Almost Christmas

Back in the U.S., the commercial frenzy that comes with Christmas began before Thanksgiving. Here, I am having trouble remembering what month it is. The reverse of seasons from the northern hemisphere plus the lack of hubbub about Christmas makes it easy for me to forget that it is December. Yesterday, however, was my Christmas. Our container arrived at the house.

The MSC Dresden container ship had come into port on the 28th of November, only slightly behind schedule. The journey from Baltimore to Montevideo, with many stops in between, was scheduled to take 22 days. Several days before the ship arrived, we contacted a despachante de aduana (customs broker) to get our things through Aduana (customs) and out of the port. What followed was a highly stressful debacle that seemed destined to end with us not being able to even claim our things, no matter what kind of deposit we put down. Then we found someone competent. Our new despachante de aduana whisked our container through the labyrinthine clearing process and had it delivered to our door exactly one week from the day we staggered, nearly hopeless, into his office. Everything worked out exactly as he said it would.

So in the 40 minutes it took us and two friends to unload the container, we went from a camping lifestyle to North American abundance. I did not really miss the stuff while we were without it, by oh my, is it nice to have after doing without it for a month. This little chacra feels down right luxurious to me now. And while opening boxes I felt like a kid again on Christmas morning.