TA

Colonia smells like grilled meat. There is smoke everywhere from the many parillas. My clothes, my hair, my skin, smell like smoke. It´s kind of nice, especially at night when it´s chilly. It makes me think of warm fires and hot chocolate. But it also makes me want to eat, even if I'm not hungry. It's like the smell of cinnabuns in the airport.

I'm doing well here on my new plan of just keeping myself medicated. I wasn't sure how it would be this morning as I went out to explore. There were times when I felt like I could be on the verge of an attack, but then reassured myself that the medicine would work, and it did.

Colonia is a sweet little town. It is lovely today with very few tourists. I imagine it might not be as charming on the weekend with thousands of Argentines tramping all over the place, but who knows. I am also glad I did not come last winter. There is not much to see, and once I did a walk around, I was really happy to have a room to be able to return to for a nap.

It is located right on the Rio Plata, or perhaps it is the Rio Uruguay. I think it is one of those bodies of water that has two names depending on whose shores it is lapping up against - like the Sea of Japan/Sea of China.

Uruguayans seem pretty much indistinguishable from Argentines in appearance, except that most of them seem to carry mates around with them. They walk with their mate in one hand and a thermos under their arm. If there are two people, one carries the mate and the other carries the thermos. It´s kind of cool looking - especially the mates that they have, which are gourds covered in formed leather with a metal stand. I picked up a gourd mate in the supermarket that has drawings on it, just as a little souvenier, but I will keep my eye out for one of the more fancy ones. Perhaps in Montevideo.

The other thing which seems to be different is a little espression they use here "ta". Thanks to Lonely Planet, I was prepped for it. It is short for esta, as in esta bien (it's ok). I just had a chorpan and there was a rather large guy sitting on a bench outside of the little shop where I ate. As people walked by and said hello, he said, "ta bien" in response. Here in my hotel, I just heard the clerk finish a conversation with "ta". It's kind of cute, but I don't think I'll be here long enough to adopt it.

Turns out I was kind of ripped off last night for my chivito. I paid $20 US for a chivito, fries, salad and water. Today I had lunch in a sort of homey little restaurant - a nice piece of grilled beef, salad and water and paid $6 US! Quite a difference! I was not prepared because I didn't know the exchange rates, so when I saw the prices on the menu in Uruguayan pesos, I had no idea how much that was. I paid in Argentine pesos, and that was when I discovered how expensive it was. Oh well, live and learn. Anyone who visits Uruguay, avoid the little restaurant at the end of the main drag right on the river.

After lunch today I stopped and had a yummy ice cream on a quiet little cobblestone street. I had dulce de leche al piu and chocolate al piu. I didn't know what this "piu" was and was prepared to ask the server, until I looked up and saw that it was the name of the restaurant! It was REALLY good and I may go back for more. After that I took a nap and had a hard time waking up. I just went out and bought some water and am going to go up on the terrace to watch the sun set.

My hotel is nice, but I think I got one of the worse rooms. My room is in the very front of the building on the street. Even though the little alley it is on is quiet, I can still hear noise from the main street, which includes motorcycles and buses. Not heavy traffic compared to Buenos Aires, but it is noisy. I explored the hotel earlier and saw that there are some rooms that have really nice views of the river. I guess when making a reservation, you have to be very specific about what you want. Also, I got in late last night (turns out I lost an hour) and maybe all of the other rooms were taken.

Tomorrow I am leaving on a 10:30 bus to Montevideo. It should take me about 3 hours to get there. The nice man in the bus station noticed that my watch had the wrong time and informed me of the time change. Good thing, or I would have missed my bus tomorrow.

Ta!