Photography / Travel

My Montevideo Meanderings

Aug 08, 2017 742 views No Comments

To meander unplanned through a city is to enter on a voyage of fresh discovery. On that journey you discover anything that your senses and your mind are open to. My stroll through Montevideo today was one such experience. Walking for several hours from the port market in the old town along Sarandi pedestrian street, I arrived at the Ciudadela Gate, which marks the transition from old walled city to the city modern. The shop and restaurant owners were just setting everything up when i wandered through the impressive iron structure of the port market, coincidentally manufactured in Union Foundry machine shops of Liverpool and set up in 1868. Foreign imports once passed through here but is now a dining and cultural centre for people’s enjoyment.

So, back to the Ciudadela gate. This is all that remains of the old ten metre high wall, demolished in the latter half of the nineteenth century. Two gates were closed at sunset and opened at sunrise, with a cannot shot announcing the fact. If you got there late you could not check in, and were left to the mercy of beasts of the night.

From the gate I just kept on going, straight, along the same main thoroughfare, Avenida 18 de Julio passing several incarnations of the twin antichrist, McDonald’s and Burger King, hoping in vain for Starbucks or Costa. In the end I settled for a tall cappucino in a French style cafe, which was much more atmospheric than aforementioned chain coffee shops. In fact there was something about the whole walk today which reminded me of Paris. It is obviously very different in many ways too, but the squares and long boulevards, the kiosks, had me in mind of the French capital on a dull autumn day. The most impressive square, Plaza Independencia, is a vast space, considered the most important open area in Montevideo. There were organised visits, groups of school children listening to history talks, couples taking selfies, and an assortment of vagrants and vagabonds muttering to themselves on the benches around the outside.

For me the highlight of most cities is in its street art, not its major monuments. This can be deliberately created art or views that turn into art before your eyes. Shabby chic, gloriously delapidated buildings are just one such example. They are the thing that makes Havana a photographer’s dream. Or a simple shot that becomes art by simply turning it from colour into black and white or sepia. Montevideo has these shots in abundance. Anyway, enough chattering away or I will end up on a bench next to those vagrants and vagabonds. These are the photos from my Montevideo meander. I will talk in another post about my visit to the museum dedicated to survivors and victims of the 1972 Andes plane crash, inspiration for the film Alive.

Words and photos by Si @cre8ivation

The Ciudadela Gate