So, if I haven't said lately that I love Montevideo and that it's easily my favorite place that I've lived, let me reiterate that point. Today, a tribute - a week's worth of shots taken along La Rambla, at the Museo de la Memoria, El Cerrito, and Bulevar José Battle y Ordoñez (aka Bulevar Propios), the street I go down every day on the 145 bus on my way to and from work.
1. Playa Buceo is the closest beach to my house...I normally go to Pocitos when I'm in a beach mood because I like the walk there better, but Buceo's nice, too. It lies along La Rambla, the 26-Km of beach, footpath, and street that run along the Rio de la Plata in Montevideo.
2. Buceo from the other end of the beach - note the faint white dot, a sailboat.
3. Playa Malvin is the next one down from Buceo; they're separated by a rock formation that juts out into the water. Malvin's got really nice sand, and also an island offshore...the island made an appearance in the lyrics of Queso Magro's murga act this past Carnaval!
4. Montevideo has two great scenic outlooks - one faces the harbor and old city, and the other, Punta Gorda, faces La Rambla...and it's a great view.
5. The vista also features a somewhat-odd looking monument to fallen seamen.
6. The other direction - Playa Verde and Carrasco.
7. Montevideo is arguably the best city for architecture in Latin America - this is a stretch of houses at Punta Gorda that I like, if just for their stylistic diversity.
8. El Museo de la Memoria, intentionally/ironically located in the former estate of a military strongman, is dedicated to telling the story of the human rights abuses of the military government of '73-85...the first democratically-elected president after the military government was sworn in 10 days after I was born.
9. In front of the museum, there are pictures on the pavement devoted to the theme of the "desaparecidos" - people who "disappeared" during the dictatorship and are now beginning to "reappear" on shallow graves on military bases. Uruguay, being much smaller than Argentina, had a lower number of desaparecidos (between 200 and 300; in Argentina, there were over 30,000), but the highest percentage of citizens jailed by the government of any of the Latin American dictatorships in the '70s-'80s- at least 7,5000, probably more, in a country with a population of 3.3 million.
10. Read it and weep...I did. Keeping in mind the previous caption, I'll just say that a major point of this paragraph is to combine the phrases "death squads," "supported by," and "government of the United States of America."
11. The theology of glory in a world of the cross - the enormous Church of the Sacred Heart on top of El Cerrito, towering over a fairly poor neighborhood. I can see the church for much of my daily bus ride to and from La Obra.
12. Close-up of the church.
13. The bus stops generally come with ads - this one is a Health Ministry informative ad about condoms..."Do it well, use a condom."
14. One of the main technical schools in the city.
15. The Police Hospital.
16. And THIS is why I've never been tempted to break into any warehouses...you see a LOT of guard dogs in this city.
17. The big milk processing plant...this is an industrial zone of the city.
18. The 145, which I take every day...and yes, the destination is "Colon"...it's Spanish for "Columbus."
19. Leftist political graffiti, which can be seen all over the city...this one is calling for the repeal of the law granting immunity to those involved with the human rights abuses mentioned above.
20. Il Mondo della Pizza, a block from my house - REALLY good pizza and fainá.
21. The fruit stand on the corner where I catch the bus every day.
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