South America’s Best-kept Secret!

I’ve been 20 years in South America and never knew Uruguay has such beautiful places! (haven’t been north yet, which is apparently a little more “rustic”😁).  

The wealthier part of Montevideo, where Don and Kathie live, is very nice.  They live 6 blocks from the waterfront.  I can’t get over how not security-conscious they are…makes me nervous, coming from Argentina where you’d get your cell phone whipped out your hand if you have it out in the open.  Here they walk along brandishing their phones with no fear! (I have been told you wouldn’t do that out in the poorer areas…hmmm won’t take my chances either way).  

So now, we have come to “Maldonado”.  A town I have heard of for many years (due to their being quite a few of our friends here), and always pictured it as a poorish country town with nothing much going for it.  Well.  Look at it!

This was looking out the bus window on the way. About a two hour bus ride from Montevideo, going east.  I was instantly converted to Uruguay ❤️.  The sea!!

So, this is the holiday destination for the rich and famous from Argentina.  A small peninsula attached to Maldonado, called “Punta del Este” (East Point) is the destination of choice, due to the golden sand and extensive beaches.  It has a big marina where all sorts of luxury boats are moored, and high rise building after high rise building…hate to think of what the pandemic did there.  They depend on tourism for their livelihoods.  They are starting to recover but the wealthy Argentinians aren’t so wealthy anymore, so there will be a downturn.

Arriving into Maldonado, Punta del Este in the distance.  Note the whale tail…it’s common to sight whales in the spring.

Rolling countryside of Uruguay.  These would be the highest hills you’d see here.

Apartments and hotels for as far you can see!!  Punta del Este

These high-rise buildings are all built on a fairly small surface area, looks like a massive city, but it’s not!  Lots of our friends here are employed in the high summer season when all the tourists come, which is pretty much 7 days a week, then work is quite scarce for the rest of the year.  Some of them have come to live here from the north of the country and they come from families that have had the influence of the gospel in their lives for generations.  The rest of them are first generation, and have interesting stories as to how they came in touch.

This is Noemí (Naomi).  Her parents were amongst the first to hear and respond to the gospel in this eastern part of Uruguay.  For years it was just them and a couple of others faithfully living the truth.  She grew up going to to meetings, but wasn’t really wanting to committ to it, yet at the same time never really cut off contact completely.  She married, and had a new-born baby when her husband was tragically killed in a vehicle accident.  That took a big toll on her of course, and she started going more frequently, but never committed to it until after she married her 2nd husband, Andrés.  However, during all those years, she would invite people to the meetings.  She had a little mini-market type shop, and a man called Carlos would deliver fruit and veg.  One day in conversation he told her he was looking for something more than his church, so she told him where the Sunday am mtg was!  He got the time wrong and turned up just as everyone was leaving.  José Ramos one of the workers was there and spoke to him, but he never returned.  Until 10 years later!  In that interim many things had happened, but when he came back again, he and his wife Adriana made their choices to serve God.  They live on a market garden farm, and have the annual mtgs and special meetings at their home.  Carlos professed before Noemí, and he would talk to her strongly encouraging her to do something about her own salvation! 

                                  Buying fresh fish at the harbour

                              Gus finding some fat, lazy friends

                                          Yum seafood for sale

Walking down the marina where the world’s wealthy have their yachts

                                                Not hard to take!!

This is Susana and her daughter Rebecca.  Susana also had a little shop like a small supermarket.  These kind of shops are fairly common here as a lot of people don’t have vehicles so they just walk to the local grocery shop in the neighbourhood.  So the aforementioned Carlos also delivered veges to her.  She was super-religious in a pentecostal type church.  She would faithfully trot off to church every week with her 9 kids!  Carlos was now professing, and he told her about the meetings.  So this time she trotted off to the gospel meeting with her 9 kids! (Rebecca is the eldest.  She was about 16 at the time).  Imagine the sight of that big family coming into the gospel meeting!  Carlos would go and pick all these people up in his car, as Susana lived on the smell of an oily rag.  (But still gave all the kids money for the church offering each week).  So they’d go to the gospel meeting, then that night they would trot off to the church.  The church services would go on for hours, full of noise and hallelujahs.  All of a sudden Rebecca turned very rebellious and decided she was NOT going to the church anymore.  She wasn’t a disobedient daughter as a rule, so it took Susana by surprise! And there was nothing she could do to change that.  Rebecca mutinously refused to go so off they went and she stayed home.  The following week her other siblings started refusing to go as well.  

At the age of 22 Rebecca had a little baby and was living with the baby’s father, a man who had been married and was a lot older than herself. She already had a daughter, Abigail, from a previous relationship.   They lived in another seaside town Rocha, further east than Maldonado.  They owned a very busy bakery together, but she felt this huge need and ache in her heart.  The workers went to have meetings for her, and they had quite a mission in the bakery.  Rebecca and her partner Walter professed, and there were lots of locals who came, and some of them professed (of the group that did profess, there is just Rebecca and Walter, a d another lady who have continued).  Rebecca wanted to be baptised, and knew her living situation wasn’t right in the eyes of God.  After much agonising about it, she took the costly decision to separate from Walter.  She still cries as she tells of her pain as she walked away, and went back to her mother’s home.  We have a hymn in Spanish which has the theme of leaving behind the old life to walk with God.  One of the verses of that hymn came to her in a very real and for her personal way, and helped her to keep going… translated it says “Be like Rebecca, who left everthing behind - All that she loved with her whole heart.  And she began a long journey, because she believed and obeyed God.”  That decision cost her a lot of misunderstandings and hardships…but she stuck to it.  Still lives with her mother, and that little boy is now 22.  Her daughter Abigail is a lovely young mum, married to a South African called André Wise.  Andre lived and worked for some time in Uruguay years ago, but the couple now live inSweden.  He has a sister in the work, Jestine, who last year went to work on the Argentine staff.  Walter has had his ups and downs, his “on and offs”, but it’s nice to see him coming to the meetings of late, an elderly man now.  He takes part on Sunday mornings, and has a real spirit of gratitude and thankfulness.

Of Susana’s 9 children, Rebecca, and another daughter Ana, and her husband Victor are professing.  Her daughter-in-law Andrea too.  Susana also brought a lady, Celica, from her old church, who professed. Rebecca is always inviting people to the meetings!

A curious feature of this eastern part of Uruguay, are these houses with thatched rooves…they look very much like old English country houses from the Cotswolds or something.

Alberto and Bettina de Abreu.  Alberto is from one of those families that heard the gospel many years ago from the north of the country.  There are two main families whose descendants are part of our fellowship today, and also most of the native Uruguayan workers are descended from them.  De Abreu and Barrientos are common surnames amongst our friends.  If they’re not related to one they’re related to the other…and sometimes both!  Interestingly Uruguay has a very small population (3.5 million) but it has produced a lot of workers over the years.  Anyway Alberto brought Bettina to mtgs, she’s the only one in her family.  They have one of the Sunday fellowship mtgs in their home.

Don’t get to do this in Argentina!  This area is not far from where the River Plate meets with the Atlantic Ocean.  Alberto and Bettina took us to Whale Point to see the sunset…what a treat!  Whales are often sighted here in the spring…watch this space!

Shifting house was never like this in NZ! 😁 Alberto and Bettina live at the front of the property and his cousin Eduardo and wife Graciela live at the back.  So instead of loading up the gospel chariot, just pass your backpack out the window to Gus who puts it in the next bedroom 😆

There’s someone parked down the end of our street! Cruise ship season has been very welcomed by the people here who suffered by lack of them in the pandemic.

                                      Out at Carlos and Adriana’s market garden