[Remote Year] Montevideo: Initial Impressions
On Saturday, January 30, my mom got in bed with me at 7:30 am to snuggle and snooze for a bit before we got up. I’d been awake until 5:45 am, finalizing the last of my meticulous packing and uploading photos to my dropbox account. Mom lifted up the comforter and I scooted over to make room, burrowing into my pillow, feeling achy and exhausted. She asked if I wanted to go to the 8 am yoga class I’d insisted I’d be awake for. I said no, unsure my muscles were capable of doing a pushup. At 8 am, she set up mats in her room and we did an easy 25 minutes of yoga to gently wake up our bodies.
She made us breakfast while I did a few remaining to-do items. Then I treated us to mani pedis together for her birthday before we ran a last couple errands. My stepdad picked up lunch, mosquito spray, and duct tape (to repair the panic-inducing hole I found on the corner of my suitcase). We ate on the back patio while I helped my mom set up labels to organize her gmail. Then they drove me to DFW airport. My suitcase was 58 pounds, so the check-in officer made me split it into two bags. Luckily, I’d had a duffle flat-packed in my suitcase, so I pulled it out, threw a couple packing cubes in it, and sent both bags away to meet me in Montevideo.
Mom walked me over to security and gave me a hug while we both cried our way through goodbye (it’s not at all my first time traveling or living abroad, we’re just criers). She stood next to the security line until we couldn’t see each other anymore, and then I sent through a handful of “on the plane, I love y'all!” texts and took off for Miami.
My flight arrived a few minutes early but proceeded to spend a painstaking 45 minutes sitting and waiting for a gate. I checked my phone’s clock neurotically and sent messages to my Remote Year group on slack, even though I hated knowing I was making the impression of being neurotic and nervous. We finally pulled in to a gate and were luckily just a couple gates away from my flight to Montevideo. I rushed over and boarded almost instantly.
And then, we sat.
As soon as everyone was boarded and anxiously wondering if our bags would make the connection from our first flight to this plane, the captain announced there was a mechanical issue that we’d be waiting on to fix. Every 20 or so minutes, he’d hop back on and explain that he knew nothing and could offer us no timeline for taking off. After two hours of sitting (and one announcement that we could deboard but not get back on), the mechanic arrived and fixed the problem in less than 5 minutes. He was near enough to my seat that I heard him tell someone — “tweet at American or something, this isn’t how business should be done!” before he hurried back off the plane and the captain announced we would be on our way to Uruguay!
After some standard lackluster plane food, ache-inducing economy class sleeping, and 10 hours of flying across the world, we arrived in Montevideo, Uruguay on Sunday, January 31, 2016 around 11 am local (which is +2 EST and +5 PST). I managed to deboard the plane, pass immigation, get my bags, and exit customs remarkably quickly, inexplicably beating the other 16 Remote Year people from my flight by at least 10 minutes.
I immediately saw Dave, our community manager, standing with a bright smile and a huge REMOTE YEAR sign. He introduced me to Heather, the social media / marketing RY staff member. Over the next 45 minutes or so, fellow Remotes trickled through the doors and joined our group. Once we had enough for a van, we piled our bags in the back and got a 30 minute ride into the city. I met and talked to my seat mate, Maya, during the drive, and we observed the unexpected fact that the ocean at Montevideo is brown, which is disconcerting. (I’ve only seen rivers look like this, and a quick check with google/wiki confirms that a river drains into the water near here and explains the brown ocean phenomenon.)
We arrived to the Lancaster Hotel and met Jason, our operations manager, who gave us welcome packets and our pre-ordered SIM cards. Everyone immediately went about setting up their phones, and then we got our keys as rooms became ready and available. I went up to my room and was, honestly, a bit disappointed. I’d been traveling in SE Asia last summer (to be written about soon!), and I’d paid $20/night for rooms with air conditioning and private bathrooms. So I was expecting a similar level of quality. Now that I’ve been here 3 nights, I think that overall it’s fine (especially considering the coworking space — more on that below!), but the sad plastic drapes, ancient hospital room tv, and random remnants of hair+dust combined with my utter exhaustion and hunger was not a recipe for instant delight.
I texted my family a bit, wandered around my room in circles, and finally showered and got dressed. Before I lost momentum, I walked downstairs to see if I could find anyone to eat with. As soon as I walked into the first floor RY waiting area, I heard a girl introduce herself as Emily and realized I was meeting the only other Williams alum on the trip, who several of my friends had enthusiastically told me would also be on Remote Year and assured me that we would be friends. We hugged, explained our coincidental relationship to the confused witnesses, and set out to find the Mercado where another group had recently gone to eat.
As soon as we exited the hotel and I took the above photo of the square, we saw a girl walking nearby that had the look of a freshly showered but exhausted traveler and asked if she was part of our group. She was, and we walked together about 30 minutes across town to find the Mercado del Puerto — a large indoor market of restaurants and shops.
The city was noticeably empty, closed, and quiet. Shopfronts all had large doors shut and the streets suspiciously lacked both cars and pedestrians. We chalked it up to being a summer Sunday, which apparently was correct as Montevideans (?) all do spend weekends devotedly at the beach. After finding the entrance to the mercado, we spotted the easily identifiable group of other RYers and added ourselves to their table. I have no idea which stall/restaurant we were actually eating at, but someone told me that one of the closed restaurants had been featured in an Anthony Bourdain episode, so I’m sure we will be back to test that one out.
Leo, a Columbian in our group, was ordering food for the table and ensured there was entirely too much for everyone to eat. He got the three of us “chivitos for two”, which ended up being a giant plate with fried eggs on top of steak + bacon + cheese on top of fries piled on top of shredded carrots and sliced tomatoes, next to some peas + carrots + potatoes covered in mayonnaise. I wasn’t sold on the cold mayo-veggie mix, but the steak and eggs and fries certainly hit the spot, and we all realized just how incredibly hungry and exhausted we’d been as soon as we’d eaten some food. Our tab was about $1000 pesos ($32 USD) for the big chivitos platter + three waters + 10% tip, so it’s not cheap but also not quite as expensive as at “home” (most of us hail from big cities so consider those prices standard).
We walked back to the hotel area, picked up water and toiletries at the Tata supermarket, dropped things off, and then set out to meet the group at La Pasiva at the Plaza del Entrevero. It turned out there were about 40 or so RYers sitting at an already winding table, to which we added another arm of tables and 10 more people. I was pretty tired and somewhat overwhelmed by the number of names and new faces surrounding me, so I mostly kept to talking to Emily, Tarryn, and my immediate neighbors or quietly observed the interactions around me.
Around 8, we walked 2 km over to Brickell Irish Pub (unclear why we had to trek out so far from the hotel when the Pasiva was mere blocks away) to meet more of the group. I stayed for a beer and introduced myself to some more new people, but around 10 pm was pretty well done with being awake and standing. A group of us ducked out and walked the 30 minutes back to the hotel for our newly appreciated beds.
Monday, February 1 was our first official day of Remote Year! I woke up groggy and travel-hungover but managed to get up by 9 am. Apparently I missed a marching band at 7 am on the plaza side of the hotel, but I walked through some kind of guard ceremony next door.
I arrived at the Sinergia coworking space around 9:45 am. Jason gave me a quick rundown of how the space works (office spaces are rented to companies, tables are fair game to work from; basement downstairs has some kitchen items, the eating area, and free instant coffee/tea/water; upstairs has the lunch chef and a big room + patio).
At noon, we had our orientation to Remote Year, and it was pretty insane to see (almost) all 76 of us in one place. We all continue to try and introduce ourselves and apologize for not remembering most people’s names, but I think we’re all doing pretty well and certainly empathize with the overwhelm. Dave and Jason explained more about their roles and some of the RY systems, but they also told us we’d be getting more detailed information this weekend.
Then the Sinergia founder + employees (three badass and funny Uruguayan women) did a very enthusiastic presentation about how to use the space (essentially: respect it and each other, treat it like your home, clean up, be quiet, be friendly). They also handed out name tags and stickers, and then they showed us how to cure our new RY mate gourds and prepare & drink mate. I haven’t started with mine yet, but I’m curious to try it — you really do see EVERYONE drinking it out of the gourds all over the city, even walking down the street.
Emily and I *hustled* to get in line for the chef’s lunch before it got painfully long, and I got two empanadas and a salad (surprisingly good) for $200 pesos ($7 USD). We ate in the basement and talked to more new RYers and smiled in apology for my rusty Spanish to the local Sinergia coworkers also eating at the table (who then went on to play foosball before returning to work).
We worked for a few more hours (with some internet connectivity issues), and then it was time for the 6 pm meet & greet social hour for Remote Year + Sinergia. We met up in the upstairs room and balcony area and indulged in some free drinks and empanadas and chatted while the sun went down. The Sinergia ladies ruled the foosball table for many games before agonized yelling alerted us to the fact that, ironically, Jason and Will (both Remote Year staff) had upset their winning streak.
I left around 8:20 pm and ran into a group of 10 heading out to eat (dinner happens very late here, like in Spain / Europe), so I tagged along to eat at El Mingus. It was a very cute and pleasant environment with nice staff, who immediately accommodated our group and then the shortly following other 30ish people that arrived from Sinergia after us. I had a salad with fruit (greens, strawberries, raisins, almonds, goat cheese mousse, dressing) for about $10 USD that was really delicious and happily received — I’d been nervous that fresh veggies and salad would be lacking here (or make me sick) like in India and SE Asia.
I finally got home around 11:00 pm and facetimed a friend before bed. I decided not to set an alarm for this morning so that my body could finally get as much sleep as it needed after all the traveling and meeting people and being on my feet. I slept 9.5 hours and woke up feeling pretty darn good, at last.
Today was less eventful — I got up around 10 am, slowly got ready at the hotel, and went across the street to the Oro del Rhin across the plaza. I managed my way through ordering (thanks to my Italian and muttering Spanish-sounding words) and had a mediocre quiche and salad and a not very good cappuccino. But the wifi worked well and the view of the plaza was nice, so I was able to get about 4 hours of work done. I also learned that Sinergia was having wifi issues thanks to our team Slack updates, so I was glad I’d worked elsewhere for the day while they got their systems caught up to our bandwidth needs.
Arielle, who had come in to get coffee and sat down with me for a chat earlier at the cafe, and I headed to the workspace around 4. It’s a nice 30 minute walk through some residential neighborhoods with some shops and restaurants. I got to work pretty quickly and was busy until 6:30, when the group met to walk out to the beach for the annual Yemoja celebration.
According to Wikipedia, Yemoja / Iemanja is the patron saint of women and the ocean:
In Montevideo, worshippers gather on Ramirez Beach in the Parque Rodo neighborhood every February 2 to celebrate Iemanjá Day. Hundreds of thousands sit waiting for the sunset before they launch small boats with offerings into the ocean. In 2015, the Uruguayan government estimated that 100,000 people had visited the beach for the celebrations.
We sat and talked, watching the crowds gather for a while, but by 8 pm, some of us were too hungry to wait any longer for dinner.
But we were treated to a beautiful sunset before 8 of us set off to find dinner.
We ended up at a restaurant that I can’t remember / never knew the name of [update: Cocina de Pedro], and we ordered a Bandiola (or, as google translate told us, a gondola?) of pork and 2 of the Parrilla (?) entrees for two. They brought us some bread and cheese spread and pork dip, all of which was very delicious and incredibly well received by the table. We entertained ourselves by playing “two truths and a lie”, which gave us some opportunities to learn some random stories about one another and also wish that some of our lies were true.
Then dinner came, and as I suspected based on our portion sizes at the Mercado del Puerto, it was a tremendous amount of food. Each order of the Parrilla (if that’s even what it was called) was a giant pot / tray covered with sizzling meats of every kind: beef, pork, and chicken done grilled, sausaged, and fried. It was served with fries and veggies, plus our pork dish that was immediately indistinguishable from all the other meat on the table. It was delicious, though, and we were all full. With bottled water and tip, the bill was $4000 pesos total or $500 pesos each ($16 USD).
After dinner, we were grateful for our 20 minute walk home. I continued to chat everyone’s ears off and provide too much backstory, try as I might to remind myself to shut up and ask questions. We arrived to the hotels, I came up to my room, wasted a bit of time on social media, showered, and sat down to write this — which has somehow taken me more than an hour (doesn’t bode well for quick readability).
Thus far, two full days in, I’m very happy with Remote Year and am excited to be part of this group. Jason and Dave are great and seem to be on top of their jobs and managing us. Sinergia is a great workspace, and Montevideo seems like a great city to spend some time in. The other Remoters have all been really friendly and interesting people to start to get to know, so I’m looking forward to making more friends and seeing how professional + personal relationships develop this year. There’s still a lot to be sorted out on my side in terms of picking up more clients / projects, but overall, I’m feeling confident and good about being here.
