| "So, you're Canadian, eh?"
Hi Christine:I'm Canadian too and am looking into visiting Uruguay with a long term view of perhaps taking up residency there. My first step was to find out as much as possible about the place. I read its history, novels etc.. This site has been helpful to a degree, the people who contribute seem especially nice. The downside is they tend to compare it to home, wherever that is, so if you're not familiar with life in the US, the UK, Aus, NZ etc., it's sometimes not clear what they're raving or ranting about. If you can already speak Spanish or intend on learning it would be a great advantage because all government information is in Spanish. It's not a bilingual country like Canada. I found that the Uruguayan consulate here in Montreal was very helpful and was able to respond in an excellent French. It's best to get information first hand. There's a consulate in TO and the embassy is in Ottawa. I've read a number of tourist guide books, in English, French and Spanish and found the Spanish ones to be more adventurous and took you outside of the worn paths made by most tourists: Guía Azul is recommendable. I already have my return ticket purchased, from American Airlines (the cheapest and most direct: Montreal - Maiami, Miami-Montevideo) for less than $1300 Cdn) to spend the month of November in Montevideo. I am presently checking the "Buscando Casas" real-estate site for sublets of furnished apartments for my stay as they are infinitely cheaper than staying in an hotel. As a Canadian, you don't need a special visa nor vaccinations. You can stay 90 days. To get residency, there's an excellent link in the menu on the left hand side of this page. If your looking for a language school to do an immersion, the London Institute has competitive prices, is Cervantes Institute approved, and offers interesting co-options with the National Hotelery and Culinary school plus specific courses geared to your interest: business, commerce, science, translation and so on. Though between you and me, you'd likely find a good private Spanish teacher in Toronto for a fraction of the price and have the basics down by the time you reached Uruguay. I've got a fellow here in Montreal who charges me $20 and hour. There are a lot of Spanish TV programs on cable TV, if not, there's rtve.es which is the Spanish equivalent of CBC which offers on-line Spanish programming for TV, radio etc.. It helps to get your ear accustomed to the sound of the language. And get yourself a good map of the country and Montevideo, where half of the population is. I found a good one published by International Travel Maps www.itmb.com or phone 604-273-1400 it's in Imperial and metric scales and though it cost me $12, 95, it's a fold out road style map with a helpful place index and the routes give the distance between cities in klms. If you familiarize yourself with place names, and their spatial location, you get a clear mental image of the country or the city so if someone speaks of Colonia, you know it's soutwest, near the Argentine border and close to Buenos Aires, other places are close to Brazil, or are on the Atlantic coast or on the coast of the Plata estuary. The city barrios or neighbourhoods tend to have fluid boundaries but the extreme east of the downtown is la Ciudad Vieja, the aeroport is in Carrasco and so on. Uruguay's surface area is a bit bigger than the three Maritime provinces put together, so even though it's one of the smallest countries in South America and smaller than it's neighbours it's not a postage stamp of a place. Montevideo has about 1.5 million people, which makes it about the size of Montreal, excluding the metropolitan region so it's not a huge metropolis. Are you retired? If so, there may be restrictions with how the federal government in Canada views your status if you're outside of the country for longer than 183 days a year in terms of taxable income or if you're a recipient of the O.A.S. You can find that out on the Canada Revenue Agency site: www.cra.gc.ca Anyway, good luck and I hope you find what you're looking for. |
