The 5 most important Spanish words to know and use. In the land of Dulce de Leche, that was the go to line when we got into cabs - directly translated, atrocious grammar and all, as hello! Favorite eat very good? Accompanied with the hand signal for money and waving your palm around to indicate an average price, it worked wonders, and we were driven to a spectrum of a fancy, award winning restaurant but that didn't rip us off (and here the taxi driver chops his neck to indicate that it was reasonable), and the neighborhood family grill where the owner was the chef and didn't speak a word of English.
It was almost surreal, to be in South America, a continent I had wanted to visit for so long. It felt so markedly different from everywhere else we had been, which sounds like a silly statement, but this is considering that Ghana and South Africa actually had similar vibes to places in Asia. Argentina and Uruguay made me so determined to learn Spanish, and then we hit Brazil and of course now I know I need to learn Portuguese. This is a disastrous situation, considering the limits of time constraint and personal discipline, and ironic, considering that many of the nicest, most memorable moments were borne out of serendipity and the vulnerability that arises out of a language barrier. Someone needs to stage an intervention and cure me of this travel bug.
I'd like to do a detailed post of my thoughts regarding my experiences in each country, but for now I'll just say that while riding around the Montevideo promenade, it was crazy to think of how we had travelled by ship, train, taxi, bus, buggy (as in golf cart), bike, horse, ferry and car in just 5 days. The car is significant because it has been ages since we have actually been in someone's personal car instead of just a taxi, and if we had extended the time to Rio, I would have added in cable car. The varied experiences we can fit into a mere 3 or 4 days in port still astounds me. Time warps, with things that happened a few days back feeling like a generation ago, while things that happened months ago feeling like just yesterday.
23 days left. Time to make the best of our time on SAS.
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