Right across from the bus terminal in Punta Del Este at Parada 1, Bravo Beach, is ” The Hand.”
It is difficult not to see the outside beach sculpture if you are anywhere near it. The” Hand” is only the tips of three fingers and a thumb rising out of the sand, but the fingers motion to you to come closer.
This sculpture was created in 1982 by a Chilean sculptor Mario Irarrazabel as part of an art competition and it wasn’t, at first, his most favored project.
It has remained here, since then, intact.
The fingers rise out of the sand higher than most people stand.
The art work has been called “Men Emerging to Life,” “Monument of the Fingers,” “Monument to the Drowned,” “The Hand.” The artist didn’t like the third title much, according to Wikipedia, but once your works are on their own you can’t say much about how they are received and what is done to them.
This afternoon visitors pose, touch the fingers and hang out.
One morning, the Hand might rise from the sand a bit more, exposing its massive wrist.
We would then need a ladder to climb up to pose for our picture sitting in the huge open palm. .
From any angle I look, I can see that the ” Hand ” will always be a manicurist’s dream job.
Artists always make us pay attention when we start to drift into numbing routine.
I haven’t been to Greek islands but they must be similar to this place.
Following the Rambla past the port, past expensive homes, you reach the end of the Punta Del Este peninsula. At the end is a parking lot with exercise equipment, two mermaids, a flagpole with a Uruguayan flag flying, and an old man standing perilously close to incoming waves as he tries to fish rough waters while a friend watches.
These two mermaids are made from a concrete mix but they have been damaged. The tail of one has been severed from her body. There are limbs missing from both .
The statues look alive from a distance and you have to watch to make sure they aren’t moving to realize they are just sculptures. You can walk up to them and that is their problem. It doesn’t take much alcohol for someone to get carried away and vent frustration on two Goddesses who can’t fight back because a workman has anchored their tails in concrete.
The two old men fishing are being bold. Wind is kicking up waves and the one who is fishing is very close to being caught in one and becoming whisked out to sea.
At the end of land, I look for Neptune to rise out of the water with his seaweed fouled trident and demand to know what offerings I am making.
I haven’t been to Greek islands but it is easy to see how they came to have Gods and Goddesses.
There are forces in this universe we don’t control.
Building temples and worshiping God’s is not a bad precaution.
The Rambla is a good place to walk.
On this morning’s jaunt, I come across a table and chairs out in the surf. The narrow path out to a concrete table and concrete chairs, in the midst of waves, turns into temptation.
Making sure my Passport is buttoned up, my cell phone is buttoned up, the keys to my hotel room are in my front shirt pocket, buttoned up, I take a side trip. The table looks inviting, surrounded by water, waves crashing to make a sound that drains out all other sounds.
It is shaky walking over metal planks that make the first part of the path. Water moves underneath, triggering thoughts of pirates walking the plank and knowing, as they walk off with a pistol pointed at their back, that being able to swim ain’t going to save their life.
Once over the iron barnacle encrusted planks, the going is easy, just climbing a few stone algae covered stone steps and finishing by taking a seat at the little concrete table out in the water.
It is relaxing being in the eye of a hurricane.
This is what a conductor must hear in front of an orchestra.
I am way down Alice’s rabbit hole.
My bus arrives at two fifteen in the afternoon in Punta Del Este and one of the bus cleaners finds my hat and brings it out to me at a taxi stand which is unbelievably kind.
A taxi driver pulls up quickly, loads me and my stuff, and whisks us all to the Hotel Playa Brava which is only a short cab ride from the bus terminal.
Unpacked and checked in at my new home, I take a short stair climb to the observation deck on the hotel roof.
The surf is just blocks away.The sky is blue, lighter than the blue water, diffused with light, clear, endless. Water stretches to the horizon where it meets sky and the line there is like a wall meeting a floor.
The owner of the Hotel Playa Brava, Juan Carlos, told me, in English, about a tourist bus I can take to see Punta Del Este sights as well as the famous sunset at Casa Vilaro.
This city is another room in the Uruguay mansion and it is light, airy, and contemporary.
From this rooftop I can see what pirate’s saw from their crows nest, scanning the horizon for land, hoping for ships flying Spanish flags filled with gold and silver.
While I’m not likely to find gold and silver here, except dangling on tourists necks, I am pleased to be in a place for real that used to be just an internet vacation dream.
Being from the desert, water always gets my full attention.
Punta Del Este, moving into its tourist season, is a movie set waiting for a movie crew.
It is hard to find fault with beach towns full of light, openness, a relaxed attitude and water in every direction, at the end of every street. This morning a few souls are on a little beach at the end of the street from Hotel Playa. The beach is named Emir Playa after a local family.
In Montevideo, streets are narrow and buildings tower like giants looking down shaking their fingers at those of us who dare to move without the proper password. Here, I can breath.
Going from the big city to the beach feels like ditching a heavy jacket and changing into a pair of swim trunks.
This is a reputed playground for the rich and well connected but the season hasn’t started yet and I’m one of the few out walking today.
Whether I will be viewed by others on the street, as rich and famous, is unlikely, but how exactly do you tell a person is rich by looking at them in just their swimming trunks? When you strip away all their jewelry, clothes, cars, perfumes, makeup, how do you really know that who you think you see is really how they are?
I expect to be seen as a senior tourista, healthy enough to walk, not on a schedule, with enough time and money, in the correct proportions, to see the world, going where the winds blow me.
How people see us, strangely enough, is quite often how we actually are.
Reading between the lines is, apparently, not as difficult as it first seems.
The Rambla is a paved course way that runs from Ciudad Vieja to Pocitos and beyond.
It runs along the sea where humans go to walk and talk, show themselves off to the world, build sand castles on the beach. There are animals, bike riders, skateboarders, old couples, young families, and tourists strolling and playing here this morning.
Buildings along the beach in Pocitos are unimaginative as if beaches all over the world have been given up to developers who see things only in cost per square foot and know instinctively that boxes are the cheapest and quickest geometric forms to build.
A dog chases a Frisbee thrown for him onto the incoming waves.
When he comes out of the sea, he brings his Frisbee back to his human companion and refuses to let go of it, shaking his head and keeping the toy from an outstretched hand.
His human wrestles the Frisbee out of his dog’s mouth and then throws it back into the surf. to keep the game going. The dog chases it again, happy as a clam.
Dogs have a good handle on what they need.
Getting your master to love you is their ultimate prize and catching and bringing back a frisbee seems a small price to pay for love.
South Beach is like beaches in the Caribbean.
The sand is white and grainy and blue beach umbrellas blow in the wind like the tops of stir sticks in one’s Pina Colada.
Some brave souls wade in the water even though it is cold this time of year. Bodies are spread under the sun trying to become a different color than they were born. This Saturday afternoon there is plenty of beach to occupy and lifeguards are so nonchalant that one has his feet up in the window of the lifeguard shack, his eyes looking at the plywood ceiling instead of the ocean.
A walk on the beach hooks me up with couples, kids, turistas, gawkers, and local vendors like Dave the water guy making a living off strangers who have washed up on shore and have credit cards and cash stowed away in their socks and bras.
It is a festive scene, and, as a small plane pulls an advertisement in the sky behind it, I trek up and down the beach in levis and a pair of hiking boots – feeling a little overdressed.
There are photo op’s galore.
The one, not taken advantage of, is a Latina sprawled on the beach, topless, tanned, not at all worried about nipple burn. She is bold and is probably one of the few to have a good enough physique to get away with wanting the world to see all of her. Her girlfriend, tanning next to her, looks mean enough to scare the junkyard dog.
Walking this afternoon, I have come, have seen, and have been conquered by narcissism bleeding like a cut finger.
I am a tourist with no responsibilities, no ambitions, and no agenda except blending in like the ingredients of your favorite margarita.
There is much concern in this country about skin damage.
There is, on this beach, a lot of skin that will be damaged and this is a perfect poster for a Dermatology convention in Miami Beach.
Two big bodies are prone on the sand, turning their backs to the world and telling it to go to hell.They have claimed their part of the beach but there is still room left for the rest of us on a day like today.
The sun is warm, the breezes are cooling.
What else would one want to do on a balmy afternoon than lay on the sand and show the world their best side?
Catching a taxi to the beach is the quickest way to get there from the Hotel Element.
For thirty bucks each way, I get a local taxi drivers music, pictures of his familia swinging from the rear view mirror, a few questions in Spanish to see if i speak his language, a driving style that saves time for phone calls, deciding which horse race to bet, or checking in with Baby Mama.
“Ocean Drive is over there.” Raul says as he turns a corner and pulls into a parking pullout not far from the Atlantic ocean.There is a green belt parallel to the ocean with sand paths leading through palm trees to the beach. The green belt also has walkways for casual strolling, roller blades and bicycles.
“If you go one block that way you hit Collins Street, ” Raul instructs me. “The food is cheaper there , because, you know, it isn’t close to the ocean.”
Raul taps his finger in the air as he talks, like he is conducting a salsa symphony.
Leaving the cab, I hike down Ocean Drive, immersed in Art Deco architecture that you find in Miami Beach, Havana, Los Angeles, all warm places on an ocean’s edge.
According to Wikipedia, Art Deco is famous for eyebrows, rounded corners, flat roofs, themes in threes, banding or racing stripes, columns, glass blocks, etched glass and portholes.
Enjoying a place I never planned to be, on someone else’s dime, is looking like more than traveler’s luck.
Why I am here, and not somewhere else, is always an enigma wrapped in a conundrum?
It isn’t fifteen minutes until my toes are in the ocean.
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