Date of Entry: May 5th 2016

Date of Writing:  July 19th 2016,  Mameluco Hostel, Olinda, Brazil

This will be a short post.  But a valuable one for anyone planning to make the journey into brazil from northern Uruguay. It’s not a happy post.  It wasn’t a good experience.  And really it was my first notably negative experience with people from south america in almost two years travelling across the continent (So yes south america is awesome.)  It’s worth noting that the behaviour in this post is not reflective of Uruguayan people, much to the contrary, all the others I met have been kind warm people and I will look back fondly on my time in Uruguay, except for when it came time to leave with Lydia  and enter Brazil, the south american behemoth famous for beaches, samba, good food, the amazon, beautiful women and also corruption.  Granted I’ve been to Brazil back in December, but only to visit iguazu falls, so even if this night turns terible at least underneath the frustration is an excitement akin to the thrill i feel at seeing a new country.

At any rate, here’s the story and I’l try to be brief since I prefer to be positive about travel.  We leave our lovely hostel in Punta del diablo around 730 to catch a one hour local bus to the border stop where we will catch a bus to porto alegre which we have booked with the help of the hostel to be picked up at the border.  It is due to cross the border at about midnight, but on the advice of the hostel staff we decide being early is better safe then sorry, besides I always have fun hanging out at border checkpoints.

Everything goes smoothly at first and we arrive at the border just before 9.  We head inside the offices with smiles on our faces, Lydia and I joined by two friendly canadian guys who’ve been travelling together in south america for a good few months, one of them who reminds of once feature artist with my rap group the Authentics.  Brendan Monahan.   And believe it or not they went to Queen’s university in my home town.

We get inside and are promptly told that we cant clear the border until our bus arrives.  The tone of the immigration officer is a little gruff, but no big deal, Lydia and I let him know in Spanish that it’s no big deal and we’re happy to wait, and the four of us put our bags down beside a row of chairs and move to take a seat. That’s when it gets weird.

We are immediately and very angrily told that we absolutely cannot wait inside the offices, and are given no reason other than they are busy and have work to do.  Normally this wouldn’t be a problem but it’s dipping towards 0 degrees outside and we have hours to wait. I try explaining that with  smile on my face sure that the man will let his south american nature emerge but no such luck.  We are kicked out onto the dark street surrounded by friendly but sick and constantly peeing stray dogs, and quickly getting quite cold.

We all resolve to make the best of it and chat and play with our technology and try to relax and wait for the bus as the immigration officers do their very important work on the other side of he glass.  This work quickly becomes drinking beer, watching futbol, yelling at eachother, and eventually cooking up amazing smelling meat on the barbecue. This is all fine and typical south american behaviour, except normally we’d be invited inside to partake and enjoy, or at least not be left outside where we are getting colder and colder and more and more annoyed by the minute.  They aren’t even using the section of the building where wed first tried to take a seat.  Bit by bit we are losing our minds as the dogs become more and more annoying.  I’m getting to the point where I’m going to go say something stupid to these guys (I should note it seemed like there was one ringleader, the supervisor, who wanted nothing to do with us and the others just went along with it) and it doesn’t matter where you are in the world, losing your temper with border guards is never a good idea.  Instead of losing it, I excuse myself put on music and go for a long walk under the incredible stars back into uruguay. Maybe the countries just mad at me for leaving so soon.

At any rat eI eventually return, apologizing to my friends that they’ve undoubtedly heard me singing as i walked, and then we get another nice surprise.  Apparently we’re no longer allowed to hang out on this side of the outside area and they’ve decided they want us further away, where there are no chairs and even less shelter from the wind.  Great.  And now we’re figuring out that the bus is going to be late, at least an hour, and it’s only getting colder.

We tough it out, glad that it’s three canadians and a bavarian to brave the night time chill (not canadian cold but hell I’m way out of practice).  Eventually the bus arrives just over two hours late and we give our passports to the bus driver to get our exit stamps before boarding the thankfully heated bus, our teeth chattering and goosebumps all over.

I’m immensely thankful I don’t have to go deal with the people, because I’m not sure I’d be able to hold my tongue.  But sometimes travel sucks, and sometimes people are assholes.  And tomorrow’s a new day, and a new country.  And it’s going to be absolutely unbelievable.  Stay tuned and sorry for the lack of pictures on this entry, I think if i’d tried to take any I’d still be locked deep in the bowels of a Uruguayan Prison.

So in the end what’s the lesson?  I’m not sure there is one barring the obvious try to avoid having to spend any time at this border crossing, lest you meet the first truly rude (to me) South Americans I have met in two years on this wonderful continent.