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| Why? |
Now there are the cardboard-on-grass tobogganers of
Montevideo, Uruguay.
During a recent visit we went for a walk along the Uruguayan
capital’s lovely coastline, which is scalloped with sandy beaches. It’s not the
best swimming, but people were out sunbathing, walking their dogs, jogging,
cycling, rollerblading, and...toboganning.
On cardboard boxes. On grassy slopes interrupted with stones.
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| Call Children's Aid |
And not drug addled
teenagers (we might have said “Hooray!”), but entire families dressed in decent
clothes (white slacks!?) and pulling out high-end digital cameras to take snaps
of all the almost fun.
But you can’t take too many snaps, Pops, because soon your
young son is kinda unhappy. He is bruised. He is beaten. Three runs in, and he’s
ready to call it quits.
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| Noooooooooooooooooo! |
This is not an isolated phenomenon. We saw three separate
groups in one area. They didn’t look stoned, and appeared by their affect and
manner of dress to be otherwise normally functioning humans.
We took some photos of the inevitable failures. The lack of
fun and the complete hopelessness of the endeavour itself seemed to be a source
of amusement.
Do they do this every weekend?
“Grab the cardboard boxes kids, we’re gonna go tobbogan on
some grass and rocks!”
Whereupon, after every outing, they return commenting on how
hard it was on their asses, and how you couldn’t really go that fast, or even move properly, and the cardboard tore
and...and the amnesia slowly, slowly sets in to smooth the way for the next
weekend’s attempt.
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| Hooked on Advil? |
We’re stumped. Montevideo is a charming city, with leafy
streets and a casual air (a Nike track suit town, as compared to Buenos Aires’Adidas). The people are gregarious, and by all accounts stop on red lights and
do not wander into traffic.
Could it be a form of post-Catholic, bourgeois
self-flagellation, a la “The Pope may be an Argentine, but God is a Uruguayan”,
or the 63 year world cup drought?
We’ll likely never know.
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| Happy at first |
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| Dude...Bad idea! |
Twitter: @TimothyEWilson
Email: lapoliticaeslapolitica [at] gmail [dot] com
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Hell, me and my buddies were doing this back in the 50's in Montreal on the sides of highway overpasses. The danger wasn't the rocks, it was in not being able to stop before sliding onto the road.
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