados and Trinidad. I do think that a lot of Americans (myself included) become desensitized to horrible things that happen around the world, and rate news of these things only a passing glance unless Americans were involved. When disasters happened in the past and Americans were involved, I sometimes thought, "What the hell were Americans doing there/flying on that airline/etc., anyway?" It’s a sad and embarrassing thing to admit to this lack of compassion, but writing the Government of Umpty-Squat Aviation Commissioner certainly isn’t going to stop airline disasters in Umpty-Squat. One thing that’s very obvious to anyone that’s traveled abroad is that other countries are going to do whatever they want or need to do, and no crazy foreigner is going to change that.
I did enjoy a chivito from "Chivitos Marcos." A chivito is a massive sandwich that contains Philly cheesesteak-like steak, ham, chopped eggs, bacon, hollandaise-like sauce, olives, tomatoes, lettuce, hot peppers, etc. My left hand was 90% covered in sauce by the time I was finished. My coworker said that I had to do as he did, which was to wait until the sandwich was completely finished before wiping your hands and mouth. I think that should be a new eating rule, but the next time you eat something messy, think about how difficult it would be to keep yourself from wiping any stray food item from your face or hands.

Uruguayan Diary: Day Three.
This day certainly started out as the worst day of all. It was arranged that I’d be picked up at the hotel at 7:30am (why won’t I learn?). At 7:30, I hit the lobby doors to find gray skies, a 50F temperature and moderate winds that seem to come from every direction, making it impossible to hide around corners, behind building columns, etc. I wait, and wait, and wait until 8:15, when I decided that I stood a better chance at not freezing to death by waiting in the lobby with my view adjusted so that I can see the cars pulling up to the curb. At 9:30 the car arrived, and this is when I (honestly) decided to stop believing people when they say that I’ll be picked up at 7:30.
The drive to work revealed that the damage from the winds is probably in the millions. A car somehow burst out of a third floor window of an unoccupied building (which didn’t look like a parking garage inside) and ended up straddling a fence ten feet in the air, for one bizarre example of the property damage. After several detours around downed trees in the roads, we arrived at work to find that half of a breezeway roof was destroyed, and there was no electricity. No electricity=no work for this job, so my company’s agent was called to come and assess the situation. A gas generator was found and connected, but the voltage varied from 190 to 120 volts, which won’t keep 110VAC equipment running, and certainly wouldn’t be good for digital electronics if it could.
Off to lunch we went, while the agent called to arrange for the delivery of a rental generator at 3:00pm. Lunch was good, consisting mostly of meat, meat, and more meat—lamb, chicken, sausage, beef, tripe, and what looked like a fried brain. I didn’t ask what the fried brain was, but the agent said that, "We like to eat of lot of sweetbreads—intestines…" I winced, and he continued, "It’s an acquired taste." The "brain" was gobbled up, as was the tripe—but neither was so much as sniffed at by me. "Picky American," you might say, but I’ll counter with this: I’ve had tripe, and I think it has no flavor and has the consistency of gristle. I call the third strike against it because of what it was previously used for by the animal that owned it. This gastronomical strikeout would be better suited for a truth or dare game than a serious meal.
The rest of the day was cold and patience-trying. Not only did I have to use a generator instead of a wall outlet (a first for me in five and one-half years), the generator couldn’t power the lights or the heat, so I worked a few hours in the dark until I suggested that it was time for everyone to go. After freezing all day, then running out of cigarettes, I really wanted to get back to the hotel, buy smokes, then run to the warmth of my room, but I had to wait 45 minutes while everyone in the car was dropped off first.
My mood was lifted a bit at the supermercado, where I bought a liter of pear juice, a 100g chocolate bar, and two packs of Marlboros for about five bucks. No dinner tonight (not even the candy bar) as I’m holding out for breakfast. I was told I’d be picked up at 8:30am tomorrow, which means that I’ll probably have time for lunch, as well.