Strangeways

There's an argentinian reporter who once said that Montevideo at night looks like Gotham City.

No, I've never been to La Paz, but I am sure it would be an interesting trip. They say it's very difficult to breath when you are at the Bolivian heights.

No, you can't see Buenos Aires from Montevideo but you can see it from Colonia.

That friend of mine did not complain about breathing problems in Bolivia but he is quite experienced with those environments as he has also travelled in Peru and Ecuador a lot, including some towns at over 4000m height. He did say Bolivia was more authentic than most other South American countries, probably he means it is less globalised and less internationalised than the other countries who get tourists and expats from all over the world. Bolivia indeed seems 'less travelled' than the other S.American countries. Paraguay may be the same though, as there's not too many travellers going there.

Doesn't Montivideo also have a soccer team called River Plate, just like Buenos Aires have? Probably a reference to the same water that seperates Uruguay from Argentina?

Well, yeah... I would say bolivia is the more authentic country of the Americas since they clearly kept alive their native-indigenous population and culture while Uruguay has no native population at all, they killed them all a long long time ago... Anyway, we do have our own culture that comes from the mix of french, italian, spanish, english and an important 4% of afroamerican population... It's a mix but it feels authentic now.

About River Plate... yeah! River Plate is one of the biggest teams from Argentina. Uruguayan's River Plate is a much more small club with no cups or anything.

*is learning SO much from this discussion*


...and now for your regularly scheduled programming...

(an image of motevideo:)

Lovely. I love metropolises by the sea, always a lovely combination and one that attracted me often yet in cities (Oslo, Istanbul, ...).

I know the Argentinan River Plate, those shirts are extremely nice with that diagonal red stripe. Wasn't it the club Canniggia used to play for?
In Uruguay the big club is Penarol, isn't it?

Yeah, that's my team. I don't remember if Caniggia played for River, I remember he did in Boca Juniors.

The weird thing is that Chile has a team called Everton and in Argentine there's a team called Arsenal. That is so unoriginal.

Which are Penarol's main rivals again? Trying to think of the other team that is usually fighting for the trophies...

In Argentine, I think you're right about Caniggia being a Boca man. My mistake. Must say I like the River Plate club, that name alone is very nice and their fans seem passionate beyond compare even to Argentinian standards.

Nacional is our enemy club. Peñarol was founded by english workers, while Nacional was founded by uruguayans, that's one of the reasons for our rivality.

About those unoriginal names, you must remember that southamerican football was started by english immigrants, so that can be a reason. In Uruguay we have a Liverpool and an Amateur football team (which is the first team of all) called Albion.

So there can be a Liverpool-Everton game played in S.American tournaments as well :blink: In Argentina you can see the immigrant influence on the game well when looking at team names. There's a few teams named Espanola, Deportivo Armenia, I believe there's a team called Portuguesa as well.

Yeah, we also have a Sportivo Italiano, Central Español...

I so love willows ...




took these pictures a week ago

A good view of Yosemite I took-- I am totally diggin' the glare.