Here’s an interesting video discussing how those living abroad tend to be more creative- possibly tied to language skills and adaptation. Interesting studies!
“People who live abroad are more creative; and the more time they spend away from home, the more creative they become. Thats according to a recent study done by William Maddux, an assistant professor of organisational behavior at INSEAD.“
I needed to view and approve samples for work, but they were 6000 miles away in Minnesota. I weighed my options: FedEx and UPS were quoting in the $160-200 USD range to get a 2 kilo box to uruguay. I thought that was insane and was determined to find a better way. Mail would be cheap, but there is a hell of an ordeal to claim your package at the Correo Central and pay aduana (taxes) if necessary- plus stories of packages never arriving and I couldn’t take that chance. I decided on Miami-Box.
Miami-Box is a parcel forwarding service between Miami, FL and Uruguay. Set up a free account on their website and you get a unique address to send packages to in Miami. This is a great solution for items purchased online or gifts from family and friends. Once a package arrives for you in Miami, you are notified via email and you have a few options depending on the purchase price of the package: if under $100 USD, you can opt to pick up your package at the airport and handle the aduana (taxes) yourself (with Miami-Box supplying the paperwork for you), or you can opt for full service delivery, with your credit card on file being billed for the aduana and delivery fees. I decided on the latter and it was so convenient. Not necessarily inexpensive, but convenient.
My little 2 kilo package cost me $99.60 on a $30 retail value. A little painful, but still cheap in comparison to what UPS or FedEx were quoting. The fees were broken down as follows (all in USD):
Airline freight from Miami (based on weight) $27.00
Aduana Taxes (based on retail value of $30 + freight of $27.00) $36.00
Delivery (optional) $15.00
Handling $15.00
Administrative fees $6.60
___________________________
Grand total of $99.60 USD
The package arrived within 5 days, in one piece and hand delivered to my door. I will try priority mail next time for comparisons sake. The correspondence with Miami-Box throughout the process, as well as the delivery were all extremely professional. I would certainly recommend their service.
*As noted on the Miami-Box site, books and magazines are not taxed to bring into Uruguay. I will definitely use Miami-Box in the future for that purpose. They are also offering 60 magazines without the normal subscription cost for a limited time. Please see their site for details.
Except in Uruguay, it is a physical location and not an online ‘for sale’ ad.
You can find any assortment of thing for sale at these remates (or auction houses). There are everything from antiques, to rugs, small appliances, farm equipment, architectural salvage and even cars. Yes, you can even buy ‘normal’ furniture and housewares, which is a great resource for an expat trying to set up a household here.
One of the best remates that I know of is Castells. I’ve been told this remate is most often frequented by Uruguayos, and as such, is not as expensive as some of the extranjero remates.
Castells is located at Galicia 1069. It’s about a 10 minute cab ride from the Pocitos/Punta Carretas area. The main furniture sale is every Tuesday at 2 PM. When I’ve been there, this sale has been very informal and in a large back room. The front main auction room is full of antiques and fine art pieces, with everyone sitting down and was what you’d envision of a ”civilized” auction. The back room was with everyone standing, crowded around a given piece of furniture and the auctioneer on a small podium. You can visit early on Tuesday or on any other day to see the sale items ahead of time. Occasionally the rooms for the separate sales are reversed, so keep your eyes open.
There are other rooms as well, one upstairs and another in a garage area, full of items that sell on different days. Some is household goods and small appliances (upstairs) and outside has everything from architectural artifacts, to farm equipment to cars and all sorts of random junk.
There are no numbers or paddles for bidding, you just raise your hand. If you are the highest bidder, someone will come over to you and take your information and a deposit on the piece (30% of the sale price). You get a receipt and can pay the balance and pick up your purchase the same day or within 24 hours.
A few notes before you hit the remate:
Even if you’re not in the market for new stuff, the remates are a great place to go and experience a part of Uruguayan culture. Have fun!
Missing some of your favorite shows back in your home country? We’re not huge TV fanatics (we didn’t get cable or DirecTV hooked up the moment we landed in Uruguay, but I sprung for rabbit ears at the grocery store US$3) however we like to watch a few things like 30 Rock, House and an occasional sporting event in the States and elsewhere. The best access to these shows and many others is video stream via your computer. To access most video streams you have to be in the country where the program airs. Hulu, NBC.com, Fancast, CBS.com, and NFL.com all require that you live in the US to watch their broadcasts. Shows are typically available within 24 hours of their original air date. The problem is their websites know where you live; they will pick up your computer’s IP address and say “Hey, wait a second, you don’t live in America. You don’t help pay the bills through buying from our advertisers.” I argue the contrary, but it will deny you access. What you need is a solution to convince Hulu and others that you are in the US or UK, Canada, even if you’re in South America, Europe, Asia or Timbuktu.
The solution is StrongVPN. Love it! I can establish a virtual connection to the States, in our case. Currently, we’re “in” Washington D.C. I’ve found that it has the best/fastest connection for the best video streams. After following a quick step by step tutorial from StrongVPN you will automatically be able to connect with one click any time you want to stream video. It will slow down your connection a little bit but generally it’s fantastic.
The plan I recommend for most users is the 3 City Special PPTP US$55/year plan. It gives you access to San Francisco, New York & UK. I use the Lite Open and PPTP plan. It’s US$90 per year. It just gives me access to more cities and connection options. If you have a connection that’s not particularly fast one day to can switch to another. You’re allowed to change cities/servers 3 to 5 times per month without charge. You can also upgrade and downgrade without extra setup fees.
I have watched: various TV shows, NFL games (just caught the Giants/Dallas game) US Open Golf (it was a perfect Live stream in near Hi Def quality) The British and US Tennis Opens and many more.
Connect to StrongVPN and go to Hulu.com, NBC.com or where ever your program is available. Most of the video sites look like Tivo or YouTube. Use Firefox 3 as your browser. I’ve tried with Google’s Chrome and Internet Explorer 8, but Firefox is the best. Once you queue up your show, let it buffer for a little bit. Definition: Give the “Internets” a little time to load the show into the viewer. For Hulu, you will see a buffer gauge of one to five bars just like your mobile phone. The more bars the better. Once it gets to about 3 or 4 bars you’re usually safe to hit play. Sometimes you need to wait to 5 bars to get a good uninterrupted quality video stream. Hulu, Fancast, etc. usually run a 15-30 second ad every 10 minutes or so–a lot fewer commercials than you find on TV. The commercials are almost worth watching, since the advertisers don’t have the FCC breathing down their neck on the Internet. The ads might screw up the buffer, so you may need to pause the show for a minute. Once you’re buffered up again, you’re ready for your TV enjoying experience.
Quick Recap of what you need:
StrongVPN: Other Cool Stuff
Pandora
Get Your Music Fix. Another little bonus is streaming music from Pandora.com. It’s closed outside the US, but thanks to my US IP address; I’m able to listen to 30 hours free per month. There is an alternative, Last.fm. It’s US$3/month to stream music without a US IP address. Although very much like Pandora–Pandora has a better mix of songs in my opinion. There are also some radio stations for both talk and music that are only available to US listeners. The stream quality of music is excellent and there is no notable difference compared to my experience in the States.
US Website Access
The reason I first looked into StrongVPN was to convince regular websites that I’m in the States. Since I operate a travel company, I need to shop the competition. I can’t have Expedia or Priceline thinking that I’m in Uruguay when I want them to believe I’m in the US. The sites are different abroad and you can’t always select a US version. I’ve also heard reports from Expats of rejected transactions by Amazon, PayPal , etc. even though their billing address is in the US provided through Earth Class Mail, family, or other residence. By using StrongVPN these sites always assume I’m in the US. It’s been great and is a small cost of doing business.
Email:
My email messages are less likely to go to spam folders when sent from a US IP address. It’s kind of important that my clients receive my emails. ¿No?
Poor man’s solution:
I do have a workaround, which is particularly helpful for live events that are not available online. I like to watch the Vikings. I can’t find a free stream online, so I’ve had my Dad fix his webcam on a TV in his office where we usually Skype. We start a Skype Video call and I am able to watch the whole game. The quality isn’t perfect, but last week I was able to watch Brett Favre rip his old team the Packers on Monday Night Football. It was glorious.
I’ve tried several solutions and StrongVPN has been the best and serves the purpose of both business and pleasure. I’d love to hear any other solutions people have for watching their favorite shows while living or traveling abroad. Please add your comments.
Spring in Montevideo is coming in fits and starts this year. Cold and rainy one day, 70 degrees the next. I’m amazed at how quickly time here is passing and we’re keeping busy with lots of different activities.
Dia del Patrimonio was a great family day. We went to Ciudad Vieja’s Plaza Matriz and toured Club Uruguayo (Uruguay’s most prestigious private social club, founded in 1878), the Cathedral of Montevideo and the Spanish Embassy on Sunday. All were very beautiful old buildings, with the Embassy being an eclectic mix of traditional and austere contemporary architecture. We wanted to get out and see more places on Saturday, but we had a spring festival on the farm with the preschool class, so we were otherwise occupied with kids, animals and lots of food. Saturday was the nicer of the two days so I was happy that was our day outside. Sunday was cold and rainy and a perfect day to dash from one building to another, which is exactly what we did.
We’re busy planing our trip back to the USA in December and all of the festivities there. Early December brings us our little girl’s second birthday and a baby shower for my sister-in-law and first niece. Later in the month we celebrate Christmas with multiple families and try to equally split our time, which is not always easy. We fly back to MVD on the 28th, which happens to be on the same flight as another family we know who is moving here! We are so excited and can’t wait to have them join us in this fair city.
This past Saturday we went to our first wedding in Uruguay!! It was a beautiful church ceremony- very formal and very late. The invitation stated a start time of 8:30 PM. We were advised not to get there before 9 PM, and the ceremony started at about 9:15. A few differences: there were no attendants, no ushers, no programs. We also learned that it’s customary for there to be two or even three sets of invitations sent out: one to the ceremony only, one to the reception and sometimes one to the after-reception. Receptions usually last until dawn or later. We went to the ceremony only- but had a great dinner out afterwards by ourselves at a funky little restaurant/interior design studio called Innove.
As if we don’t have enough going on, we’ve been in our house for 6 months and are already thinking of the lease end. A unique opportunity has presented itself and we are weighing our options. A family that we know and love is moving to the USA for a year, and renting out their house here in Montevideo. It’s in the Cordon neighborhood, and is close to the jardín, hospital we belong to and many other services. This is an area we have been considering for our next house here, but since it is not the “normal” expat/tourist areas of Pocitos or Punta Carretas, the furnished rentals are very limited. This house is furnished and quite a bit larger than our current house for hopefully about the same monthly rent. Brad and I could each have private offices within the house! The lease terms don’t quite match up so we all need to talk more- but it’s an exciting prospect!
I’m definitely feeling some of the ups and downs of life in Uruguay. The longer we are here and the more we learn, the more we like some aspects of life here and dislike others. That’s true with any place I suppose. Some days I am really homesick (mostly for how “easy” it is to exist in a place you know well) but I do like Montevideo. This is a unique place with unique people that can’t seem to understand why we would want to come to tiny Uruguay “just because”.